01624 – The Vine & Branches Metaphor
O'Day, Gail R.

The communal life envisioned in the vine metaphor raises a strong challenge to contemporary Western models of individual autonomy and privatism.

At the heart of the Johannine model is social interrelationship and corporate accountability. The vine and branches metaphor exhorts the community to steadfastness in its relationship to Jesus, a steadfastness that is measured by the community’s fruits (vv. 4-5).

To bear fruit–that is, to act in love–is a decidedly corporate act. It is “rooted” in Jesus’ love for the community (v. 9) and issues in the community’s embrace of that love as the central commandment of its own life (vv. 10, 12, 17).

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