Please read the passage before the homily.
“I am the true vine and my Father is the vine grower.” It is said that in many places, lemon growers graft lemon branches onto orange trees rather than growing lemon trees from seed. Jesus has grafted us onto the vine that is himself. If Jesus is the vine and we the branches, it us because Jesus has inserted us into himself who is the vine.
We are Christ by reason of our baptism. We are children of God by reason of our baptism. By reason of our human nature, we are not God, but God has adopted us into God’s divine life. As long as we remain in this life, we have God’s life in us.
The totality of the vine and the branches has many twists and turns. If Jesus is the vine and we the branches, then as long as we remain in Jesus, he remains in us. Jesus became like the air in which we live, and which is outside of us at the same time. It is a two-way street: we live in Christ and Christ lives in us. Jesus is both within us and around us. He is like the air which is both within us and around us. Jesus is both within us and outside us. He is within us, and we are within him.
We give glory to the Father when we bear much fruit. We are in reality like a flea on an elephant that has stomped over the ground while the flea claims the honor. God, like the elephant, has done all the work while we claim the honor for ourselves.
We are grafted into the life of God. We have the same DNA that God has. We are God’s chosen and choice ones. God is our inheritance. We exist for the glory and honor of God: our relationship with God is no small thing.
In English the saying, “I am the vine” rhymes with “I am divine”. Jesus is both divine and the vine. We share the life and the divinity of Jesus.
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