5th Easter - Fr. Leo
We live, and move, and have our being. These are all gifts from our creator who sustains them at every moment. Our earthly life will cease when our bodies stop moving. However, our ‘being’ lives for ever. Our being is timeless. We always were in God’s time, then we became incarnate in our bodies, and like Christ, we lives on in eternity.
When Jesus uses the analogy of the vine, he speaks of the connection between our eternal being and our earthly life. This life matters. How we live here produces fruit. God wants our fruit to be good fruit and to be abundant. Without sharing in his divinity by letting God’s grace run through our veins, or our being, we will not produce much fruit.
Our motivation to live in Christ is best when it comes from our own hunger for God’s love and goodness. Fear and guilt don’t work. They can lock us in our brokenness. It is only love that can free us from choices that will limit our life instead of helping us make the choices that will help us bear fruit abundantly.
We are gathered here to choose life. To listen to God’s word. We receive his presence in our prayer and song, enliven by the Eucharist. Here we are made one in Christ at the table of word and sacrifice. From here we go out inspired to make God’s love real in the world. The fruit that is born of this going forth is eternal, and is what will be our door to the fullness of life in eternity.
May the Spirit enliven us in this celebration, and may our experience of Christ here, be real, and may we share God’s presence with all, now and forever. Amen.