This sermon was preached on Sunday 28th April 2024 at All Saints Church, Oakham.

Bible Reading: John 15:1-8

As many of you know, Cecily and I moved house a couple of weeks ago. As with any move, there are lots of things that need to be set up in the new place. You move over utilities, insurance policies, subscriptions, GPs etc. One of the things that Cecily and I transferred over this week was joining a new gym.

Talking about the gym can be a mixed topic. For some of us, we might feel excited when it comes to thinking about the gym and exercise. For others, you might find your pulse is rising, your hands are getting sweaty, and you are looking for the nearest exit to make your getaway.  It generates so many feelings, good and bad, exciting and fear-inducing.

I’m sure you each have your own feelings regarding the gym, and I’m sorry if I’ve ruined your day by bringing up the gym. But don’t clock out just yet, please. Hear me out a little bit.

The reason that many of us go to the gym is to exercise and get fitter. We often want to shed a few kilos or pounds as well. For many of us who struggle with fitness or weight, we might choose to join a gym as the solution to losing weight and getting fitter. The problem is that joining the gym isn’t enough (as much as we might like it to be). We have to go to the gym and exercise at the gym. A gym membership and wishful thinking sitting at home isn’t going to help you lose the weight or become fitter. You need to get up, leave the house and go to the gym, and when you get there, do some exercise. You have to be in the gym and take part in the gym. That is the only way you are going to grow in fitness and lose the weight.

I would argue that our discipleship works in the same way. Jesus says:

‘Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing.’[1]

I’ve probably lost some of you, I know. You are thinking, how does this relate to the gym, and vice versa how does the gym relate to discipleship and what Jesus is saying here? Please stick with me.

This reading from John’s gospel comes from the teaching that Jesus gave his disciples on Maundy Thursday after they had shared in what we call the Last Supper. In his final teaching to his disciples before the rest of the events of the Maundy Thursday unfold, Jesus is giving his final words on what it means to be a disciple and to follow Jesus. Before Jesus goes, he wants his disciples to know the most important part of being a disciple. One of the things that he says to his disciples is: Abide in Me. This is the key to growing and flourishing as a disciple.   

Jesus, ever one to use relatable images and explanations, uses this image from gardening. Take the example of a tree. When a tree grows, branches spring out from the trunk. Then as the branches grow and develop, they will grow and bear fruit. Now, if a branch was cut off from the tree, it would not be able to bear fruit, because the tree is the source of life that bears the fruit. The branches that abide in the tree, are able to bear fruit. Likewise, those disciples who abide in Jesus will be able to bear the fruit of Jesus and discipleship to him. It is only when we go to Jesus, when we remain in him, remain in his presence and leading in our lives, that we will see the fruit of Jesus in our discipleship.

As we said earlier about going to the gym, you are not going to grow in fitness by having a gym membership but never going to the gym to exercise. You need to go and abide in the gym, go and spend time in the gym and time doing the exercises. In the same way, we don’t grow as disciples just by having a Christian membership card but never going to spend time with Jesus. We need to go to Jesus and be with him and do the things that he did. It is when we do this, that we will grow. We are being branches rooted to the vine and the tree so that we may flourish to bear the fruit of discipleship. We become spiritually fitter as disciples, and through this process, we are able to throw off the metaphorical weight that impacts our spiritual health and growth as disciples.

We go to the gym to grow in our fitness. We go to Jesus to grow in our discipleship. If we don’t go to the gym to exercise, we cannot grow in our fitness. Without abiding in Jesus, we cannot grow in our discipleship. Jesus says, ‘Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.’[2] We cannot bear the fruit of discipleship to Jesus unless we spend time with him and grow with him.

So this week I encourage you to abide in Jesus. Go to him and spend time with him. Spend time in prayer, in worship, in contemplation. Invite Jesus to be with you in sending emails at work, doing the dishes at home, or walking the dog.

Saying all this, I know often this can be easier said than done. Just like saying you will go to the gym is a lot easier than going to the gym. But like we put steps in place to help us go to the gym and keep us on track, we can do that with spending time with Jesus. Here are three tips from the gym world that will help us abide with Jesus.

Step 1 – Set a plan. The first step to help you go to the gym is to set a plan for when you are going to go. You decide what day and time you are going to the gym and for how long. You also put it in your diary. You set a plan of what you are going to do at the gym – how much cardio, weights etc. – so that you don’t get lost in not knowing what to do when you get there.

We can do the same with abiding with Jesus. Plan when you are going to spend time with Jesus. Plan when you are going to spend time with him. There is church on a Sunday, but how are you going to spend time with him throughout the week? Plan in some times to pray and read the bible. And plan what you are going to read. Maybe choose to read a chapter of John’s gospel each day. That gives you a plan for 21 days. Or plan to say the Lord’s Prayer every morning in the shower. As the saying goes: ‘fail to plan, plan to fail.’ Successful gym people make a plan to focus their training, and we can do the same with abiding in Jesus.

Step 2 – Turning up is a win. So often we can beat ourselves up when we get to the gym and the workout feels rubbish. We didn’t run very long or very fast on the treadmill, and we only manage one set out of the planned three. That’s okay. There will be days that feel bad, but the fact that you turned up to the gym to work out is the main thing. Runners have this saying that ‘there is no such thing as a bad run.’ The fact that you turned up to run means that you succeeded because you chose to get up and try, which will always be better than never running at all, no matter how bad you felt the run went.

This same logic applies to our discipleship. Sometimes we feel that we didn’t pray very well, or that we didn’t have much focus in church or during our Bible reading. You have only managed one minute of praying before getting distracted. That’s okay. Again, the main thing is that you turned up to pray and spend time with Jesus. Through practice, we will make the small and steady steps in the right direction to grow in our discipleship. Consistency is key. Consistency in turning up to the gym, even for a small workout, is what brings the fitness and results in the long-term. One great workout and then not going back to the gym for the rest of the year isn’t going to make you stronger and fitter. It’s going back to the gym again and again. This same logic applies to our abiding with Jesus. It is through consistently turning up to spend time with Jesus which will bring our spiritual growth.

Step 3 – Start small and increase the amount as you feel comfortable with it. Nobody starts at the gym by going for the 100kg weights. They start with 1 kilo, and once that feels comfortable they move on to 2 kilos, and then once they are comfortable with that they move on to 3 kilos, and so on. After a while, you find that you are lifting huge 50kg, 60kg weights that you never envisaged at the start. But through steady progress, you grew in your strength and fitness and became capable of lifting these weights. 

This is the same when it comes to spending time with Jesus. We start small. We pray for one minute, or we read one bible verse. Then we move onto two minutes, and reading two verses. This feels small at first, but as we do it more and more, we grow in our spiritual strength and fitness as we abide in Jesus, and we become spiritually stronger disciples. It’s steady growth. I know many of you are pensioners, and you can testify to the power of small and steady financial growth to give you the pension that you have today. Small, steady, and consistent growth will have a greater impact on our spiritual growth than one single day of praying for 8 hours and reading the New Testament in one sitting.  

C.S. Lewis famously said, ‘Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when we look back everything is different.’ It’s the same with going to the gym, and it’s the same with going to spend time abiding in Jesus.

We follow these three steps: to set a plan, consistently turn up, and start small and grow it steadily. This will help us abide in Jesus, grow in our discipleship, and see the spiritual fruit and growth we long to see.

Amen.  

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[1] John 15:4-5 [NRSV].

[2] John 15:4 [NRSV].