I’ve been exploring some of the very modern worship songs as an old guy😀. But now, I’ve decided to alternate between very modern hymns, old hymns, and in-between hymns, namely the worship songs from the 60s to the 90s that feature in hymnbooks such as Mission Praise. Today it’s the turn of the in-between hymns.
Today’s song is You Are the Vine from 1982.
I only became aware of this one in 2017, when I started exploring all the hymns in the Mission Praise with a view to learning those that were new to me. But the passage on which it’s based was very familiar to me. Here it is:
John 15:5-6
5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.
This passage has encourging and scary aspects. The scary bit is the branches that don’t remain in Jesus. Some believe that a genuine believer can stop abiding in Christ and lose their faith. But others, like me, believe that though we are called to actively abide in Christ, ultimately God will ensure that we will abide in Him, even if we sometimes drift away for a while. The same gospel brings that out elsewhere:
John 10:27-20
27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one.”
And here’s one of many New Testament verses that makes me confident that God will keep me:
Philippians 1:4-6
4 In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5 because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6 being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
Of course, we shouldn’t sit back and live a careless life, believing that we’ll be OK. We are called to fight the good fight and run the great race. But we can be confident that we will win. If an angel appeared to me and told me that I was going win the 100m race in the next Olympics, I wouldn’t stay at home in bed. I’d still find a way to enter the Olympics 😀. We are called to be active, but behind it all, God is at work. And only God could cause me to win any race 😀.
As with most of the older “new” songs, I don’t see many instances on YouTube, but I do see a few:
And I see lots of other hymns that are based on the passage:
Hibernia Gospel 