Why Was I Born?

John 15:1-8
Why was I born? I didn’t choose to be born. I didn’t ask to have all sorts of wants and needs thrust upon me. Why was I born with needs at all– the need for food and water, for shelter, for love?
Perhaps these are questions that you may have contemplated or heard from someone else. Perhaps the question needs to be reframed completely into something like: if I am created what was the purpose of the creator? What was the plan?
Well, if God is love, there must be love involved in my formation. I may not be loved by any other person, but I am loved by God. Perhaps that’s the purpose of my life, to be needed and loved by God above all else. After all he came to earth in the form of Jesus Christ to give himself for the world of which I am a part.
This week’s gospel text begins with the familiar “I Am.” Throughout the gospels Christ touches on things that we are very familiar with in our lives, bread, light, sheep, door etc: I AM bread of life, John 6:35; I AM light of the world, 8:12; I AM the door/gate for the sheep, 10:7; I AM the resurrection and the life, 11:25, and now “I AM the true vine.” Each one of these ‘I AM’s’ connect with something, something that relates to us and the world in general.
In today’s text Jesus connects himself with each one of us. “If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” God has shown his need for you, a need born out of his love for you.
Pastor Darryl

Photo by Carlo Navarro on Unsplash