5th Wednesday of Easter
6 May 2026
Remain in me
In today’s Gospel, Jesus gives another of His great “I AM” statements:
“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower.”
And then He says the key line that repeats throughout the passage:
“Remain in me.”
That word remain, or abide is the center of everything here.
Because Jesus is not describing a casual relationship.
He is describing communion. Participation.
Life flowing from Him into us the way life flows from a vine into its branches. And Jesus is meaning the Last Supper.
The context is Jesus the Farewell Discourse in the Upper Room. He is preparing the apostles for what life will look like after His Passion, Resurrection, and Ascension.
He is answering the question:
How will you remain united to me when I am no longer physically standing beside you?
And His answer is not merely emotional or symbolic.
“Remain in me.”
Now for the apostles,
that would immediately raise another question: how?
Because throughout Israel’s history,
remaining in covenant with God was expressed through signs, practices, and observances of the Old Covenant.
Circumcision, dietary laws, temple worship
these marked out the people of God.
But now Jesus says something radical.
He Himself is the vine.
Life with God is no longer centered primarily on the old covenant signs.
It is centered on Him personally.
Communion with God now flows through union with Christ.
And that helps explain why Jesus emphasizes inward communion so strongly throughout the Gospels.
Again and again, He pushes beyond mere outward conformity. The Pharisees often had external observance,
but Jesus continually exposes the deeper issue of the heart.
“You honor me with your lips,
but your heart is far from me.”
That’s the danger when we get caught up in doing religious things.
It is possible to look connected externally
while not actually remaining in Him internally.
And yet Jesus is not describing a purely invisible or individual spirituality either.
He is not saying,
“Just think about me privately.”
No He creates a real communion,
a real people,
a real covenant life through which we remain in Him.
So how do we remain in Christ?
We remain in Him through His Body, the Church.
We remain in Him through prayer,
where relationship with Him becomes real and living.
We remain in Him through His Word,
allowing His teaching to dwell within us and shape us.
And we remain in Him sacramentally.
Especially through the Eucharist.
Because the vine imagery is not disconnected from the rest of John’s Gospel.
Earlier, in John 6, Jesus says:
“Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.”
That language is almost identical.
How do we abide in Christ? He tells us.
Through sacramental communion with Him.
The Eucharist is not merely a symbol reminding us of Jesus from a distance.
It is Christ giving His own life to the branches so they may live.
That’s why Jesus says,
“Without me you can do nothing.”
Not little.
Nothing.
A branch separated from the vine may look alive for a little while, but eventually it withers
because the life is no longer flowing into it.
And spiritually, the same thing happens to us.
If prayer disappears,
if sacramental life disappears,
if we separate ourselves from the life of the Church,
eventually we begin to dry out spiritually.
Maybe not immediately.
But gradually.
Because Christianity is not self-sustaining.
It is participatory.
It is communion.
And then Jesus says something else important:
“Every branch that bears fruit he prunes,
so that it may bear more fruit.”
Even remaining branches are pruned.
Meaning:
remaining in Christ does not mean comfort.
It means purification. Growth. Correction.
Sometimes painful change.
But pruning is not punishment.
It is the work of the Father helping the branch become what it was meant to be.
So today, the question is not simply whether we believe in Christ.
The question is: are we remaining in Him?
Not just externally.
Not just culturally.
But truly.
Through prayer.
Through His Church.
Through His Word.
Through the sacraments.
Through a living communion in which His life continues to flow into ours.
Because Jesus does not merely give teachings.
He gives Himself.
And if we remain in Him, His life begins to bear fruit in us.