Christians are life-sucking parasites!

"A long time ago you broke out of the harness.
   You shook off all restraints.
You said, 'I will not serve!'
   and off you went,
Visiting every sex-and-religion shrine on the way,
   like a common whore.
You were a select vine when I planted you
   from completely reliable stock.
And look how you've turned out—
   a tangle of rancid growth, a poor excuse for a vine.
Scrub, using the strongest soaps.
   Scour your skin raw.
The sin-grease won't come out. I can't stand to even look at you!"
   God's Decree, the Master's Decree. 

Jeremiah 2:20-22

I'm one of those fools who knows a little and thinks he knows a lot. This happens most regarding the Bible. I have read, studied, prayed and been taught by some of the finest theologians this world has to offer. I'm not saying I have bad theology. I understand God, well as much as God has revealed to us to be understood. I'm saying I don't catch on to a good deal of what God is saying simply because I do not tend sheep, or grow grapes. These are the people God spoke to. He uses their language. 

A few years back I was schooled in some awesome theology by a crunchy-girl in Grass Valley California. She was spending the summer working in a vineyard. She understood grapes and through this she taught me about God. 

"You know, when you graft a new shoot onto an old trunk, 

the new graft gives nothing to old trunk, 

it only takes.

They cut the trunk and strip off the bark. 

Then they cut deep into the trunk and stick the new shoot in. 

 All of the energy goes one way; food, water, energy, all of it. 

Without the old trunk, the graft would die It can to nothing on it's own. 

It's completely helpless, completely dependent." 

This is what Jesus was talking about in John, chapter 15;

 "Live in me. Make your home in me just as I do in you. In the same way that a branch can't bear grapes by itself but only by being joined to the vine, you can't bear fruit unless you are joined with me.
 "I am the Vine, you are the branches. When you're joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant. 

Separated, you can't produce a thing. 
Anyone who separates from me is deadwood, gathered up and thrown on the bonfire. 
But if you make yourselves at home with me and my words are at home in you, 
you can be sure that whatever you ask will be listened to and acted upon. 
This is how my Father shows who he is—when you produce grapes, when you mature as my disciples."

John 15:4-5

So we are life-sucking parasites. And thank God for that! On our own our lives would be fruitless. 

But God in his mercy took us, a wild shoot, stripped his Son of all his glory, cut him open and grafted us in. This is good news! So many shudder and think "put pruning is so painful!" A little snip here and there is nothing compared to what the Root of Jesse endured! And we, wild vines, get to share in producing the works of the Kingdom as His life flows through us! We can't produce the glorious fruit on our own. Read the papers, talk to your neighbors folks. Quit trying to think you are fruity. Ask God to graft you in. He doesn't care where you have been or what you have done.