May 21, 2025 // Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Easter // Optional Memorial of Saint Christopher Magallanes, Priest, and Companions, Martyrs
Read the Word // Open your Bible to today’s Gospel: John 15:1-8
Reflect on the Word //
Do you remember being a teenager and running up to your bedroom, slamming the door, and loudly declaring that you wanted to be alone? Was I the only one who felt misunderstood at this age? I see now how misunderstanding often comes from not wanting to resolve a conflict, not wanting to relent in our way of thinking, and possibly from being unwilling to meet each other halfway. We want to be alone to protect ourselves, but oftentimes we choose to be alone because we don’t want to check our own pride and our belief that we’re right and everyone else is wrong.
When Jesus says “unless it remains on the vine” (John 15:4), I think of my stubborn refusal to remain in the presence of others. This happens with my relationship with Jesus as well. There are definitely times when I choose not to remain with Christ. It isn’t a benign “falling away” or “growing apart,” but truly a choice I make. A choice to sin, to pick my way through what I know Jesus has revealed to the Church to be true, to prefer my own personal isolation and disguise it as freedom. And with that there is a severing and loss of good fruit in my life.
When we separate ourselves from Jesus we experience loneliness and being cut off from others in its most acute form. Why do we choose to not remain with Him, attached to Him like a branch on the vine?
Jesus speaks truly when He tells us, “Remain in me, as I remain in you. Just as a branch cannot bear fruit on its own unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me” (John 15:4). Separation between Christ and ourselves is not simply physical, but is a spiritual separation that impacts every aspect of our lives. To remain in Christ is our choice not simply to avoid loneliness, but to experience the promise of Heaven even here in our lives now, to be one with Him, and bear the fruit He calls us to bear.
Relate to the Lord // How have you been isolating from the Lord or others? How can you make a move back into relationship today?
Christy Isinger is a wife and mom to five lovely, loud children and lives in northern Canada. When not homeschooling, she is a devoted reader of English literature from Jane Austen to Agatha Christie and blogs about beauty and life. She is the co-host of the Fountains of Carrots Podcast. She is the author of Blessed Conversations: The Ten Commandments. Find out more about her here.
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