“…perhaps our true labor is to abide…”

..and we also abide through our labors.

Thank you very much. I had never understood this parable in this way, before or understood how it applied to me.

What a strange thing…we are both husbandmen, laboring in His vineyard and, at the same time, branches abiding on the Vine, tended by our Father, the Husbandman (John 15:1). Simultaneously we must hold in our minds this image of both laboring and abiding–or perhaps our true labor is to abide. To abide is to remain still and connected to the Vine so that His Life flows through us to produce fruit. For me, this is often harder and requires more effort than any outward, exterior activity.