Viticulture imagery occurs prominently throughout the Bible and Second Temple Literature as a symbol for Israel (e.g., Isa 5:7; Ps 80:8; Jer 2:21; Philo, Dreams 2.172). Brown (2008) argues that John creatively repurposes the OT viticulture imagery for his unique Christology (Jn 15), while Thompson (2015, p. 324) sees John picking up on Isaiah’s “prophetic yearning for God’s restoration of his vineyard so that it might be the fruitful vine it was intended to be.” Petersen (2008) claims that John uses viticulture imagery to show that Jesus has replaced Israel. What the various Christological or ecclesiological interpretations of John’s use of Isaiah have continually overlooked, however, is how Isaiah’s “prophetic yearning” is fulfilled by a vital union between Christ and his people. I will argue that the well-known observation that John 15 includes the only predicate “I am” saying that includes the Father has, nevertheless, been insufficiently interrogated for its significance to John’s interpretation of Isaiah. By describing the Father, Christ, and the disciples with viticulture imagery, John triangulates the “abiding” that is necessary to bear fruit, securing the identity of Christ and the disciples as new Israel. Three lines of argumentation suggest that John’s interpretation of Isaiah triangulates the abiding that is necessary to bear fruit in the Father, Christ, and the disciples. First, I will engage passages in Isaiah that use viticulture imagery to communicate cursing and “prophetic yearning.” For Isaiah, God as the planter of the vine is the sources of fruitfulness (Isa 27:3, 6), whereas a lack of fruitfulness and curse comes from the failure to keep God’s law (Isa 5:24). Second, John blends these two concepts of planting and law keeping to express that Jesus is the true vine because the Father has sent him (Jn 5:24) and he has kept his Father’s commandments (Jn 15:10), securing the fruitfulness of the branches (Jn 15:5). Third, Philo (Dreams 2.169–180) serves as a helpful analog to John since both—as an interpreters of the OT—are similar yet divergent in their understanding of viticulture imagery. Philo equates the vine with Israel and its fruit with the virtue attained when one “reverts to righteousness, following by a free-will choice the laws and statutes of nature” (Dreams 2.174), while John equates fruitfulness as abiding expressed through keeping Christ’s commandments (Jn 15:2). These lines of argumentation suggest an interpretation that harmonizes the Christological focus that so thoroughly characterizes John’s Gospel with the ecclesiological implications of those united to the vine.