St. James the Less Episcopal, Ashland, VA
“The Gardener Knows Best”
Collect: Almighty God, you know that we have no power in ourselves to help ourselves: Keep us both outwardly in our bodies and inwardly in our souls, that we may be defended from all adversities which may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Luke 13:1-9
At that very time there were some present who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. He asked them, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did. Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them--do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did."
Then he told this parable: "A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, 'See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?' He replied, 'Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.'"
Why do bad things happen? Why do they, really? If God is all-powerful, then why does God allow suffering and misery? Does it mean that God is not all-powerful, as Rabbi Kushner argues? (In Why Do Bad Things Happen to Good People?) Or is it that God is not all-good? Archibald MacLeish in his Pulitzer Prize winning play J.B. said, “If God is God, he is not good. If God is good, he is not God.” Or is it something else entirely? These are hard and age-old questions.
From our earliest days as humans, we think that God works like we do, and the tit-for-tat, transactional lives we have on this plain of existence is too often how we perceive the workings of God. Some of the oldest portions of our Scriptures according to scholars come from the Book of Job. There a righteous man is assaulted by the enemy (of himself and God) and made to suffer. A string of calamities happen. He loses his flocks, his children, everything, and all he had was his wife who instructed him to “Curse God and die.” And then his so-called “friends” come asking, “So what did you do to deserve this?”
The assumption always seem to be that we cause our fate. That’s what Job’s friends assumed, and it is what the ones who came to Jesus assumed as well. Jesus cites two calamities and brings a spotlight on them.
Bad things happen, with intent sometimes like with Pilate. And bad things happen just because, like with the falling tower. To both Jesus gives a phrase, “repent, or you will perish as they did.” Now this is tricky, because it sounds causative. If you do not do this, then this will happen. This bad thing will be the outcome. It may sound like Jesus is saying that. It can be confusing. However, when we look at the whole narrative, and where Jesus goes next it offers us a different way to read it.
Jesus immediately tells them a story of a fig tree. Now what is it we expect of a fig tree? [Wait for a response.] Figs, of course. And in the story we see something not doing what it is meant to do. A fig tree not producing figs is pretty worthless. And here we are given two competing views. What does one do with worthless things?
The man who planted the fig tree says this: “For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?”
This makes total sense. Why waste time and energy on this worthless fig tree. So often I think this is how people see God. They seem to think that God is ready to write most of us off, ready to chop us down and chuck us on the trash heap (Gehenna, the word we translate as hell in the Gospels literally was the trash heap of Jerusalem, by the way.) This thinking is what the people who came to Jesus must have thought. It is what Job’s wife and friends thought. Maybe it is what you think or have thought along the way.
But then we are given the image of the Gardener, the one who loves the tree, and is not ready to chop it down. “Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.” When we look at the entirety of the teachings of Jesus, I think this is what he is saying. The Gardener, the one who lovingly cares for and fertilizes the fig tree, is actually a better image of the nature of God.
And here is something to ponder. The Gardener puts manure on the tree. Manure happens. No one wants it. No one seeks it out. Manure happens. But from that, new growth can happen. The manure is what brings us to another place. For our muscles to work, we must work them. We fight gravity from the moment we are born. Without it our muscles wither and die. Astronauts spending lengthy time on the space station have to drastically up their exercise or when they come home they will be as weak as babies. They no longer fight gravity just to exist. We are designed to flourish in an adversarial atmosphere!
When bad things happen, we do not wish them, want them, nor do we seek them out. But they DO and WILL come. Always. And we have a response, we can sit on the ash heap, curse God, and die. Or, we can see the things as an opportunity for growth. A line from the Batman movie, “Master Wayne, why do we fall down? To learn to pick ourselves back up.”
And that is how I have to read the enigmatic statement of Jesus, “Repent, or perish like they did.” Repent means to change direction, to turn around. It ALSO means to CHANGE OUR MINDS. (Metanoia) And that is what I hear Jesus saying to those who thought God was out to smite folks. “You all need to repent, or you will continue to suffer under this delusion like those who are perishing in those thoughts. God is not like that…” And that is where he tells the fig tree story.
We perish in unhealthy views of God. We perish when we sell God short, and believe God to be other than Grace-filled, grace-ful, and loving of us all. God wants to give us another chance. God wants to care for us, fertilize us, and give us time to grow. We think of God too often to be like the Owner. But God, Jesus is telling us is really like the Gardener. And the Gardener KNOWS BEST!
What a beautiful thought. What a beautiful God. God is NOT SMITING US! God does not want that.
You have a choice in how you see things. You have a choice in how you respond. You cannot control what life deals you. But your response to that is what shapes your faith, and the more you work those faith muscles the more ready you will be when life hands you a really bad hand.
I must add the caveat to my sermon today. Bad things, horrible things, unspeakable things happen. They hurt, and some things take a lifetime to recover from. I know this. God knows this. One of the great things of being a Christian is that we have a God who so loves us, that he chose to come and be one of us. To breathe, to laugh, to hurt, to cry, and even to die. He knows the human condition. Ecce homo. Behold, the Son of Man. He is not a stranger to what we go through. When Lazarus died, John’s Gospel says, “Jesus cried.” [11:35] When he approached Jerusalem in Luke’s Gospel, he wept. [19:41] When we suffer, God still weeps.
A quote I use a lot in my discernment work with the Diocese comes from writer Frederick Buechner. “The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” I know it has been true for me, and for so many passionate Christ followers I have met on my journey, where my deepest woundedness is can be a source of hope and grace for others. That deep gladness that Buechner speaks of is exactly that. My strongest joy, my deep gladness comes from my deepest woundedness. When I was a child, my father passed. It has made so much of my life intent on protecting and caring for the emotional and spiritual welfare for children. The Papa Bear comes out. I want happy, joy-filled, care-free children. They are my deep gladness, and it is so often a great need of the world. In my faith, my woundedness was transformed, utilized, and transforming for others. God is the Gardener who tilled that soil, broke up the clumps deep down in my soul, and breathed life into that barrenness. I repented. I changed my mind and my ways. I no longer perish in the pain and confusion of “Why me?”
God can take that manure that covers us in our living and breathing, and can cleanse us of it and use it to God’s honor and glory. In the economy of our faith, nothing is futile, pointless, or without redemption, even our heartaches and heartbreaks. In our weakness, he is strong. In our weakness, he is mighty to save. Thanks be to God. Amen.
From our earliest days as humans, we think that God works like we do, and the tit-for-tat, transactional lives we have on this plain of existence is too often how we perceive the workings of God. Some of the oldest portions of our Scriptures according to scholars come from the Book of Job. There a righteous man is assaulted by the enemy (of himself and God) and made to suffer. A string of calamities happen. He loses his flocks, his children, everything, and all he had was his wife who instructed him to “Curse God and die.” And then his so-called “friends” come asking, “So what did you do to deserve this?”
The assumption always seem to be that we cause our fate. That’s what Job’s friends assumed, and it is what the ones who came to Jesus assumed as well. Jesus cites two calamities and brings a spotlight on them.
Pilate, the Roman prefect, was notorious for cruelty. Some event took place where some Galileans had made sacrifices, and they were killed and their blood was mingled with the offerings they had made. Jesus asked, were these any worse than their neighbors? Were they somehow deserving of this, or to blame? He then brings up another recent incident. A tower fell in Jerusalem, killing 18. Were they to blame for this accident? Of course not.
At that very time there were some present who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. He asked them, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did. Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them--do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did."
Bad things happen, with intent sometimes like with Pilate. And bad things happen just because, like with the falling tower. To both Jesus gives a phrase, “repent, or you will perish as they did.” Now this is tricky, because it sounds causative. If you do not do this, then this will happen. This bad thing will be the outcome. It may sound like Jesus is saying that. It can be confusing. However, when we look at the whole narrative, and where Jesus goes next it offers us a different way to read it.
Jesus immediately tells them a story of a fig tree. Now what is it we expect of a fig tree? [Wait for a response.] Figs, of course. And in the story we see something not doing what it is meant to do. A fig tree not producing figs is pretty worthless. And here we are given two competing views. What does one do with worthless things?
The man who planted the fig tree says this: “For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?”
This makes total sense. Why waste time and energy on this worthless fig tree. So often I think this is how people see God. They seem to think that God is ready to write most of us off, ready to chop us down and chuck us on the trash heap (Gehenna, the word we translate as hell in the Gospels literally was the trash heap of Jerusalem, by the way.) This thinking is what the people who came to Jesus must have thought. It is what Job’s wife and friends thought. Maybe it is what you think or have thought along the way.
But then we are given the image of the Gardener, the one who loves the tree, and is not ready to chop it down. “Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.” When we look at the entirety of the teachings of Jesus, I think this is what he is saying. The Gardener, the one who lovingly cares for and fertilizes the fig tree, is actually a better image of the nature of God.
And here is something to ponder. The Gardener puts manure on the tree. Manure happens. No one wants it. No one seeks it out. Manure happens. But from that, new growth can happen. The manure is what brings us to another place. For our muscles to work, we must work them. We fight gravity from the moment we are born. Without it our muscles wither and die. Astronauts spending lengthy time on the space station have to drastically up their exercise or when they come home they will be as weak as babies. They no longer fight gravity just to exist. We are designed to flourish in an adversarial atmosphere!
When bad things happen, we do not wish them, want them, nor do we seek them out. But they DO and WILL come. Always. And we have a response, we can sit on the ash heap, curse God, and die. Or, we can see the things as an opportunity for growth. A line from the Batman movie, “Master Wayne, why do we fall down? To learn to pick ourselves back up.”
And that is how I have to read the enigmatic statement of Jesus, “Repent, or perish like they did.” Repent means to change direction, to turn around. It ALSO means to CHANGE OUR MINDS. (Metanoia) And that is what I hear Jesus saying to those who thought God was out to smite folks. “You all need to repent, or you will continue to suffer under this delusion like those who are perishing in those thoughts. God is not like that…” And that is where he tells the fig tree story.
We perish in unhealthy views of God. We perish when we sell God short, and believe God to be other than Grace-filled, grace-ful, and loving of us all. God wants to give us another chance. God wants to care for us, fertilize us, and give us time to grow. We think of God too often to be like the Owner. But God, Jesus is telling us is really like the Gardener. And the Gardener KNOWS BEST!
What a beautiful thought. What a beautiful God. God is NOT SMITING US! God does not want that.
You have a choice in how you see things. You have a choice in how you respond. You cannot control what life deals you. But your response to that is what shapes your faith, and the more you work those faith muscles the more ready you will be when life hands you a really bad hand.
I must add the caveat to my sermon today. Bad things, horrible things, unspeakable things happen. They hurt, and some things take a lifetime to recover from. I know this. God knows this. One of the great things of being a Christian is that we have a God who so loves us, that he chose to come and be one of us. To breathe, to laugh, to hurt, to cry, and even to die. He knows the human condition. Ecce homo. Behold, the Son of Man. He is not a stranger to what we go through. When Lazarus died, John’s Gospel says, “Jesus cried.” [11:35] When he approached Jerusalem in Luke’s Gospel, he wept. [19:41] When we suffer, God still weeps.
A quote I use a lot in my discernment work with the Diocese comes from writer Frederick Buechner. “The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” I know it has been true for me, and for so many passionate Christ followers I have met on my journey, where my deepest woundedness is can be a source of hope and grace for others. That deep gladness that Buechner speaks of is exactly that. My strongest joy, my deep gladness comes from my deepest woundedness. When I was a child, my father passed. It has made so much of my life intent on protecting and caring for the emotional and spiritual welfare for children. The Papa Bear comes out. I want happy, joy-filled, care-free children. They are my deep gladness, and it is so often a great need of the world. In my faith, my woundedness was transformed, utilized, and transforming for others. God is the Gardener who tilled that soil, broke up the clumps deep down in my soul, and breathed life into that barrenness. I repented. I changed my mind and my ways. I no longer perish in the pain and confusion of “Why me?”
God can take that manure that covers us in our living and breathing, and can cleanse us of it and use it to God’s honor and glory. In the economy of our faith, nothing is futile, pointless, or without redemption, even our heartaches and heartbreaks. In our weakness, he is strong. In our weakness, he is mighty to save. Thanks be to God. Amen.
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Blessings, Rock