Pastor’s Corner – March 23, 2025
Gardener’s Advice/Luke 13:1-9
Who can resist the gardener’s advice to dig around deeply and replenish the soil? It’s our third Lenten Sunday and we are told of the parable of the barren fig tree. For three years, the vineyard owner claims to have waited patiently for the fig tree to bear fruit, so cutting it down was in order. However the gardener pleaded with him to give it another chance, “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.” Jesus told this parable in the context of current events of the day. His disciples were perplexed by tragic events that took many lives and wondered whether those who died were somehow responsible. In response Jesus tells them basically to mind your own business or judgement. Rather, worry about your own salvation. You are called to live out your faith in God and bear fruit, in this case the fig as a metaphor of flourishing and abundant life.
Jesus knew that figs were widely used in the biblical literature in relation to God’s blessing or woe for Israel. In the prophet Joel, the fig tree’s ruin speaks of destruction of the kingdom: “It has laid waste my vines and splintered my fig trees; it has stripped off their bark and thrown it down; their branches have turned white” (Joel 1:7). The fig tree can also mean restoration in a future day of the Lord, when “they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees, and no one shall make them afraid; for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken” (Micah 4:4).
This coming Sunday let us once again hear the parable of the fig tree, and the invitation to life abundant, and ask ourselves what steps we need to take to dig around deeply and replenish the soil for the flourishing of our life and ministry together. Amen.
“The fig tree puts forth its figs, and the vines are in blossom: they give forth fragrance. Arise my love, my fair one, and come away” (Songs of Songs 2:13). Pastor Dae