Holy Ground

Third Sunday in Lent
February 28, 2016

 1Ho, everyone who thirsts,
  come to the waters;
 and you that have no money,
  come, buy and eat!
 Come, buy wine and milk
  without money and without price.
 2Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,
  and your labor for that which does not satisfy?
 Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good,
  and delight yourselves in rich food.
 3Incline your ear, and come to me;
  listen, so that you may live.
 I will make with you an everlasting covenant,
  my steadfast, sure love for David.
 4See, I made him a witness to the peoples,
  a leader and commander for the peoples.
 5See, you shall call nations that you do not know,
  and nations that do not know you shall run to you,
 because of the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel,
  for he has glorified you.

 6Seek the Lord while he may be found,
  call upon him while he is near;
 7let the wicked forsake their way,
  and the unrighteous their thoughts;
 let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on them,
  and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
 8For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
  nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord.
 9For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
  so are my ways higher than your ways
  and my thoughts than your thoughts. – Isaiah 55:1-9

1At that very time there were some present who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.2[Jesus] asked them, “Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans?3No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did. 4Or 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? 5No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”
  6Then 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. 7So 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?’ 8He replied, ‘Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. 9If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’ ” – Luke 13:1-9

Listen to today’s sermon: sermon 2-28-16

Don’t you wonder what happened to the fig tree in the world of Jesus’ parable? What happens a year from now in the parable? What happens when the owner comes back? Have the efforts of the gardener been successful? If not, is there another reprieve or is this the last chance, the last “one more year,” the final opportunity?

The parable creates for us a moment of suspense. The end is coming. The time is now. The people walking underneath the tower of Siloam and the slaughtered masses in Galilee didn’t see it coming. Bear fruit before it’s too late. Jesus doesn’t sugar coat anything here. The time for living is now, for death is coming sooner or later.

And I suspect we don’t actually quibble with that need for urgent action. Hunger is real in our community. It’s real in faraway urban slums and rural villages and workhouses, but it’s real right here in our own community, too. There are people right here who need our help. The time for bearing fruit is now.

The climate crisis is looming ever greater. People are already dying and fighting. Agriculture is already affected. The possibility of cataclysmic destruction seems almost inevitable. We have a role to play, a voice to use, actions to take. The time for bearing fruit is now.

There are refugees coming here already and more who need homes and support. There are central American children, Syrian families, Sudanese victims of terrorism. They need safety and shelter and hope. We have resources to offer those things today. The time for bearing fruit is now.

We do not disagree with the urgency. But a lot of times we wait for tomorrow, or next month, or next year. We wait for the right time. We lose the suspense. We fail to do and say the hard things. I spent a lot of time this week trying to identify with the fig tree. I thought about dry and fruitless times in my own life. Times when I doubted God, times when I doubted myself, times when I failed. But what struck me in the end is the simply overwhelming nature of what we face as humans together. What struck me is that in big and little ways we fail to bear fruit all the time.

Which is why we are eager to know what happens to this barren fig tree. Is it a Hallmark success story, reviving with a little love and care to thrive for a long and fruitful life or is it a darker tale that ends in failure and tragedy?

It’s also why we tend to be so drawn to Isaiah’s beautiful depictions of God’s future for us. Come, all who are hungry and thirsty, receive free food and drink. For the many who hunger for real food and thirst for clean water, that image is straightforward. But it doesn’t take much poetic imagination for us to see the food and drink in God’s vision for us as the satisfaction of all we long for. Not the longing for nicer cars and bigger salaries, or more fame and success. Longing for fulfillment for the deep hunger and thirst that underlies those desires. The need for safety and care and wholeness. The need we have to overcome our barrenness to bear fruit in the world. That’s the holy ground we seek.

That is our tension. That we live with a vision of what could be and the reality, to which we admittedly contribute, that is not what it should be. Sometimes our lack of action is laziness or fear, but sometimes it’s also facing the overwhelming gap between God’s holy mountain where all are satisfied and the seemingly less-than-holy ground we walk every day past barren trees and hungry masses.

But the gardener sees a way where we cannot. She looks at a barren fig tree and sees it full of fruit. He looks at the hungry masses and sees a free feast for everyone. We have a God who sees the gap between what is and what could be and manages to love us where we are. This is a God who presides over the feast described in Isaiah, the God who desires abundance for all creatures. And this God chooses to spend time with a fruitless fig tree.

If bearing fruit were all about getting fruit to eat, there are probably more economical ways to deal with a consistently barren tree as the landowner suggests. But if the gardener is concerned about the well-being of the tree, then it’s worth the work to bring it forth from barrenness. It’s worth the work to consecrate the soil where the tree is planted to be just as holy as the ground for Isaiah’s rich feast for all.

I don’t think the urgency of bearing fruit is all about feeding others. I think it’s at least as much about God’s desire that we grow into the fullness of the creatures we were made to be. God isn’t so much demanding fruit from us, as cultivating fruit for us, leading us to experience the joy of sharing ourselves with the world.

We have a God who makes holy the ground where we are planted and even makes holy the state of our barrenness, by claiming us as we are and gifting us with more time to flourish, more time to receive the care of the gardener – sunlight and water along with pruning and manure.

Our challenge is to live in the suspense, in the one-more-year of the parable. To live firmly planted in the holy ground right where we are, as we are, and yet also hold the vision of the holy ground that has already been transformed by the gardener, the vision of free food and drink for all.

Our challenge is to pray for our daily bread, and only that. To live in the moment of now, to seek what we need in the present day, to receive the care of God in our day-to-day living, and also to feast at the Eucharistic table to acknowledge the reality of more than daily bread, more than enough, more than one more year.

It is in that tension, that suspense that we experience simultaneously God’s love and challenge. It is in that tension and suspense that we are so bowled over by the wideness of God’s mercy for us that we begin to bear fruit in abundance. It is in that suspense that we are nourished into the kingdom of God.

-Pastor Steven Wilco