Sunday, March 24, 2019

3^rd Sunday in Lent

The Revised Common Lectionary passages for the Lord’s Day are:

First Reading: Isaiah 55:1-9, Psalm: 63:1-8
Second Reading: I Corinthians 10:1-13
Gospel Reading: Luke 13:1-9

The liturgical color for the day is: Purple

I remember my 5th grade basketball coach.  As a coach he hollered two things: “Turn it around,” and “Get it together.”

They come to Jesus.  They come to him looking for Jesus to both have mercy and to hear the injustice that has been done to their brothers and sisters.  Those Galileans who were mowed down by Pilate, there was no justice there and something had to be done about it.  Jesus pushes them.

He pushes their righteous indignation at the issue.  Where is the justice?  What was the cause?  Those background questions did not interest Jesus and he did not want them to be the primary questions they were asking.  There was no issue here—what Pilate did was wrong—absolute fact.  There was no issue here—those tragically killed when the tower of Siloam fell, it was absolutely unfair.

They want answers, they want justice.  Jesus pointes them to something else.  He points them to their own lives.  He invites them to stop looking beyond at all the injustices that are done to them and he invites them to see their own lives.  It is not just Pilate and the traumas and tragedies of this world; it is also about our role.  He tells them, and us too, about that fig tree.

It is a useless tree.  It should be cut down and the soil tilled and something else planted there.  The farmer knows it is taking up space and pulling resources out of the soil while it is bearing no fruit.  Cut it down and be done with it.

The farmer’s hired hand says, “Give me some time.”  “Let me work on it.  Let me till and fertilize and see what happens.  Give it another year.”  The hired hand does not see this as fait-a-complete’—he does not see it as finished and done.  He sees the possibilities yet to be.  He sees the capacities yet unrealized.  He envisions the fate of this tree as something that can yet be turned around.

There is patience here with the hired hand.  There is a cost to be born—the tilling and fertilizing and waiting.  Yet, he sees the possibilities as something that can yet be turned around.  It is a repentance of sorts in action.

In the encounter, the story of the tree is this holy blessing of Jesus.  He stops them there.  He wraps them in it.  Not in a shout but in a shroud of love.  He wraps them in the warm invitation: “Turn it around.”  “Get it together.”

In the cross of Christ, we see God leaning into us—leaning into our space with the confidence and grace and wrapping us in the shroud of love.  It is God wrapping us with that shroud of love that enables us to hear the call: “Get It Together.  Turn it around.”

Daris Bultena
General Presbyter