Reflection
As
the days grow warmer and brighter; as the robins return bringing the hope of
Spring, we turn our efforts to cleaning up our gardens and preparing
the soil for planting, with the hope of a fruitful harvest.
Luke reminds us with this story, that our God, also, is a gardener expecting
from us abundant fruit.
The loving Father of Jesus watches over us like the gardener in this parable of
the Fig Tree, a fig tree that seems only to be taking up space in this orchard.
It has been barren for three years and the owner is tired of waiting for
his figs. He wants the tree out of his orchard.
But the gardener has compassion for the barren tree and asks to give the poor
tree another chance. He suggests that with a little more patience this
tree
might blossom. He will loosen the soil around it, add some fertilizer and
prune its branches, then perhaps this year there will be figs.
What Luke is trying to tell us is that our God is like this. Just as the
gardener hopes for change, so God watches over each of us, looking into our
hearts and
waits for a change of attitude, a conversion of heart. And God knows that
conversion takes time, requires patience.
As an excellent gardener, God calls us to loosen the hardness of our hearts, to
apply the fertilizer of grace, to prune the selfishness of our actions.
Each of us is created to do more than take up space in the garden.
Each of us is called to bear abundant fruit.
Each Lent we are invited to reflect on the fruitfulness of our lives.
Perhaps I am that fig tree walking the path of conversion this Lent to the
fullness of life, to the victor and joy of Easter.