Are you ready to return and reconnect? Many of us have deeply missed gathering in person with loved ones and worshipping together in the same room. The isolation we experienced has been challenging in so many ways. We rejoice for the ways that we have remained in relationship with one another at Saint Luke, but are so thankful to be together each Wednesday evening, sharing a bowl of soup and hearing from lay preachers. Journey with us this lent as we discover how connected we are in Christ.
Suffering, repentance, and barren fig trees. This week’s lessons weren’t exactly filled with obvious hope and feel-good associations to our midweek Lenten theme of “return and reconnect,” but guest preacher Amanda Heintzelman walks us through them with such thoughtfulness, vulnerability, and grace. Be blessed, friends.
At that very time there were some present who told him 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.”
The Parable of the Barren Fig Tree
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.’”
—Luke 13: 1-9
QUESTIONS TO PONDER
Amanda shares about how we too have moments of functioning like the fig tree. Sometimes we see each other or ourselves or our situations as a lost cause, but God just sees us as lost and know we have potential. We just need a little more nourishment and a little more patience and little more tending, and another chance to bear fruit. We don’t need to be cut down, we need to be seen and loved.
Have you ever felt this way? How did others around you respond?
When you are in a place of suffering or disconnection, where or how do you feel God's presence? What helps you turn back toward God?
Reconnecting through repentance is all about being able to look each other in the eye when we are in pain. Bearing witness to each other’s suffering. Enduring the loving gaze of God looking us in the eye when we are in pain, and knowing we are seen and understood, even, no, especially when we don’t understand.