The Barren Fig Tree

Fig trees have featured in the Bible all through its history.   We hear of Adam and Eve covering themselves with fig leaves in the Garden of Eden.   One of the ways in which peace is described is to say that people may now sit under their fig trees.   With such large leaves they offered excellent shade from the hot sun.   It was the place to which a person would invite friends or neighbours to come and sit and share food and wine.   The fig tree seems to have been central to life in those days in that place.

For a number of years we used to spend our annual holidays on the tiny Greek island of Anghistri.   We would walk around and find fig trees growing there.   As we used to travel there in September it was always after the figs had been picked.   The only figs we knew, therefore, were shrivelled up and on the ground where they had fallen, probably at harvest time.    One year we went earlier and it was the fig season.   Late one evening, as I sat in a favourite taverna, Katerina, the owner’s wife came and gave me a bowl of figs.   She had picked them and peeled them and put them in her fridge.   There, before me was a fruit I had never tried before.   It was someone at another table who explained to me what this fruit was.   When I tasted the first one it was pure ecstasy!

All over the island the fig trees had yielded their fruit and it was wonderful.   My wife had left me at the table as she was tired and wanted to retire to bed.   I collected the last few figs and popped them in my pocket and walked round the corner to our apartment.   Then came a second good food experience as Pauline sampled figs for the first time.   Looking round the island we saw many trees that looked to be doing nothing.   The fact was that these were the olive trees that would be shaken hard at harvest time and their fruits taken away for pressing.   They all seemed to be trees that were old and ignored but at harvest time you would find out whose land they were on as the people came to collect what had been produced.   To us travellers they looked just part of an attractive landscape but they were not there for show.   Fruit was expected of them.

This last thought is what lies behind the story of the fig tree in Luke’s gospel.   The owner of the vineyard came to make his annual inspection and discovered that, after three years, there was no fruit.   What was the point of having the tree here?   He desired much more than shade.   Of course, the story is told to picture God in his relationship with humankind.   He called his people, and in this case, they were very special all through history.   He had brought them out of Egypt and slavery and been with them all through their history.   With Israel he had a special relationship and this is reflected throughout the Old Testament.

So Jesus tells his hearers the short tale of the barren fig tree.   Almost every vineyard had at least one fig tree growing in it.   But they were there for two purposes.   They provided shade for the workers when the sun was at its highest and they took their meals beneath them.   But a vineyard had to be productive.   It was unthinkable that any sort of tree planted there would not grow fruit.   It was the other reason for the tree’s existence in that place.   It was not just there to look at.   It had its purpose which was to produce fruit.

When Jesus came to Palestine his advent was heralded by John the Baptist.   John told the people what to expect.   After this inordinate period of time over centuries when the people had drifted away from God they were to get a visit from God’s Son who was going to make a difference to how things were.   John was saying, “Prove your repentance by the fruit you bear.   Already the axe is laid to the roots of the trees; and every tree that fails to produce good fruit is cut down and thrown in the fire.”   In other words, John says: “You have been warned.”   So here the first three years of the fig tree are mirrored by centuries of patience when God has longed for his people to return to him.   But now the time has come when the fig tree (or, in this case, Israel) gets its final chance to repent.

Looking at the three years of the ministry of Jesus we have another representation of the three years at the end of which comes the last chance to change how things are.   Over the early years of my life I listened to a depiction of Jesus as “Gentle Jesus, meek and mild.”   It became the way I saw Jesus and it was completely wrong.   The real Jesus is a powerful force that confronts the individual and challenges him or her to make a decision for or against.   If the answer is affirmative then there is no going back for the die has been cast.   To say yes is to accept the power of Jesus, alive in the world, and there is no possibility of unravelling what has been learnt.

The acceptance is our commitment to start the gardener’s work on the fig tree.   There can be no backing off this commitment without completely negating what we have discovered and know to be absolute truth.   The fig tree in our life now just has to bear fruit.   There are no excuses because it is growing simply to bear that fruit.   It is not for show.   This fig tree may have impressive umbrella-like leaves but its purpose is to bear fruit.

I think that the most wonderful aspect of this story is that there really is that last chance.   God, in Jesus, does not give up on us and still places his faith in us and what we are capable of achieving.   Speaking in gardening terms and experience, I can say that if a tree did not bear fruit I would be one for digging it up and using the logs to heat my house.   Yet God always allows that final chance.  

During my career in local government I had a boss who loved to bring plants into the office that were not growing at all well at home.   He always gave them a last chance to thrive with different and regular attention in our office.   He had this undying belief that all was not lost and the plant might suddenly come to full life.   Very often he was right.   Then one day he came to work and discovered a very sorry sight.   He had brought in a spider plant that he thought might find more life in our office.   When he arrived in the office he discovered that someone had given it a haircut.   Even to our untutored eyes it was obvious that this would kill the little plant.   On enquiry he discovered that our office cleaner had thought it a good idea to partially cut back the long leaves.   She killed the plant.   Bill was very disappointed about what had happened.

I can see that God would be disappointed to find that, after giving us another chance, we had squandered it.    Isn’t it one of the wonderful things about God that he has endless patience with us?   Reading the stories in the Old Testament, we realise that, even when Israel had wandered as far away from their God as was possible, he always waited for them to return.   In Malachi we read: “If you will return to me, I shall turn back to you, says the Lord of hosts”.   For a long time we have been reminded that God is incredibly patient.   Against this there are scripture passages where there seems has considerable impatience with Israel.   Yet God still stays with his chosen people.   In the same way he stays with us, even when we try his patience sorely.

Let’s look at the Book of Exodus when Moses went back down the mountain after meeting God at its summit.  He found the people had got Aaron to provide a graven image for them to worship.   God’s reaction was “I have considered this people, and I see their stubbornness.   Now, let me alone to pour out my anger on them, so that I may put an end to them and make a great nation spring from you.”   Moses is the one to caution God.   “Why pour out your anger on your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a strong hand?   Why let the Egyptians say ‘He meant evil when he took them out, to kill them in the mountains and wipe them off the face of the earth.’   Then Moses reminded God of his great promise to make the descendants of Abraham and Isaac as countless as the stars and to give them their own land.   We read that God let his anger abate and cancelled out his threats.

Also countless are the times when Israel has driven God to distraction with her selfish activities.   They tried his patience sorely.   Often I have marvelled at how God has stuck with those he has saved.   It seems that no one can be considered worthless or finished with because of their actions.   If we get it wrong we always find that last chance in our dealings with God.

How many of us, from time to time, despair of our garden?   In the eleven years I have lived here I have many times wondered how I can improve things in my garden.   There is a sense in which Jesus is the gardener in the fig tree story.   He may be thought of as such in that he tries, as the owner’s patience wears thin,  to dig around the tree and manure it to give it a last chance to fruit.   I never used to have a picture of Jesus as a gardener until I saw a unique window of Flemish stained glass in a church near where I live.   It must be the only artistic depiction of Jesus wearing a gardener’s hat.   The context is that where Mary Magdalene, seeking the body of Jesus by the tomb, sees Jesus and takes him for the gardener.   It reminds us that Jesus and his work can be clearly seen in gardening terms in that throughout each year with its seasons there is always work to do for a gardener who wishes to redeem his garden.   And this is certainly the case with Jesus, Lord and Saviour.

The Prodigal Son

The story of the Prodigal Son is completely impossible and can only be considered a work of fiction mixed with a little fantasy.   We know this story so well and yet we rarely consider its credibility.   When you read the New Testament you must first consider the place and time in which the stories are set.   It is totally wrong to simply make a quick comparison with life today and then proceed to expound on the stories that Jesus told.   I have to say, of course, that what all agree on is that it is a story about God’s grace.   This is the first thing we have to bear in mind.   But the setting is 2,000 years ago in a country with very different traditions than we have when and where we live.

The idea of a son going to his father and asking for his inheritance in advance is completely unthinkable.   There was a missionary working in the rural Middle East for many years.   Wherever he went he asked the same question: “Do you know of any case where a son sought his inheritance before his father died?”   The answer was always, “No.”   The question put related to recent times, and still there was no case to consider.   Nothing had changed in 2,000 years.   It just would not happen, and that was that.   We can, therefore, consider it only as a work of fiction.   Yet it is a story with an amazing message – nothing less than the grace of God.

It is a story full of the most unlikely scenarios.   That a son would approach his father and make such a request is to suggest he was saying that he wished his father was dead.   No son would ever do that.   The next unlikely thing is that his father complied with this request.   It would have been totally unthinkable.   If it had been true the father would have been distraught to say the least.   To have his son speak like this would have cut him to the quick.   He would have looked back at the years he had spent showing love to the boy, showing him how to do everything his own father had taught him.   He would have been incredibly sorrowful to have it all come to this.

For the son to have spent the money in a short time would also have been unthinkable.   He had been brought up on a farm in an environment where, regardless of the wealth of his father, every penny would have had to count in the way the father and his two sons ran the farm.   That was the way everyone worked.   He would have been carefully brought up to appreciate the value of everything.   He was not the son of someone like an oligarch where he could have led a completely safe and sheltered life with costly gifts on a regular basis.   Life on a farm was labour intensive and the hours were long – sunrise to sunset, day in day out.

Many years ago I bought a book called Hedingham harvest.   It was an account of the Victorian period of a particular family in Lincolnshire.   Grandfather was the farming head of the family, and he ruled with a rod of iron.   When it came to harvest time he hired in a steam engine and threshing machine.   Everyone in the family was out in the fields getting in the crop to be threshed.   Time was money and grandfather, although a successful farmer, would carefully time the breaks the workers took during the day.   As soon as he thought everyone had time to eat and drink he would whip them into line.   “Come on now, back to work, we’re breaking, we’re breaking!” he would cry.   He was paying for every minute that threshing machine was on his land and he insisted that no time was lost unnecessarily.

This is a parallel with the scene in the parable.   Every minute was made to count.   The very idea of a son carefully raised to appreciate the value of money going out and spending it recklessly was unthinkable.   Yet Jesus put it in his parable.   He knew what he was doing and why this story had to be told.   It had to be a story with an amazing message – nothing less than the grace of God.

The next part is equally difficult for a Middle East rural community 2,000 years ago to believe.   The young man, having spent everything, went to get work as a swineherd.   Just imagine – a Jew herding swine!   Jesus really adds plenty of graphic illustration to this story.   It really yells at his listeners, steeped in Judaism and all its tradition.   You can almost hear the scoffing of the people – a Jew herding swine?   Do me a favour!

Yet, the outcast by his own actions comes to his senses.   He can’t return the inheritance but he can go home and become a servant in his father’s household.   At least he would get food and drink and shelter.   So he pulls himself together and sets off for home to see if his father will employ him.   Despite his despicable actions he still believes his father will take him in as a servant.   Here is a measure of faith I find interesting.

To illustrate why I say this, I too must tell a story.   This story is true.   In the days of the Labrador fishing community there was a doctor who committed his life to working among them whilst they were out at sea.   Should any man suffer an injury or fall ill he would be called in to help.   One day a fishing boat crew called him in to help a young woman who was sailing with them as ship’s cook.   Although the crew did not realise it, she was pregnant and had developed a complication.   The doctor, Wilfred Grenfell, took her to the mainland and took care of her at a Moravian mission station.   He was able to deal with her condition but she had her own ideas.   “I can never go home, doctor.” She said.   “I just want to die.”   The shame of her pregnancy overcame everything and she did, indeed, die.   Grenfell buried her on the headland with this inscription, “and Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn thee.”

I feel sure that the shame attached to what he had done during that time he was away would have weighed heavily with that young man.   How could he go home after what he had done?   So desperate was he that he decided to throw himself at his father’s feet and beg for a job as a servant.   Anything was better than the life he had just then.   He would carry the shame for the rest of his days.   Nothing could change that.   But he was prepared to swallow his pride and beg for a job.    Despite all that had happened he believed his father would take him in.   So here is a measure of faith on his part.

Once more we have an incredible activity.   His father saw him coming and ran to greet him.   Older people never ran anywhere at any time.   It was completely undignified and it was a hot country too.   But run to meet him he did and flung his arms around him and kissed him.   Now that is a true welcome!   The son grovelled but the father ordered a celebration to be organised in honour of the son’s return.   The son would never have expected that!  

The older brother then returns from work and grumbles at the big welcome and the celebration.   After all, he has never once stepped out of line and never even had a kid to share with his friends in celebration.   His brother comes home after wasting all his money and the fatted calf,no less, is shared round!   It was an amazing story about nothing less than the grace of God.

Although it would be unbelievable to the people present, they were Jews whose history included the rescuing of the Children of Israel from Egypt.   There was a real echo of this going on here.   Later on in the history of Israel there was the return from exile of many Israelites.   Back home there were people none too pleased to see these people brought home again.   They had cared for the Promised Land whilst the others were in exile and now they had to share it with them again.   Not happy bunnies at all!   In the story of the prodigal they compare with the elder son who stayed home.   These people were who remained were the nucleus of the people we later hear called the Samaritans.   Those to whom Jesus spoke would most likely see this tale in a historical context too.

The whole point of this unbelievable story was that Jesus was demonstrating the true extent of God’s great love for them.    This amazing story was unbelievable and was so to give them an idea of what limitless love meant.   Jesus was speaking of God the Father whose joy and happiness were boundless at the coming home of just one sinner.   This is the great inheritance that is ours.   Remember what Paul wrote in Romans 8: “I am convinced that there is nothing in death or life, in the realms of spirits or superhuman powers, in the world as it is or the world as it shall be, in the forces of the universe, in heights or depths – nothing in all creation that can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

To his servants the father said, “For this son of mine was dead and has come back to life; he was lost and is found.”   Here we hear something we can probably understand as Christians.   There is no doubt that this story is about nothing less than the grace of God.   So we recognise God as the father in the parable.   Later he was to lose his son in death and receive him back again.   In the short space of time between death and resurrection Jesus was lost but then found in the amazing account of the Resurrection.

Looking at this parable today tells us much more than it meant when it was first told.   We have the reminder of how far the amazing grace of God was prepared to go.   If the fictional story of the Prodigal Son was unbelievable, how much more is the real story of God’s grace unbelievable?   Because it is unbelievable in the worldly sense it adds so much to our personal experience as we commit ourselves to God who gave everything that we might have life everlasting.   This gospel passage is about nothing less than the boundless grace of God.