Bazaar United Methodist Church

Bazaar, Kansas

February 22, 2009
Sermon Text
Luke 13:6-9

Where's the Fruit?

6 Then [Jesus] told this parable: "A man had a fig tree growing in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it but did not find any. 7 So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, 'For three years now I've been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven't found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?'
8 " 'Sir,' the man replied, 'leave it alone for one more year, and I'll dig around it and fertilize it. 9 If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.' " Luke 13:6-9 TNIV

Jesus is talking in parables again. This man has a fig tree growing in his vineyard. It was not uncommon to plant fig trees in vineyards. They have a shallow root system that will not rob nutrients from the vines. So the owner goes and looks for figs on the tree expecting to find some, but he finds none. Obviously it must be the time for figs or the owner would not be seeking figs. Now he has been looking for figs for three years but has found none. He's been patient. It takes new fig trees three years to produce. But now it's time and there are still no figs. "Cut it down!" he says. "Why should it use up good soil?" But the gardener convinces him to give the tree one more year. He will dig around it, fertilize it and see to it that it has the best of chances. If it then doesn't bear fruit, it should be cut down.

So, do you think Jesus is really talking about fig trees? Or is he really talking about people? Well, if you're a fig tree and I'm a fig tree and Jesus comes along looking for fruit in us, the question is; does he find fruit? Is there love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness or self-control demonstrated in our living? Or are we just taking up space? Are we pew potatoes in the church and the chosen frozen in the world? Or have we so given our lives over to Christ Jesus that he dwells within us sufficiently that when a fruit inspector comes along they see evidence of fruit everywhere?

My clergy friend, Bud, used to say, "I'm not here to be anybody's judge. But I am a fruit inspector." The fact is that when we leave the doors of this church just about everybody we meet is a fruit inspector. They know you and I come here. They know we belong to a faith community that talks about these fruits; especially love, joy, and peace. And quite frankly, even if they can't name them they expect us to practice patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control. If we fail to demonstrate the fruits of the Spirit in our lives then they don't believe us when we say we are Christians and that Jesus makes a difference in our lives. They think we're frauds.
That seems to be what the owner of the vineyard thought about his fig tree. It was a fraud. Here it was smack dab in the middle of the vineyard, taking up vital soil, leafed out and looking like it should produce a delectable crop of figs. But it only presented a great facade. It was a fake; lots of good healthy leaves but no fruit to show for all that effort. So you and I go to all this effort; we get out of bed each Sunday, we get up get dressed, get ready and come to church. But is that enough effort to produce fruit? No, not really. It takes more than just showing up, doesn't it? It takes those disciplines of study and prayer and service and Christian conferencing as well as worship and meditation and contemplation to bear really good fruit. We may bear some fruit, we may even have born fruit in the past that is rather shriveled and dried up at present-do you have fruit like that? Or we may have some fruit that has just plain rotted and fallen from the tree. Do you have fruit like that? What will the fruit inspector say about that when he comes checking for fruit? I, personally, am not fond of rotten fruit. . .and I only like the dried stuff that was intentionally dried, not the kind that was just neglected until it shriveled up.

We get plenty of opportunities for growth but many of us don't take advantage of the ones with which we are presented. Or we don't ask for those we want. I have said I was willing to do a day time study if anyone was interested but only one person has said that they would be interested in that. Now maybe if I just scheduled the class some of you would sign up for or come to it. And gentlemen, just because I am a female pastor doesn't mean that classes should be for women only. Since when do men not need to grow spiritually as much as women do? When did men abdicate all spiritual roles to women? You know there are still those churches where women are not allowed to teach or preach or be in any leadership role. I certainly don't advocate that, but I don't think men should just abdicate all roles to women either. The fruit on our trees will not be well-rounded if we only have input from a single gender. And who wants flat fruit?

The benefit of diversity is that we see things from different perspectives and are therefore able to learn from one another. It is one of the dangers of living in a community that is homogeneous. We look too much alike, often think alike and talk alike. It means that no new ideas are able to break in to our little boxes. We get too tied up in what has been or the way we like it rather than breaking out into new ways of doing things.

Where's the fruit? I don't know about you but I am glad that I have yet another chance before I have to answer that question. That's one of the great graces God gives us. Every day we get to get up and start over. Where's the fruit? What fruit will I produce today? What will I work toward with my attitude? Will I show gratitude and love and joy or will I get up on the wrong side of the bed and be grumpy and angry with everyone I meet?

Larry tells me about a man he meets down at the Port of Houston. If you get there early in the day, meeting him is like meeting someone who has been chewing nails and eating poison. He couldn't care less about your needs; he is cranky and crummy to deal with. But if you come in around 4:00 near the end of the day he is all smiles, he jokes with you and is in a good temper. Now the only thing that Larry can figure out about this guy is that he really hates his job. He hates being there. He hates what he does. But in the last couple hours of the day he knows he's about ready to go home. He can happy up because he's almost done with what he hates and he can go to the place he loves. The problem with such a life is that it shows no fruit throughout the day. And it produces a lot of stress both for him and for those around him. It would be easy to become shriveled fruit if you were around such a person day in and day out.

But the good news of the parable is that the gardener asks for an extra year to dig around and fertilize the tree, to give it special attention. You see that is the constant good news of the Gospel. We have the God of Second Chances and third and fourth and infinite chances until the day we die. God does not give up on us. This parable helps us learn about God's patience with our failings. God is in no hurry to pass final judgment on us. To borrow an image from modern psychology, God appears to have a "type B personality," that is, God is more interested in encouraging us over and over again to be productive, positive, to be in the process of "bearing fruit," than in assessing the final, absolute, end result.

That's good news to me! Some days I feel like a barren tree. I like to know that the gardener is interceding on my behalf; willing to go to bat for me, desiring that I should have every chance to do better. But that also means that in the next year I should not be in the same place that I am today. I ought to be able to show more fruit than I have now; more fruit, better fruit. That means I need to work, to practice. I am not off the hook just because the gardener is interceding for me.

What about you? Where's the fruit? Is it better this year than last year? Will it be better next year? Can anybody else in looking at the life you lead name any of the fruits of the Spirit as belonging to you? Do you exude love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control? Are you willing to choose love, think love and act love so that the other fruits will follow as you grow in grace?

The autobiography of E. Stanley Jones is titled A Song of Ascent, and is considered to be one of the great spiritual classics. Jones was a great man: a missionary to India, a friend to Gandhi, a tireless world traveler, and a great writer and speaker.

What is amazing, is that this book was actually his third attempt at an autobiography. And he was 83 at the time. He had written two previous books but had been unwilling to publish them. The first, he said, was too filled with the little events of his life-things he judged not worth telling. In the second attempt, he tried to take the events of his life and to use them to philosophize about life in general. But even this, he decided, was not the right focus. The third time, he determined, he was going to begin with Jesus, and that's what he did. You see, what he discovered after two bad attempts was that he had been working backwards; he had been working from life events to the Christ Event. And now, in his third attempt, he found he had it wrong. As he would say in his introduction to that third book: "Christ has been, and is, to me The Event."

In the third and successful book he concentrated on the Event and worked back to life events, understanding his own life in the light of Christ.

Now, I know how hard writing can be. And to think that Jones threw away not one but two manuscripts, the second of which was 596 pages long, because he had made a bad beginning of it. Well, that is almost incomprehensible.

But Jones had learned, what all of us can learn from his example, that none of us has to stay with a bad beginning. None of us has to live with a bad shot. None of us has to be content with the mistakes of the past, and any guilt that may tie us to them. We have an advocate, a gardener if you will, who will free us from such burdens, who will give us courage to try again, and who will stand by us in the efforts we make to live as his people.

Maybe this day the owner will come. What will his judgment be? Fruit? Maybe it has been a barren year?

But wait ... I hear some discussion going on. The gardener who has loved us from birth when he watered us into life and growth, the gardener is pleading for us.

And look! The owner has agreed; and agreed with alacrity, because he created us and loves us with an everlasting love.

Okay! Tend and feed us, dear gardener. We are thirsty and hungry for what you have to give us. And we will work and seek to bear the fruit of your love and favor. Amen and Amen."