Made Clean in Fertilizer
The world tells us we get what we deserve, while the gardener, aka Jesus, tells us he will continue to care for and nurture us until we produce fruit.
Two weeks ago, I packed up all my Apple products and a fresh shirt and headed to Nashville for a training I was looking forward to attending. Some people go to Nashville for the Honky-tonk bars or food. Not pastors. We go to Nashville to sit in dank church basements from sunup to sundown.
The group assembled in the basement of Belmont United Methodist Church was nearly exclusively Methodist. 9/12 of us are knee-deep in United Methodist polity and doctrine, while the three outsiders had already had the experience of denominational divorce.
When pastors attending a training or a meeting have downtime, they do what most of you would assume we would do; namely debate church doctrine as though our discussion, and my correct opinions, will right the ship that is the United Methodist Church heading toward a Titanic-sinking iceberg.
The conversation we had in Nashville echoes the opening verses from today’s scripture reading.
I do not know how often I have heard someone asserting something is a sin by saying, “but the Bible says!” while they themselves are violating several codes, Laws laid out in the Bible.
What constitutes sin?
And, what is God’s response to our sin?
My two favorite log in the eye or biblical foot in the mouth moments come when someone says, “but the Bible says,” while they are wearing a garment made of mixed fabrics – Leviticus 19:19 states that is a Biblical no-no. Or men, saying, “you know the Bible says,” while they have shaved off their facial hair, clearly ignoring Leviticus 19:27.
Our questions about sin, or our insistence that others are more sinful than we are discussed in a manner similar to the question posed to Jesus.
Before our scripture reading, Jesus had been teaching about settling disputes with others, i.e., how to address the sins committed against and by neighbors.
Jesus said, “when you go with your accuser before a magistrate, on the way make an effort to settle the case, or you may be dragged before the judge, and the judge hand you over to the officer, and the officer throw you in prison. I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the very last penny.”[1]
Jesus had barely gotten the words out of his mouth when his audience deflected their attention away from themselves and toward those who had been ordered to be killed by Pilate. It is almost as though Jesus’ audience did not want to acknowledge their own sin, so they deflected attention elsewhere by asking a question like, “didn’t those people get what they deserved?”
“Jesus, you know what it is says in the Bible, didn’t they deserve that punishment?” the crowd asks.
Jesus has a way of addressing questions that are the wrong question to be asked at the moment. Jesus pivots the conversation toward the Kingdom of God.
Jesus’ ministry was constantly pointing toward the grace and mercy of God.
Grace and mercy.
Mercy and grace.
Over and over again.
If you ever want to know the answer to the question, “What Would Jesus Do?” the safe answer is the assume the answer has something to do with mercy and grace.
Mercy for those who need healing.
And grace – “forgiveness we can’t earn”[2] – for those who turn against God’s will for our lives.
Sin is the thing we do that God explicitly tells us not to do, i.e., the Ten Commandments.
But sin is also the thing we do when we do not do the things God explicitly tells us to do, i.e., loving God with all our heart, mind, and strength and loving one another.
Jesus takes the question head-on because all of us have fallen short of the glory of God. All of us at one time or another have either failed at God’s top ten or have been unable to love God, our neighbor, or ourselves.
Jesus interrupts the conversation with his pivot because, as Archbishop Michael Curry points out, if God dealt with sin through punishment – killing people because they failed to do what the Bible says – there would not be anyone left on the planet.
God’s kingdom, Jesus points out, is different from the empires and kingdoms of the world. In a world where getting what you deserve is the norm, Jesus is saying there is another way. Jesus is gathering the world into a new way of life where we are less focused on what the Bible says and instead lean into mercy and grace.
Grace and mercy.
Mercy and grace.
Over and over again.
Jesus closes the scene with a parable.
Parables are stories with an earthy feel that point to Biblical truth.
“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?’”[3]
I know less about gardening than I do about getting pastors together and not talking about church doctrine. It seems to be good practice to remove the tree from the vineyard. After all, the vineyard owner is probably concerned about nutrients being wasted on a non-producing tree.
Again, I don’t know much about trees, but that makes sense.
Then Jesus says, “He (the gardener) 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.’”[4]
The opposite of what the ways of the world tell us. Instead of cutting down the tree, the gardener insists on caring for the tree for another year. And if after a year the tree is still not producing fruit, I am confident the gardener would again petition for more time.
The world tells us we get what we deserve, while the gardener, aka Jesus, tells us he will continue to care for and nurture us until we produce fruit. Manure, fertilizer, was extremely valuable in the ancient world. The gardener is willing to pay a high price for the tree he is tending to bear fruit, and the gardener is the One who will pay a high price, willingly, on the cross for us.
The hope we need in a world broken by sin is that our fruitfulness comes by the laboring of the divine gardener, the One who is devoted to the flourishing, the fruitfulness of all creation, despite what our sin says about us.
By gathering all of creation up in his mercy and grace, Jesus is cultivating us toward fruitfulness, answering the question pastors love to debate with one another in large arenas and dank church basements – “how has God has dealt with our sin?”
The starting point for us is to repent, turning away from the bright lights of sin and toward the faithfulness of the gardener. The One who promises never to forsake or abandon. The One who has covered us in the manure of his divine grace so that we are made clean by his righteousness.
Grace and mercy.
Mercy and grace.
[1] Luke 12:58-59, NRSV
[2] Spufford, Francis. Unapologetic: Why, Despite Everything, Christianity Can Still Make Surprisingly Emotional Sense. Pg. 166.
[3] Luke 13:6-7, NRSV
[4] Luke 13:8-8, NRSV