The Parable of the Barren Fig Tree, a sermon based on Luke 13: 6-9, preached on July 14, 2024

Friends, I was worried about partisan division and the state of our nation before one of the presidential candidates was shot. Yesterday, two people died. One was the 20-year-old shooter. He’s been killed. He killed one in the crowd. President Trump was injured, and as I pray for his healing, as I mourn with those who lost a loved one yesterday, I also worry over our nation, for it feels as though we are coming apart at the seams. It appears as though we are losing our grip on what makes our nation great. On the day the Constitution was signed, September 17, 1787, a woman named Elizabeth Powel asked Benjamin Franklin as he emerged from the Constitutional Convention, “Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?” “A republic,” he said, “if you can keep it.” Can we keep it? I’m starting to worry about that. However, here in this parable that we’ve just read, the Parable of the Sower, I see that Jesus is not so quick to give up as I am. “Cut it down,” the man says to the gardener, “Why should this fig tree be wasting soil?” Yet the gardener (who is Jesus, by the way) says to this man, “Why give up? Why not try something else?” That’s no radical suggestion. Just dig around it. Just add a little fertilizer. And this not-so-radical suggestion makes me think about the small things that God calls on us to do in the face of hopelessness. Just dig around it. Just add a little fertilizer. Just try. The first church I preached in was Druid Hills Presbyterian Church on Ponce De Leon Avenue in Atlanta. I was the summer intern. I preached my first three sermons there, which was daunting enough, but even more so because that church’s sanctuary was built to seat 1,000 people. It was a huge space, yet, each time I preached that summer, only 50 or 60 people were there. Most of my jokes went out from the pulpit and lost steam and petered before they reached anybody’s ears. It was empty in there. The church was dying, only nobody knew what to do about it. The fig tree was dying, and some there were ready to say, “Cut it down. It’s wasting soil. The members here can go to some of the other Presbyterian churches around. Let’s close this place down, for decline is inevitable,” they said. In fact, someone looked at the marquee sign out by the street and said it looked like a tombstone. They could imagine the inscription on the tombstone: “Here lies what was once a great church.” It was a sad place to be. One afternoon, someone heard that I had worked on a lawn maintenance crew. They asked me to consider planting some flowers out around the marquee, and that’s what we did. We pulled up the grass around it. We turned over the soil. We put down a little fertilizer and planted some flowers. It was a nice dose of life and beauty, and while I know those flowers didn’t save the church, sometimes my greatest wish is simply that we had faith enough to try. I wish we would give up on our giving up and find faith enough to doubt the negativity that pushes us to declare that all is lost. All is not lost. In the face of hopelessness, remember that the light of hope may flicker, but it’s just as likely to spread. “Who knows?” Mordecai asked in our first Scripture lesson, “Perhaps you have come to royal dignity for just such a time as this?” Who knows? Perhaps all the tree needs is a little bit of fertilizer? Who knows, maybe all we need to do is to break up the soil around its trunk? Perhaps you and I are here for just such a time as this. Perhaps this church is here for just such a time as this. I think about this church a lot. And I think about how many places in our world are so socially divided. Did you know that when politicians gauge the political leanings of a region, they look for Cracker Barrells and Whole Foods Grocery Stores? That’s because republicans tend to eat at Cracker Barrell and democrats like to shop at Whole Foods. There might be some truth to that. Certainly, our divided nation is becoming more and more divided. Parents worry that their children will marry outside of party lines. Churches lean to one pole or the other, too, but when I look around our pews, I see something different. I see an alternative to the depressing narrative that the evening news keeps us fixated on. While the news tells us that division is getting worse and worse, and that the left is further from the right now more than ever, I look around this sanctuary and I see people who I know don’t vote the same way, singing the same song. When I think about our food distribution ministry, I know that people who vote differently are serving the Lord together. When I hear about who all went to visit Marilyn Barton in the hospital last weekend, I know that here, there is something more important than which side will come out on top in November, and so I remember again that the fig tree isn’t dead yet. We just need to dig around it a little. We just need to fertilize the roots. We just need to remember that hope is not lost. “Don’t give up yet,” the gardener says. “Let’s try something else and see what happens,” for with God on our side, even our meager efforts may lead to long-lasting change if we simply try. Sometimes we get so stuck in habits that we can’t imagine trying anything new. A man in our church who has become a friend of mine is a specialist in habits. This man, his name is Neale Martin, and he told me that there are between 39,000 – 50,000 products in our local grocery stores, yet the average shopper buys the same 300 repeatedly. If you doubt that statistic, then think about the kind of ketchup you buy. Or the kind of mayonnaise. I believe my grandmother would have preferred that I marry a convicted felon over a woman who used a brand of mayonnaise other than Duke’s, which is what happens to all of us. With a few purchases, we blaze the trail, and over time, the trail we’ve blazed becomes a well-worn path, then it’s a rut that we can’t get out of. Likewise, we watch the same news, and we hear the same message. We talk to the people who think like we do, and we get sucked down the same rabbit trails. Try something new, Jesus says. Don’t give up. Dig around the roots. Add a little fertilizer. Befriend someone new. Think some new thoughts. Go out of your way to show kindness. Be open minded. Start asking more questions rather than standing in judgement. We’ve been trained not to talk politics at the dinner table, but what if we try something new: talking politics at the table and listening to people who think differently than we do? Or what about respecting people and loving those we disagree with? The fig tree may yet live. In fact, you and I, it may be that we are here for just such a time as this. Amen.