26 October 2016 - fig-ured out

Image by Angeles Balaguer from Pixabay

Today's Readings
(Audio)

'For three years now I have come in search of fruit on this fig tree     
but have found none.
So cut it down.
Why should it exhaust the soil?'
He said to him in reply,
'Sir, leave it for this year also,
and I shall cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it;
it may bear fruit in the future.
If not you can cut it down.'"

The LORD himself is the gardener who does all he can to help us bear fruit. The law was powerless to help us bear this fruit. It insisted, yes, that we bear fruit. But when we did not and could not it was only able to speak in condemnation. We were sinners heading toward death. The law told us this was our just fate. It seemed inevitable. The tower would have eventually collapsed upon us. Our blood would have been mingled with the blood of our sacrifices.

do you think they were more guilty
than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem?
By no means!
But I tell you, if you do not repent,
you will all perish as they did!

In his mercy the gardener prolonged the time before our judgment (see Romans 2:4). And he did not leave without help. He cultivated the ground and fertilized us by the Holy Spirit he poured out.

and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
But you are not in the flesh;
on the contrary, you are in the spirit,
if only the Spirit of God dwells in you.

Although our bodies are still going to experience death even so is everything different, transformed for us, by the Spirit inside.

But if Christ is in you,
although the body is dead because of sin,
the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you,
the one who raised Christ from the dead
will give life to your mortal bodies also,
through his Spirit that dwells in you.

May we not try to grow in arid soil without the nutrients we need. We need all the help the gardener desires to give. And he does desire to give it. So let us open our hearts to the Holy Spirit this morning. Let us open ourselves to his fruit.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law (see Galatians 5:22-23)