Episode Transcript
Hello friends and welcome to this week's episode of Gritz and the Gospel. My name is Reverend Katie Griffess and is great to have e-worshipping with me today. It is the third Sunday of Lent. We are moving swiftly toward Easter and I am so thankful that we are on this journey together. Let us come together now in a time of worship, the Lord do with you and also with you. Today's song, Lesson is from the 63rd song, verses 1-8. Here now these words of encouragement. Oh God, you are my God. I seek you. My soul thirst for you, my flesh, faints for you as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I've looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory, because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live. I will lift up my hands and call on your name. My soul is satisfied as with a rich feast, and my mouth praises you, with joyful lips. Then I think of you on my bed and meditate on you and the watches of the night. For you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I sing for joy. My soul clings to you. Your right hand upholds me. The word of God, for us the people of God. Thanks be to God. In this time of lent, let us come together and not just recite the same words of the apostles' creed. But say them with fresh ears and hear the words of this lent and season, embedded in the words of the creed. Friends, what do we believe? I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ his only son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried. The third day he rose from the dead, he ascended into heaven and said it at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty, from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen. Let us pray, dear Lord, as we come together today in this lent and season, help us stay focused on sacrifice. The sacrifices of your son and the wilderness, and the sacrifices that we choose to make during lent, that we may renew and replenish our spirits so that on Easter morning we may have an Easter moment, a renewal, a rebirth in you. Hear us now as we pray the words that your son, our Savior, taught us to pray. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, by kingdom come, by will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. We lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Where Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever, amen. Today's Gospel Lesson comes from the Book of Luke. We are still in the Gospel according to Luke. We are in the 13th chapter. We're going backwards a little bit. We're going back to the beginning of the chapter, and verses 1 through 9, with the parable of the fig tree. Hear now the word of the Lord. At that very time there were some present who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood pilot had mingled with their sacrifices. He asked them, do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way that they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you, but unless you repent, you will perish as they did. Then he told this parable, 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 man working the vineyard, see here for three years. Then he told this parable, 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 man working the vineyard, 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? He replied, sir, let 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. The word of God, for us the people of God. Thanks be to God. Would you pray with me? To Lord, as I come to share this message, let it be as meaningful and full of life for those that hear it as it was for me to receive it. The words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart, the acceptable in my sight, oh Lord, my strength and my redeemer. Here I go talking about plants again. It's natural to think that manure would be what I would want to talk about. Some people say I have plenty. But if you give me a chance, maybe we can learn something about faith while we talk about manure. My great grandmother, the mother of my grandmother, Gogi, gave me a few pieces of advice in the short time we had together. Lucy had some very important sayings that she passed on to us. But there is one that fits today's scripture. When she was planting her garden, she would say, you put a $2 plant in a million hole. The idea being that it wasn't the quality of the thing you were trying to get to bloom, but the dirt that it was planted in that made the difference. Red Georgia clay is not easy to dig in. And once you get a hole in the ground, it's not always easy to grow things in it. You have to add good things. You're a growing soil, peat, and you guessed it, manure. Things with nutrients and materials to encourage fruitfulness and growth. Now, Lucy was more likely to plant a chameleon than a fruit tree or a crop. But the same thing is true for gardens. It is the soil, a care that you put into the ground, the foundation of the plant that makes the biggest difference, that gives the plant a second chance to be fruitful. Today's scripture is typical of Jesus and how he teaches. People come to him with a problem or a question and he tries to answer them. And when they don't fully understand, he teaches them a parable that shows the point he's trying to make. The question today is about sin and injustice. The historical context of how the Galileans were seen in the Roman world can sound very familiar. The shedding of their blood mixed with sacrifices paints a pretty dim picture. They're being treated like and compared to animals. Sound familiar? Jesus, when then references a specific tragedy, were a building collapses on 18 people. The Romans were trying to say that it was the fault of the Galileans that the building fell. That somehow their sin caused the tragic event. They are foreign. They had different beliefs than the Romans. They deserved it. How many times do we see marginalized people living in subpar conditions? When tragedy strikes, they are the ones that are blamed for the poor conditions that cause the construction. It reminds me of the slum lords that don't take care of their buildings, because they know the people living there will never turn them in for fear of being deported or arrested. Tragedy often strikes and the whispers begin. Well, of course it happened in that neighborhood. Sound familiar? The two examples in the texture, unfortunately, still very relevant today. Well, they deserved it. It is in essence what the people following Jesus were saying. They were foreign and they were sinners, so they got what was coming to them. Sound familiar? Because it makes us uncomfortable, because it is not sunshine and roses, because we scrunch our noses and make that same face we make when we smell manure. We don't want to see the whole picture of what Jesus is calling people out for. We want to skip those verses and only talk about fig trees and vines and nice clean examples of how we should live. We don't want to be called out for the harm that we watch happen and do nothing about. Whitewashed Sunday School Jesus only tells fun stories, but the real Jesus saw injustice and named it. Worked to remind people what it really means to be a part of the Kingdom of God. Reminds us that it is open to everyone and not just a select fee. He points out the injustice of it all. So twice Jesus tells the people listening and accusing, no, you are no better than the Galileans. They need to repent just as badly and just the same as the people of Israel. And if any of them did just that no matter where they were from, or what accent they had or what language they spoke, they would find forgiveness. We all deserve a second chance. No one is more deserving than another or more lovable than another or more worthy than another. All we have to do is repent and we will be forgiven. It was revolutionary. It was pointed. It was not necessarily what the people wanted to hear, but it's what they needed to hear. It was the nourishing and the growth that needed to happen. So they could be part of the Kingdom. So they could bear fruit. Trees just like people need all kinds of nourishment to grow. Sometimes what a fig tree needs the most is smelly and difficult to work with. Sometimes what we need to grow is to get our hands dirty. And just to make sure they understood Jesus told a story about a farmer and his fig tree. And this is where we find the manure. The owner of the farm wants to chop down the tree because it's not profitable. It is not worthy of keeping if it is not going to bear fruit. But the farmer, the one who is actually working the land, the one that knows the trees and their potential says to the owner, let's try one more time. Let's give the tree a chance to get some nourishing, add some manure, build up the dirt and see what happens. And because the farmer intervened and gave the tree a chance at redemption, the tree thrived and was able to live. Do you hear the story of Jesus in there? Jesus was constantly telling the disciples in many ways the story of what would ultimately become our way to salvation. They may not have seen it in full. But the question is today, do we? Salvation is there for all of us, no matter who we are, no matter our religious background or what language we speak or what our skin color is, or who we love, the world may see certain sins or certain people as worse than the other, but God does not. We are all sinners in need of redemption. We are all in need of a little manure in our lives. We are all that $2 plant. Those times when we are not bearing fruit, when we sin, it is what keeps us from God. It makes him want to chop us down and separate us completely from him. But Jesus, the one who came down and worked among the trees, intervenes and gives us a second chance in life. His lessons, his teaching, his love, his sacrifice all contribute to how we can nurture our spirits and become fruitful again. We are the $2 plant that needs a million dollar hold to grow in. It takes some time and care with the farmer to reach that goal. It takes a little manure. Lucy also had one joke she used to tell. Ironically, it has a punchline that goes well with the scripture today. I'm sure that she would be thrilled to know that of all the things she did in her life, this is the way I choose to quote her today. She was very witty, so maybe she wouldn't mind all that much. Lucy and her Montgomery family were from Millageville. Of course, the one joke she had was about patience and orderlies at Central State Hospital. It goes something like this. Two patients were in the common room gazing out the window overlooking the garden at Central State. Some of the orderlies came by and were talking about how they needed to put manure on the strawberries that afternoon. One patient looks at the other and says, they say, I'm the crazy one, but I put cream on that strawberries. The joke cracked Lucy up every time she told it. It is so funny because it is so true. We can all use a little manure on our strawberries or our fig trees. It is the thing that gives us a chance to actually bear fruit. The forgiveness we need to save us from being chopped down. So when people say I'm full of manure, I'm going to start taking it as a compliment. Yes, I am and proud of it. It means I make a lot of fig preserves. It means that people can see God in me through the fruit that I bear. Full manure and proud of it. I think I might put that on a t-shirt. Amen. As we go throughout our week, let us look for chances to be fruitful. Let us look for chances to have the base of our tree enhanced with a little manure from the Jesus that we call our Savior. Because in life and death and life beyond death, God is with us. We are not alone. Thanks be to God. Amen.
