The first time I remember consciously becoming aware of the question: “Why do good people seem to randomly suffer?” happened during the World Series Game between Oakland and San Francisco in October 1989. At the start of Game 3 at 5 p.m., a 6.9 earthquake rocked the Bay Area, causing the upper deck of the Nimitz Freeway to come crashing down on the lower deck of the interstate, killing 42 and injuring scores of motorists trapped inside their cars. The footage of that disaster still haunts me: rescue workers squeezing through the highway rubble searching for survivors; cameras on their helmets capturing the sound of radios still faintly playing music and motors still running.
Commuters coming home from work or running late to get to Candlestick Park that evening: in the blink of an eye, they were gone. Why, O Lord?
Those who came to Jesus in today’s Gospel were asking the very same question about their fellow countrymen and faithful Jews who died when the government attacked and towers fell. They were innocent, went the argument: they didn’t deserve to die.
Translation: we’re okay if the guilty suffer, but why, O Lord, the innocent?
We all in some way ask the very same questions in life: Why do bad things happen to good people? Why am I suffering with cancer, losing my job or going through a break-up? Why is this tragedy happening to me when I do my best to pray, to be kind to others and not break too many of the Commandments?
The questions are normal, of course, but Jesus uses these very same ponderings to bring forth something more important than the “whys” we often ask ourselves and God. More important than the “whys,” we should be asking: Am I ready?
We are all sinners, every last one of us. It makes us uncomfortable to admit that, but we are. We often choose sin over virtue; we choose our selfish selves over sacrificing for others. We ignore God’s ways and try to forge our own path. Each time we do, there are consequences for which we will one day have to answer before God. When our souls come before Him, what will He find?
It’s a sobering thought, and one that this season of Lent challenges us to look at: if I were at the Tower of Siloam or on the lower-deck of the Nimitz, and my life’s breath was taken from me in an instant, where would I spend eternity? Am I ready to face God should He call me back to Himself today?
Do I want to? Yes. Do you want to? I’m sure you’d say the same. But saying we want eternity and actively living life in order to accept the Eternal Gift of Forever-with-God are two different desires. It’s not enough to just say we want it.
We have to become through God’s grace a fruitful fig tree.
I love the parable Jesus uses as a follow-up to the “Why, Lord?” questions. Although upon first read the fig tree story seems out of place, Jesus actually uses it to call us all out for our sins – lovingly, of course.
You and I – our souls – are like beautiful fig trees planted by the Owner to whom we turn for nourishment, growth and life. The Owner of our tree and the field it is in – as well as everything around that field – demands to see fruit growing from the branches of our lives.
That fruit should bloom in a variety of ways: in how we love, serve, sacrifice and worship. Such growth is often seen in virtues and gifts poured into us by the Spirit of God: joy, peacefulness, patience and the rest. Those fruits should, when all is said and done, reflect the work (grace) of the Owner who loves our tree into existence.
And yet, as we all know, we fig trees often fail to produce, often taking from the soil but never really letting it nourish us. We exist without really living. We are planted but never truly grow in the ways we should.
And yet still, the Owner – the I AM of whom Moses encounters -- doesn’t give up on our little weak, non-producing tree. He says He wants to abandon us – who wouldn’t get frustrated with a plant that never seems to bloom as it should – but then steps in with one final attempt: sending the Gardner, one who works for three years to help the tree grow and bloom.
Hmmm … three years of toil in order to bring forth figs. What gardener do we know who spent three years acting so selflessly to help the tree grow?
What captures my heart in this parable is what the Gardner then says as he realizes the tree was still not producing figs of any kind: “Leave it for another year and I will cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it.”
Leave it and I will cultivate it: the very reason the Gardner we call the Christ went to Calvary. His blood poured out for us is the “fertilizer” He uses to cultivate. His Cross the instrument used to till the dirt around the tree in order to provide fresh nutrients for new life and growth.
This Savior-Gardner literally steps before the Owner of the Land all the barren trees within it and says to Him: Please give the tree another chance. Let me try again to save it.
The word for “Leave it” in the original Scripture text (Greek) language is the word “APHES,” meaning: forgive. In other words, Jesus steps in and says on our behalf: Forgive this barren tree. Forgive this lost soul. Forgive the ways in which fruit doesn’t grow yet. APHES – forgive.
It is the same translation wording that Jesus used to teach his disciples (and us) the Our Father prayer with its all-important line: Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive others. APHES. Jesus Christ, the Son of God and Second Person of the Trinity, became for us the Gardner who sacrificed His own life so that our tree would be given another chance to grow and bloom. He stepped in and became the APHES for our barren, fig-less trees, so that we in turn accept and offer APHES -- forgiveness.
The Owner’s Gardner never gave up on us (nor has the Owner I AM), and in fact believes in our potential, enough to give all in order that we may bear fruit and offer that produce to the Father-Owner one day when He comes back to claim His land.
Which He will – make no mistake about that. The Love we call the Christ always offers countless chances to seek His mercy and reconciliation up until the day the tower falls, the freeway collapses, the heart stops beating and the last breath is taken. It could be today; it could be 90 years from now.
The Lenten question remains: Is your tree ready? Is there fruit as evidence on the branches of your soul? Are you seeking, living and offering APHES? Or will the Owner and Gardner find zero figs upon our branches on the day He returns to reap what He has sown?