A Tree's Prayer

While preparing for a Sunday sermon I was meditating on the story of the fig tree told by Jesus in Luke's Gospel, Luke 13:1-9. Jesus uses the murder of some Galileans to make a couple of points about about calamity and God's patience. Sometimes we look around and think that the really bad stuff in life can't touch us, I mean, we're not like others, the people who deserve bad things in life! Jesus says essentially, "We're all in the same boat. Even if life seems to be all smooth sailing for us, we still need to make sure we're focused on being who God made us to be and doing what we are meant to be doing!"

And so Jesus illustrates the two-way street of being a follower of God's Way... God is patient, but God also expects us to be striving forward, trying to bring about the "fruit" we were meant to bear and share with the world. God's frustration is like the conversation in Luke 13 between the owner of the garden and the gardener: when will this tree finally get busy and do some good stuff? A tree which doesn't bear fruit is like a selfish human life which uses all of life's blessings only for itself. In contrast, we're meant to share the blessings of life!

So I wrote A Tree's Prayer, knowing that I need Jesus to be the power and source of anything I might do in this world, “Lord, I need more of you in me, to do as I was meant to do, and to be what I was meant to be." I need to get busy, and that means I need help.

Of course, Jesus knows this already. He said as much to the disciples in John 15:1-4, “I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more. You have already been pruned and purified by the message I have given you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in me."

I need more Jesus in me to be what I'm supposed to be and to do what I need to do. It's not about what I can do, but it all comes down to how much I'm willing to let Him take the lead and be my guide.

Be blessed, Rev . Todd