Fruit and the Fig Tree / Luke 13:1-9 / Pr. Ted A. Giese / Sunday March 23rd 2025 / Season of Lent / Mount Olive Lutheran Church

Mount Olive Lutheran Church / Pr. Ted A. Giese / Sunday March 23rd 2025: Season of Lent / Luke 13:1-9 “Fruit and the Fig Tree”

There were some present at that very time who told [Jesus] about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And He answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”

And [Jesus] told this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it and found none. And he said to the vinedresser, ‘Look, for three years now I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down. Why should it use up the ground?’ And he answered him, ‘Sir, let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put on manure. Then if it should bear fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’”

Let us pray: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in Your sight O Lord. Amen.

Grace peace and mercy to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Good Christian Friends you cannot find what isn’t there to find. This is the central problem that Jesus’ Parable of the Fig Tree in our Gospel Reading presents: “Look, for three years now I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none.” Think back to the days leading up to Jesus’ Public Ministry when [John the Baptiser] saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, [John] said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”[1] Does this not sound familiar to what we hear from Jesus today in our Gospel Reading from the Gospel of Saint Luke? A warning that the tree that doesn’t bear fruit is in danger of being cut down and removed, that an axe for chopping is laid at the root of the tree. And who is the warning for? It was a warning for the many Pharisees and Sadducees who had come to John the Baptiser at the River Jordan from Jerusalem seeking to be baptised,[2] and by extension it is even for us.  

Keeping this is mind the Vineyard of Jesus’ parable today is the Promised Land, Israel, or in that time what was called the Roman Province of Judea[3] and all its rightful inhabitants. The Fig Tree then is the city of Jerusalem which was planted there in the Vineyard along with its leaders. Jesus’ parable combines the Old Testament picture of the Righteous Good Man as a fruit bearing tree that bears good fruit in season and out of season like you find in Psalm 1, “He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers,”[4] and in Jeremiah, “He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit,”[5] with the picture of the Vineyard which they would have been familiar with from passages like this in Isaiah:

       Let me sing for my beloved

               my love song concerning His vineyard:

        My beloved had a vineyard

               on a very fertile hill.

        He dug it and cleared it of stones,

               and planted it with choice vines;

        He built a watchtower in the midst of it,

               and hewed out a wine vat in it;

        and He looked for it to yield grapes,

               but it yielded wild grapes.

        And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem

               and men of Judah,

        judge between Me and My vineyard.

        What more was there to do for My vineyard,

               that I have not done in it?

        When I looked for it to yield grapes,

               why did it yield wild grapes?

        And now I will tell you

               what I will do to my vineyard.

        I will remove its hedge,

               and it shall be devoured;

        I will break down its wall,

               and it shall be trampled down.

        I will make it a waste;

               it shall not be pruned or hoed,

               and briers and thorns shall grow up;

        I will also command the clouds

               that they rain no rain upon it.

        For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts

               is the house of Israel,

        and the men of Judah

               are his pleasant planting;

        and He looked for justice,

               but behold, bloodshed;

        for righteousness,

               but behold, an outcry!”[6]

So again the Vineyard of Jesus’ parable today is the Promised Land, Israel, or what in that time encompassed what was called the Roman Province of Judea. The Fig Tree then is the City of Jerusalem which was planted there in the Vineyard. The important thing to remember here is that Jesus is utilising images that they already know from Scripture, images that they already know the meaning of, warnings that they have already been given in the past; Jesus isn’t giving them something that they wouldn’t be able to understand if they had ears to hear and eyes to see. It will only be the spiritually blind and deaf who will be unable to pick up what Jesus is putting down here. The ones with a repentant heart will hear this call to repentance and perceive what is being said to them.       

In this parable the owner of the Vineyard is God the Father and the Vinedresser is His Son Jesus. Now when you consider the leading men of Judah planted in the city of Jerusalem in the days of Jesus’ Public Ministry remember that the Owner of the Vineyard is not the problem, remember that the Vinedresser is not the problem, the Vineyard is not the problem either it is the Fig Tree that has become the problem. The problem is Jerusalem and even more specifically those Scribes and Pharisees and Sadducees who are not yielding the fruit that the Owner of the Vineyard desires to see and at best are yielding wild fruit not in keeping with what is desired of them. Jesus had earlier warned, “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree,” [Jesus says] “cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.”[7]

Jesus’ Public Ministry spanned over three years and each year Jesus would have made the pilgrimage to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover and each year the Owner of the Vineyard would likewise be seeking fruit on the Fig Tree of the City of Jerusalem. As we’ve established “this Vinedresser is undoubtedly Christ.” But dear ones, “The idea [of this parable] is not that [God] the Father is severe, [and] that Jesus [His Son] alone is merciful, for [remember within the parable] the Father accepts the intercession [on behalf of the Fig Tree], and Jesus [accepts the possibility of] the cutting down [of the Fig Tree]. We should not [therefore] erase the wrath by mercy, nor lose sight of the mercy because of the wrath. Both are real, neither is absolute. Jesus is the mediator.”[8] Take to heart what Saint Paul teaches about this Mediator in his letter to the Christians of Rome, “Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us,”[9] and in Paul’s first letter to Timothy, “For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time.”[10] Jesus mediates for the Fig Tree, for Jerusalem and for the people in it even in the face of death, and He will on Good Friday still act as mediator for them even while they are abusing their authority and fraudulently orchestrating His crucifixion when from the cross Jesus prays on their behalf pleading, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”[11] Both the Vinedresser and the Owner of the Vineyard are concerned for the Fig Tree.

Over and over again, all through the Old Testament, all through the Public Ministry of Jesus right up to His final breath upon the cross “Judgment is preceded by an intercession of grace … [and yet] we should look at it from God’s [vantage point]. This supreme effort of grace [also] cuts off every shadow of excuse; [think on what you heard from Isaiah:

        What more was there to do for My vineyard,

               that I have not done in it?[12]

And from Saint Paul we hear what the Lord says not just of Jerusalem but of all of Israel, “All day long I have held out My hands to a disobedient and contrary people.”][13] In the end the sinner himself sees this, is compelled to admit it, and his complete self-blame makes his punishment [all the more clear to see].”[14] And so it would have been for those who opposed Jesus, opposed His heavenly Father, opposed the workings of the Holy Spirit as They repeatedly sent watchmen to warn them,[15] to protect them, to provide for them the way of escape, that they may be able to endure the temptations towards a fruitless life of sin.[16] It is like we hear in our Old Testament reading: “if you warn the wicked to turn from his way, and he does not turn from his way, that person shall die in his iniquity, but you will have delivered your soul.”[17] Jesus warns the people of Jerusalem, warns the many Pharisees and Sadducees and leading men of the City of Jerusalem that the axe is at the root of their tree: that they are in danger. And yet as the Mediator He also teaches in the Temple where they can hear His Word, the very Word of God, where Jesus the Good Vinedresser digs around the Fig Tree and puts on manure on it to fertilise it, He does this with His word as He teaches them, he does this with His Word in order to bring forth fruit.

I ask you, if you have a fruit bearing tree that has struggled to produce fruit or isn’t bearing fruit at the moment, does it do so in instant that you have pruned it, does it bear fruit as soon as you have fertilised it, does it bear fruit the moment you’ve watered it? No. We are often impatient, we want to see results immediately, yet the fruit takes time to grow. This Parable of the Fig Tree shows the patience of both the Owner and the Vinedresser, their willingness to cultivate fruitfulness and their concern for the Fig Tree that they have planted. Now you’ll notice that in the parable there is no answer as to whether the Fig Tree did or didn’t bear fruit in keeping with repentance.[18] There is a reason for this. In the telling of the Parable leading up to the Cross and Passion of Jesus’ Crucifixion it remained to be seen, especially by the hearers of the parable, whether or not the fruit would come? The innocent shed blood of Jesus upon the cross and the death and burial of His body placed in the tomb dug out of the stone upon which Jerusalem was built acted as fertiliser and watering for the faith of many and later after Jesus’ Easter Sunday resurrection we hear how “the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith.”[19] Those priests where Levites which may have includes some from the party of the Sadducees who where made up of Levites. Then there were some leading men like Joseph of Arimathea a member of the Sanhedrin[20] and Pharisees like Nicodemus[21] and Saul who we know as Saint Paul who turned from their ways and followed Jesus, the axe was at the root of their tree but was not used to cut them down. In the year 70 the axe would swing on Jerusalem, and with fire the City was to be burnt down, it was not the Vinedresser who swung the axe but the Roman Empire; but at that time there was fruit in keeping with repentance flourishing in the church all around the Mediterranean among those who had heard the warning and held fast to the forgiveness that Jesus provides.

Dear ones “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things [Saint Paul says] there is no law.  And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit [Saint Paul says] let us also keep in step with the Spirit.”[22] These fruits we find first in Christ Jesus and His love for us, and then as ones grafted into Him we find these fruits in our Christian lives. Pray each day that with loving patience the Lord will cultivate these fruits in our hearts and bring them forth in our daily lives for His glory and the good of our neighbour. Amen.    

Let us pray: Lord have mercy on us, Christ have mercy on us, Lord have mercy on us, “take our minds and think through them, take our lips and speak through them, take our hearts and set them on fire; for the sake of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, Amen.

[1] Matthew 3:7–10
[2] Matthew 3:5
[3] The Roman Province of Judaea, incorporated Judea, Samaria, and Idumea/Edom, from 6 AD to 135 AD.
[4] Psalm 1:3
[5] Jeremiah 17:8
[6] Isaiah 5:1–7
[7] Matthew 7:15–20
[8] The Interpretation of St. Luke’s Gospel, R.C.H. Lenski, Augsburg Publishing House 1946, Page 730.
[9] Romans 8:34
[10] 1 Timothy 2:5–6
[11] Luke 23:34
[12] Isaiah 5:4a (Isaiah 5:3-5)
[13] Romans 10:21
[14] Lenski, Page 732.
[15] Ezekiel 33:7–20
[16] 1 Corinthians 10:13
[17] Ezekiel 33:9
[18] Matthew 3:8; Luke 3:8
[19] Acts 6:7
[20] Mark 15:43; John 19:38
[21] John 3:1-21; 7:40-53 19:38-42
[22] Galatians 5:22–25

Photo Credit: Detail of painting of ripe figs in variouse stages of ripeness from wallpaperdelight.