3rd Sunday of Lent, Year C
Today’s gospel reading from the holy Gospel according to Saint Luke, chapter 13, verse 6 to 9 gives us the parable of fig tree. Biblical scholars have explained this parable stating that the man in the parable who had a fig tree planted in his orchard and who expects fruitfulness from the fig tree is God. The fig tree symbolizes the Jews who are expected to bear spiritual fruit, but are not bearing fruit at all. The gardener in this parable represents God's patience and willingness to give his people another chance to turn to him and bear fruit. The three years time that the gardener sought fruits from the tree represents the three years of Jesus’s public life. Then the judgment to cut down the fig tree represents the punishment to be meted out to the Jewish people for not accepting Jesus, their Savior.
My dear friends in Christ, though this parable directly applies to the unbelieving and stubborn Jews in Jesus’s time, it points out and emphasizes how loving, patient, tolerant and compassionate God is to us, while serving as a warning to us, that unfruitfulness will ultimately lead to judgment. It even reminds us that the barren fig tree represents anyone and everyone who hears the gospel of Christ and refuses to accept it or put it into practice. Yes, it refers to us Catholic Christians who are lazy, lukewarm and tepid, who are only Catholic Christians in name and not in deeds.
Today’s parable of the fig tree calls us to Holiness of life this Lenten season so as to bear fruit through repentance and the renewal of our spiritual lives. This is why the lesson the parable of barren fig tree teaches us today is that we do have a second chance to come back to God, to repent of our sins, to reconcile ourselves to Him and to grow in our faith. So how can we utilize this second chance and come back to God this Lenten season so as to bear much fruit as we should? We can utilize this second chance given us today to come back to God and bear much fruit by being compassionate to others; by being forgiving to them; and by being patient with all.
Hence my brothers and sisters, this Lenten season, let us be compassionate to our brothers and sisters by seeing their suffering and striving to stop it. Let us be forgiving to all by making a conscious decision to release negative emotions like anger, resentment, and bitterness towards others who has wronged us. And lastly, let us be patient with others by showing understanding, tolerance, and calmness when dealing with their shortcomings and mistakes like the gardener in today’s gospel reading, who begged the owner of the orchard to leave the fig tree for another year and he will cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it; that it may bear fruit in the future.
