Service for March 23 Third Sunday of Lent
“No I tell you, unless you repent,…”
I once helped a friend start a community farm in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. He and his church became aware of some abandoned parcels of land in the neighborhood. we cleared weeds and trash, we also took soil samples and sent them away. We were sobered to find elevated lead levels in the soil. No matter where we or anyone planted in much of that town, we’d confront this consequence of 20th century coal-fired steel-making, leaded automotive fuel and building waste. And this was a neighborhood we people didn’t have the resources or the social power to get the those with power and resources to remedy the problem.
So rather than abandon the vision or the place, the church’s task to remediate the soil. We had to research means to remediate, like a remedy, remediate the soil, so that the neighborhood could more easily grow good food there. It can be done, and all the ways are expensive- it would take work, tools, treatments, money or time, and maybe all of them. Excavate the soil and replace it with new topsoil, treat the soil with expensive solvents and a sealed vacuum bag system, grow fungus or plants that can remove the lead, increase the humus content with lots of compost, which would be a kind of biochemical shield between plants and lead. Remediation would be a pretty big effort. We didn’t see US Steel knocking on our door to help. But he church and the people they came to work with, chose to follow the call of that effort, because that place and its people, made in God’s image, were worth it.
I thought about all this memory as I read the gospel passage this week, with its story of gardening, which Jesus tells to let the listeners consider that unless you repent... What do we mean by repent? What does Jesus mean by repent? The greek word means something like ‘to change your mind’ or ‘change your heart.’ A fundamental change in your outlook and understanding, what is worth pouring your time, money, attention, life energy into, how you look at and are with others and the world and yourself and God. There are two related hebrew words for repent. One means to comfort, to be sorry for, or regret something. Another, means to literally turn around. So, Repentance, to repent,means a change within us that embraces our whole being, and it changes what we do, how we do it.
And that change isn’t self-initiated. America loves self starters and go getters. Well, repentance means God is the one who starts all good things, and we are unashamed to be grateful recipients of that common gift. It means we live into the reality of God remediating, remedying, remediating the soil of our hearts and life. As people who receive and live from the remediation God undertakes in us and through, maybe we can even become people who do small things with great love.
Jesus tells a story about what it means to repent. Yes, we expect fruit! But there is a better way to do that. And that means remediation, an effort to tend, heal, repair, mend, nurture. It takes time, and patience and humility. The gardener meets the man who was so disappointed to find no fruit. He is overheated, demanding, very clear that the tree must but cut! The gardener meets that zeal, urgency, even rage.
“Sir!” You can imagine that the gardener has his attention now. Not too many gardener’s would address him like that. Imagine it… “Let it alone for one more year,… until I dig around it…, and put manure on it…this tree is worth it. and I know more about trees than you, speaking respectfully sir. this tree is worth it, that fruit would taste so good, and good things take time. And stop, think, for a minute-how would you feel when you take your grandkids out for a walk next spring and they ask “where is that fig tree we planted with you?”
And God graciously sees that you and I are worth it, and don’t we want to let God cause us to repent to turn around, change us, remediate us?
Sermon, RCL C, 3rd Lent, 3-23-25
The Rev. Evan G Clendenin