Mark 13:28-31
I once looked at a house that was for sale just down the street from me. It was small compared to others in the neighborhood, but it had good curb appeal—enough to welcome me through its front door on the Sunday afternoon of its open house.
I moved through the living room and the front bedrooms, but quickly discovered that the real “living” area of the house was a central patio space dedicated to a fig tree, of all things!
No, I didn’t buy the house, but I’ve been fascinated by my memory of the Fig Tree House ever since. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have the chance to look out each window in that house and see that grand tree? To be blessed by its bounteous dark green leaves in the wintertime, whether or not they had produced enough fruit in the past year for even one “figgy pudding”? To study the branches in the spring, trying to determine whether they could foretell a coming fig harvest? To hover over the branches again at the beginning of summer, lamenting that figs are a late summer fruit? And then, finally, to taste and see a bounteous supply of luscious figs!
Denise Levertov wrote, “How could we tire of hope—so much is in the bud!” In this Lenten season, hear Jesus’ lesson of the fig tree and form a habit of looking carefully and gratefully at the buds of God’s new life in the world.
Consider
What buds of hope do you see within you and around you?
Pray
Creator God, you continue to tell us the story of new life, beginning with the budding signs of spring. We look for your promises of resurrection and your words of hope. Thank you for creating all of this. Amen.