The Fruit of Repentance

The Church is always talking about bearing fruit, so today I thought I would write about the fruit of repentance. Fruit always starts with a seed which is planted, nurtured, and eventually harvested. Where is your seed of repentance?

At that time, there were some present who told Jesus of 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 thus? I tell you, No; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen upon whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them, do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, No; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.” And he 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, ‘Lo, these three years 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, ‘Let it alone, sir, this year also, till I dig about it and put on manure. And if it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’”

Luke 13.1-9

The image of the fig tree is used several times in the Scriptures to teach about spiritual life. I have a fig tree in my yard, the roots of which my family has nurtured for more than fifty years. I have taken the roots to each place where I live and started a new tree. This one hits home.

When the tree is young and just rooting it requires daily care. As the years go by and the roots are established, eventually it bears fruit but not without constant attention. It isn’t the same attention as a fresh sprout, but attention nonetheless.

Ironically, you don’t need seeds to grow a fig tree, but from early sprout to fruit much is still the same. The tree requires pruning and feeding in addition to watering. Once the fruit begins to emerge special attention is required since figs do not ripen off the tree and bugs love figs.

Enough about fig trees except to say they are almost impossible to kill even if they are neglected. They might not bear good fruit, but even the most novice gardener can enjoy tending a fig tree, which makes it even more shocking that the fig tree in the Gospel had no fruit.

The gospel uses this image to teach about repentance. The gardener promised to give it more attention so it would bear fruit. His repentance was expressed by his commitment to give it the attention it needed and deserved.

I hope you were thinking about the ‘fig tree’ in your spiritual life as you read the story. The only way for our spiritual life to bear fruit is when we give it the attention it needs and deserves. In calling us to repentance Christ compares us to others who died without repentance.

“Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.” These words should pierce our soul. We’ve been warned so many times, just as the man returned for three years expecting to harvest figs. The story gives us ‘one more chance’ to produce the fruit of our repentance.

Obviously, we are not trees, but we still must give our souls attention from the early stages of joining the church to the later stages of harvesting fruit. Repentance isn’t an action. Repentance is a change of attitude. Instead of ignoring our soul, we must change our attitude and nurture it.

We must feed it holy things like reading the Holy Scriptures and participating in the Sacraments of the Church including Holy Confession and Holy Communion. We must prune it through the discipline of fasting, and we must propagate it through our love for others. We must protect it from invaders like sin and temptation through constant prayer.

Consider the Gospel reading today as request for more time from gardener. He was given another year. We have been given more time to produce the fruit worthy of our soul, worthy of being harvested by God.

Interestingly we don’t know if the tree ever had fruit. The Parable ends with the hope for future fruit. That’s where I will leave it too. Now, we have hope that our soul care bear fruit for God to harvest through our repentance. Let’s get to it!