Fig Tree Ponderings

In the mornings this month I've been using the "The Word in Season" devotional produced by Augsburg Fortress.

Saturday's reading was Mark 11:12-14 & 20-24. FASCINATING and perplexing Gospel text. Here's a look.

There are a multitude of curiosities in this text. 

• Jesus was hungry...cool little detail reminding us that Jesus was a real human who consumed food. 
• He sees a fig tree wanting to get a snack, and there are no figs on the tree....because it wasn't fig season. 
• Fascinatingly, he then curses the tree and his disciples overhear him do it. He appears to be quite upset that he can't have a fig snack. I can imagine the disciples whispering to each other, "Wow, Jesus must be having a rough day. Or he must be really hangry (hungry + angry)."
• The next morning, the tree is dead. 
• Jesus turns it into a teaching moment, "Yeah, of course it's dead. All you need is faith and you can do anything." 
• He then connects prayer to the emotional state of the person praying...he seems to be saying that prayer is about more than the words being prayed...more than the petitions. It's also about the person praying believing that it's already happening: "Believe that it will come to pass....and believe that you have already received it." 

This morning, I also heard a Gospel song I haven't heard before: "No Reason to Fear." A link to the Youtube and lyrics is below. The point of the song is that we don't have to fear in life because God gets the final say on everything. 

I think Jesus might be saying something similar in the Gospel. 

So what does this mean for our lives today? 

I don't know. I am going to keep chewing. 

And as I pray in the week ahead, I'm going to pray not just with my words and hopes...but with my whole heart - visualizing the outcome as if it's already happening and praying more than anything for God's will to be done. 

Lyrics of "No Reason to Fear"