Epiphany 2                                            John 1:43-51                                           1/15/06

                                                   “We Need More Fig Trees”

 

When is the last time you sat under a fig tree...or any tree for that matter.  Oh, I know;  even with the warm days we had last week, it was too cold to sit under a tree.  But, think about it.  How many times did you sit under a tree and just do nothing but reflect when the weather would have permitted you to sit under a tree?  When is the last time you just sat and did nothing?  

 

If you haven’t encountered Christ in your life or heard the voice of God lately, it may be because you haven’t allowed yourself the grace to be still long enough to become aware of God’s presence.  We need more fig trees and more determination to be still regularly.  If we make time to create an openness for God as Nathaniel did, we may see greater things than we can imagine.

 

In some Middle Eastern religions the fig tree was sacred and it was common for people to sit under them to meditate.  Though this was not a part of the Jewish religion, the writer of John could be using the image of Nathaniel sitting under the fig tree as an image for someone who is a religious seeker, a person who goes deeper than the superficialities of ritual, a symbol of openness to experiencing God.

 

Certainly, Nathaniel was not a gullible man, ready to jump on any new prophetic bandwagon that comes by, and he must also have been well educated in his faith traditions.  He challenges Philip’s claim to have found the Messiah.  And though his comment about Nazareth may seem cynical and snide, it also shows that he knew what the prophets had foretold. .

 

Even with his skepticism, he seems to have responded to Philip’s invitation to “Come and see”, for the next thing we know Nathaniel is coming toward Jesus.  He was willing to test what he knew and take the chance that something new might be ahead.

 

When Jesus shows His identity by telling Nathaniel something only the Son of God could know, Nathaniel proclaims His divinity and is told he will see greater things still.  And it all started with sitting under a fig tree.

 

Times were hard in the days of Jesus and the early church.  Times were hard were hard in our parents’ or grandparents’ day.  People worked long hours, usually with considerably more physical labor than we do today.  They had far fewer luxuries and much less to distract them.  A farmer could rest and reflect a moment at the end of a furrow, a woman could  meditate in the midst of repetitive chores, a child could hear God speak while sitting on the bank of a stream waiting for a fish to bite.

 

I don’t know when life changed.  It probably happened gradually over several generations.  It seems now we must be on the go every minute.  In most families both parents work long hours, and often some distance from home, making the work day even longer.  Time away from the workplace is jam-packed with household chores, civic work, children’s activities and sports.  Multi-tasking is a word even children are familiar with, as they gobble a breakfast bar down while dressing or do homework on the way to a sporting event.  People (with or without children) come to the end of a hectic day and drop into bed, falling asleep without even time to offer a prayer.

 

I feel especially sorry for children.  Most don’t know what to do with themselves if they don’t have a planned activity or an electronic gizmo to occupy them.  Tell them to go sit under a tree and they’ll be bored to death if they can’t take their game player.  Imagination and its ultimate benefits – inventions, great plays, scientific advances, beautiful works of art, etc. may be the next loss that humankind suffers, as children’s lives are increasingly filled with activity, leaving them no time to learn how to dream.

 

Worse yet, as we allow ourselves to be lured or guilt-tripped into obsessive busyness, we are losing spiritual vision and connectedness to God.  Listening to God takes time and mental quiet.  God speaks in a whisper and only when we are willing to interact with Him.  This takes time.  Time we feel we just don’t have.

 

We’ve been sold a bill of goods by ad agencies and our culture.  We think we need I-pod and X-box.  We have been bamboozled into believing that we can’t find grandma’s without a Anstar or some other fancy guidance system in our car.  We suffer the delusion that we must live in a house big enough for several families.  Yes, I know probably all of you live more modestly, but just see the future for your children by taking a look at the house being built up on the hill off Rt. 99 on the way to Edinboro.  I’m told that’s not a hotel or apartment house, but a one family home.

 

None of these things – electronics, cars with special features, big homes - or any of the other stuff we buy is bad in itself.  What should concern us though is the fact that it all cost a lot of money and having the money to pay for these things, means we have to work more and more hours, leaving us no time to live, much less be reflective about our lives or our relationship with God.  

 

To compensate, we convince ourselves that these things will give us a sense of fulfillment and satisfaction when the reality is that our only true fulfillment comes from intimacy with God and this requires having the time to sit under a fig tree.

 

Now that I’ve totally depressed you, let me tell you there is hope.  Things can change and we have much more control than we have been led to believe we have.

 

First, we must face the truth.  We must see the problem for what it is.  I read in, “Seeds For The Parish”, a little newspaper we get from the ELCA, that scientists have finally recognized what social critics have been saying for years: our brains cannot be pushed to work faster or take in more information than they had in the past.  This makes multi-tasking a delusion and lie.  Multi-tasking is actually rapid moving back and forth between tasks.  And the better we are at it, the less attention we are paying to anything, which in the long run wastes whatever time is saved by multi-tasking.  

 

I used to be proud of my ability to being doing multiple tasks at work.  I was a multi-tasker before the term was invented and I was the envy of everyone in my office because I could get so much done.  This seemed great for my ego, until I was brought up short by it at home.  

 

One day I was multi-tasking there.  I was cooking, listening to the news and at the same time planning my work for the next day.  My son came in and asked if he could go to a friend’s house.  We discussed where he was going and what time he would be back, and he left.  It was shortly after he was out of sight that I realized that while I was listening enough to talk with him, I hadn’t really been present enough to hear him.  I hadn’t the faintest idea where he had gone or when he would return.

 

So, we must face the fact that living as we do really isn’t good for us.

 

Second, we need to start slowing down.  The first step in this direction is to carve out some time regularly to just sit under a fig tree.  Make time to reflect and meditate.  If you have children, make a pack with your spouse to each spend quiet time with the children while the other takes reflection time. At first, it may be necessary to be quite rigid about your plan.  You may need to say, “ I’m setting 5PM on Monday (and maybe Wed. and Fri?) for reflection time and will turn down any requests to do something at that time”.

 

Use some of this time to actively think about other areas of life that you want to change, about your priorities, about how you want to manage your time.  Reserve a portion of the time for prayer to God and for listening for His answers.  Ask Him how He would have you use the gift of time He’s given you.  Ask Him to help you see that the time is yours to manage and that you are not a slave to time.  Remember that you can change your life and ultimately our frantic, mindless, multi-tasking culture.  Remember also that we are responsible to the children around us.  If they are to develop the imagination and vision that are so needed, we must help them learn to spend time sitting under fig trees.

 

To help you remember to do this, each of you has received a picture of a fig tree located in the Holy Land .  Put it somewhere that will help you remember to be like Nathaniel, and you too may see wonders beyond imagining.  Amen.