INI   December 31, 2008   New Year’s Eve

Sermon preached at Cross of Christ Evangelical Lutheran Church, Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS), 9931 Foley Blvd. NW, Coon Rapids, MN  55433. Please share this with someone else after you have finished. Thank you!

Bible Text—Luke13:6-9

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ:

Several poems, songs and short-stories have been written over time about New Year’s Eve. They often portray the old year as dying and the New Year as being born. In artist’s illustrations, the old year is often pictured as an old man on death’s doorstep, while the New Year is a little baby, just starting out in life.

After experiencing everything we have in 2008, we’re probably very ready to let this old year die with all its disappointments, frustrations and sadness. But let’s remember the old year doesn’t die by itself. When the world attends the funeral of an old year, it stands at its grave and tosses in everything it doesn’t want anymore. With the old year we want certain memories to die and certain things that have proved useless we throw away. This is the season when stores can clear out their stock with all kinds of sales. This is the season when people talk about New Year’s resolutions so they can rid themselves of useless and harmful habits.

But is that all New Year’s Eve is about? If the last hours of an old year are thought to be a time of death for worthless things, what better time can there be for our Lord to walk through his garden and clear out the garbage, the weeds and the useless brush? The old year is dying tonight; but we also hear God’s footsteps as he walks through his vineyard to see what should be cut down. Tonight we can almost hear him with our own ears as he says: Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?

Is he speaking about you? Is he talking about me? It’s a bad night for useless and worthless things. But it’s also a bad night for those who have failed—those who have failed their God as well as their neighbor. But you and I have come here tonight not to watch the year die, but to hear the words that give sinners their only hope of life: SIR…LEAVE IT ALONE FOR ONE MORE YEAR!

In our parable this evening, Jesus is talking about a fig tree that an owner planted in his vineyard—a fig tree and not a grape-vine. A tree where it really didn’t belong, but the owner planted it there because he wanted to. Year after year he watched it grow until it was old enough to bear fruit. Then came the season when, for the first time, there should have been figs to pick. But there were none. Another year passed. And then another. There were never any figs. Our parable shows the owner standing by the tree at the end of the third fruitless year with empty hands. If you owned a vineyard of valuable grapes, and you had a fig-tree standing there drawing nutrients from the ground but it never bore fruit, what would you do?

Now remember that “a parable is an earthly story with a heavenly meaning.” When Jesus originally spoke these words, we know what the fig-tree was supposed to represent, because our Lord was talking about Jerusalem. God’s Old Testament people, Israel, was his vineyard. And in the middle of Israel, the Lord had long ago planted this city like a fig-tree. It was a special pleasure for him. One day, he was going to harvest sweet fruit from this city.  

Then the harvest finally came, when John the Baptist at the Jordan River proclaimed to the people: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near,” Matt. 3:2. Many from Jerusalem went out to listen to John. Then Jesus came in person, but he found a city that was unwilling to fall at his feet in faith and offer him the fruits of repentance. It had been three years since John the Baptist had started the search for fruit in Jerusalem. Here and there a few had turned from their unbelieving ways, but you could count them on your fingers. The Word became flesh and Jerusalem saw his glory, but the city was only getting ready to kill him.

Sir…leave it alone for one more year… God did that with Jerusalem, and in the next year it crucified his Son. Tonight, as God walks in his vineyard at the close of the old year, he comes looking for fruit on his tree. But what does he find?

And who is the tree tonight? Could it be this congregation? Cross of Christ is like a fig tree, planted several years ago in the middle of the Lord’s vineyard. For years this church has stood in the soil of a church body that has brought forth the grapes of God’s pure Word and sacraments. This congregation could have been planted in some other place, maybe in a church body where false doctrine runs rampant. But no, it was established by God in his grace in an ideal location. It’s supposed to show the very finest Christian fruit—a high quality of Christian knowledge, love for everyone, a striving for higher, better things, complete and total devotion to the gospel and the sacraments, satisfied with only the best where God is concerned. This is a serious night for our congregation, for as the year ends, its right to live another year is up for discussion.

Or the tree could be some person in the congregation. Maybe it’s you. Maybe it’s me. We are all like trees planted in rich fertile soil. In this place from pulpit and classroom the Water of Life nourishes our spiritual roots. The precious blood of God’s Son in the gospel is poured out liberally in our teaching and preaching to heal sin-burdened souls and to cleanse guilt-ridden hearts. We’re here because God planned to delight in our fruits. We were to satisfy him with the beauty of a Christian life. 

Sir…leave it alone for one more year… How do these words sound as 2008 comes to an end? How do they sound in God’s ears tonight as he stands before his fig trees? Will he think it’s a good suggestion? God heard it a year ago, too, you know. Just a year ago tonight, the same appeal was made: leave it alone for one more year. And he did. This congregation, you, me—he left us to stand. And now it’s the same request.

Are you thinking the same thing I am? Are you thinking God must feel he’s being taken for a fool to be asked to leave us alone for one more year? What if God came to us tonight and said: Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil? We couldn’t deny his right to do such a thing. We really don’t have the right to ask anything else. Are we not wasting the ground in which we’re planted? When we think of the scriptural and spiritual wealth we have been blessed with this past year and we measure the quantity and quality of the fruit we have produced for God’s glory, who of us dares to say: Sir…leave it alone for one more year?

But those aren’t our words, and it’s not our prayer. We’re totally unworthy to make such an appeal. But there is Someone who makes it for us. In him we trust and hope.

Going back to the parable, we find the fig tree has a good friend. It’s the man who took care of the vineyard—it’s the very man who had all the trouble and all the work with that unfruitful tree. He’s the one who’s tilled the soil. He’s fertilized the tree and pruned it, in spite of repeated disappointments. This gardener stands between the owner of the vineyard and the tree and he asks for another year of grace. He promises to redouble his efforts to make it bear fruit.

Such a gardener we have at our side tonight. It’s our Savior who gave himself for us. When no one else dares to plead for us, he speaks. Only Jesus has the right to speak the words: leave it alone for one more year. It’s only in Christ we are spared from the Father’s anger. In and of ourselves we are totally unacceptable to God, but he cannot deny the sacrifice his Son made for us. We belong to Jesus by virtue of his sufferings and death. He has already dug around us and he promises to do it again. What never-failing mercy!

Since it’s God’s Son who prays for us, let’s take his words and make them a promise. Leave it alone for one more year should be our promise of fruit. And that fruit is repentance. Our promise will be to repent of our neglect and thanklessness and resistance against the Holy Spirit. Our Savior’s prayer, and ours too, is that the coming year will see green leaves, blossoms and fruit—fruit in our hearts and in our lives. In Jesus’ name. Amen.