Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and find none: cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground?
And he answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung it:
And if it bear fruit, well: and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down. Luke 13:6-9
The Elements.
The certain man here is God the Father. The vineyard
is the world and the fig tree is the church. The fruit he is looking for
is the harvest or the completion of the Great Commission. The three years
are three millennia since the birth of Jesus; the church is entering its
third millennium. The vinedresser is Jesus. Digging about the tree and
fertilizing it speaks of the judgment on the church that must come before
the harvest. Indeed the judgment is required to produce the harvest just
as fertilizing is required to produce a crop.
The Action.
There is a threat of judgment on the unfruitful
tree.
Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and find none: cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground? Luke 13:6-7
And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
And the evening and the morning were the third day. Genesis 1: 11-13
And if it bear fruit, well: and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down. Luke 13:8-9
Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest. Micah 3:12
For thus saith the LORD to the men of Judah and
Jerusalem, Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns.
Circumcise yourselves to the LORD, and take away
the foreskins of your heart, ye men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem:
lest my fury come forth like fire, and burn that none can quench it, because
of the evil of your doings. Jeremiah 4:3 -4
Micah 4:1 But in the last days it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the house of the LORD shall be established in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall flow unto it.
After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight.
Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the LORD: his going forth is prepared as the morning; and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth. Hosea 6:1-3
Also, O Judah, he hath set an harvest for thee, when I returned the captivity of my people. Hosea 6:11
The scriptures are full of examples of God's people coming under judgments and how they prayed and sought him during these judgements Let these be our examples for intercession in these trying times about to come upon us.
Neither have we hearkened unto thy servants the prophets, which spake in thy name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land.
O Lord, righteousness belongeth unto thee, but unto us confusion of faces, as at this day; to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and unto all Israel, that are near, and that are far off, through all the countries whither thou hast driven them, because of their trespass that they have trespassed against thee.
O Lord, to us belongeth confusion of face, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against thee. Daniel 9:5-8
Then said I unto them, Ye see the distress that we are in, how Jerusalem lieth waste, and the gates thereof are burned with fire: come, and let us build up the wall of Jerusalem, that we be no more a reproach. Nehemiah 2:17
Have mercy upon us, O LORD, have mercy upon us:
for we are exceedingly filled with contempt.
Our soul is exceedingly filled with the scorning
of those that are at ease, and with the contempt of the proud Psalms 123:3-4
Remember, Lord, the reproach of thy servants;
how I do bear in my bosom the reproach of all the mighty people;
Wherewith thine enemies have reproached, O LORD;
wherewith they have reproached the footsteps of thine anointed. Psalms
89:50-51
And he spake before his brethren and the army
of Samaria, and said, What do these feeble Jews? will they fortify themselves?
will they sacrifice? will they make an end in a day? will they revive the
stones out of the heaps of the rubbish which are burned?
Now Tobiah the Ammonite was by him, and he said,
Even that which they build, if a fox go up, he shall even break down their
stone wall.
Hear, O our God; for we are despised: and turn
their reproach upon their own head, and give them for a prey in the land
of captivity: Nehemiah 4:2-4
All that pass by clap their hands at thee; they
hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, Is this the
city that men call The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth?
All thine enemies have opened their mouth against
thee: they hiss and gnash the teeth: they say, We have swallowed her up:
certainly this is the day that we looked for; we have found, we have seen
it. Lamentations 2:15-16
Remember, O LORD, what is come upon us: consider, and behold our reproach. Lamentations 5:1
Psalm 44 To the chief Musician for the sons of
Korah, Maschil
1 We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers
have told us, what work thou didst in their days, in the times of old.
2 How thou didst drive out the heathen with thy
hand, and plantedst them; how thou didst afflict the people, and cast them
out.
3 For they got not the land in possession by
their own sword, neither did their own arm save them: but thy right hand,
and thine arm, and the light of thy countenance, because thou hadst a favour
unto them.
4 Thou art my King, O God: command deliverances
for Jacob.
5 Through thee will we push down our enemies:
through thy name will we tread them under that rise up against us.
6 For I will not trust in my bow, neither shall
my sword save me.
7 But thou hast saved us from our enemies, and
hast put them to shame that hated us.
8 In God we boast all the day long, and praise
thy name for ever. Selah.
9 But thou hast cast off, and put us to shame;
and goest not forth with our armies.
10 Thou makest us to turn back from the enemy:
and they which hate us spoil for themselves.
11 Thou hast given us like sheep appointed for
meat; and hast scattered us among the heathen.
12 Thou sellest thy people for nought, and dost
not increase thy wealth by their price.
13 Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours,
a scorn and a derision to them that are round about us.
14 Thou makest us a byword among the heathen,
a shaking of the head among the people.
15 My confusion is continually before me, and
the shame of my face hath covered me,
16 For the voice of him that reproacheth and
blasphemeth; by reason of the enemy and avenger.
17 ¶ All this is come upon us; yet have
we not forgotten thee, neither have we dealt falsely in thy covenant.
18 Our heart is not turned back, neither have
our steps declined from thy way;
19 Though thou hast sore broken us in the place
of dragons, and covered us with the shadow of death.
20 If we have forgotten the name of our God,
or stretched out our hands to a strange god;
21 Shall not God search this out? for he knoweth
the secrets of the heart.
22 Yea, for thy sake are we killed all the day
long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter.
23 Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord? arise, cast
us not off for ever.
24 Wherefore hidest thou thy face, and forgettest
our affliction and our oppression?
25 For our soul is bowed down to the dust: our
belly cleaveth unto the earth.
26 Arise for our help, and redeem us for thy
mercies' sake.
Romans 8:
31 What shall we then say to these things? If
God be for us, who can be against us?
32 He that spared not his own Son, but delivered
him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?
33 Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's
elect? It is God that justifieth.
34 Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that
died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of
God, who also maketh intercession for us.
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness,
or peril, or sword?
36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed
all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
37 Nay, in all these things we are more than
conquerors through him that loved us.
38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor
life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor
things to come,
39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature,
shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus
our Lord.