I like to think if the father in this parable were at one of those meetings, he’d say to these good people: You are provided for. I love you. You have enough. These others have nothing. They cannot pull themselves up by their bootstraps the way you have, because their feet have been cut off. Can we not all be in this together?

Gardeners love the story of the fig tree. Everyone needs second and third chances, and the lives of plants provide a wonderful metaphor for that.

Jesus is on a mission. Blues Brothers fans will not need to think twice about what kind of mission this is: he’s on a mission from God. He’s on a mission to Jerusalem, a mission for the redemption and salvation of the world.

If Jesus were flying a sign on the side of the road, it might say “Jerusalem or bust.”

What tricks would the devil use to test us? With Jesus, he offered the temptations to be spectacular and powerful to distract him from his identity as the Son of God and from God’s mission of reconciliation. I think in our 21^st century Episcopal Church context, the devil tests us with messages of timidity, discouragement, scarcity, and apathy.