Dove winner, multiple times,
Grammy-nominated… If you have ever watched any of the Gaither Homecoming shows or videos, chances are you have seen her. More of what she looks like now… 
And she is still at it, but long past her best or most popular days.
This is my favorite picture of her: from one of her albums, called "The Way I Feel." Kind of angelic, a bit mysterious.
Here is a link to it, from the 1985 movie, The Trip to Bountiful (which is a great movie, if you have never seen it):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jq73glgQWps
The song is in our UM hymnal, too: number 368, I believe.
If Billy Graham, Cliff Barrows and the Crusade choir made Just As I Am the most famous invitation hymn of all time, I came to Jesus, walked the aisle—and maybe some of you did too—while the choir and congregation Softly and Tenderly.
I will go so far as to say that that if our choir had sung Cynthia Clawson’s version of it—or if she had been there to sing it—I would have come to Jesus twice. I would have walked down, to shake the preacher’s hand, then hurried back to back to my pew so I could come down the aisle again.
Beautiful. Tears me up and tears me up every time I hear it: “Softly and Tenderly Jesus is Calling. Calling for you and for me. See! On the portals, he is waiting and watching, watching for you and for me..." And so he is.
"Come home, come home. Ye who are weary come home.” And so I did. At age 8. Nor have I left home since... though there have been times I thought about it.
II
Another of Cynthia Clawson’s heart-rending,
tear-evoking, soul-saving songs came to my mind this week, for the first time in
decades. But tomorrow's morning’s scripture
lesson--how Jesus turned over the money-changers’ tables--is bookended by another, stranger story: Jesus's cursing of the fig tree (Mark 11: 12-14, 20-21). That story of that poor fig tree brought to mind the lyric of I Heard About a Man. Here is a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2BR2wBeK58
It is about as simple and as beautiful a presentation of the gospel as I know…
I heard about a man, who came to live in
time…
he
did amazing things with water and new wine
He helped the cripple walk and
he
made the blind to see…
And then you know what else he did?
He gave himself for
me.
He
was a simple man, he really had no home…
He’d
go and stay where he was at, next morning he’d be gone
He made the leper whole,
and
the he set the prisoners free.
And then you know what else he did?
He came to stay with
me.
Because
I know this one who was man and yet divine
Because I know what love can do in
just a second’s time
Because he made me fully whole… he
gave me a song to sing…
He was a humble man, but always he
was bold
He would stop and talk a while,
but he could see right through your soul
He fed a hungry crowd, and he withered
up a tree…
III
He withered-up a tree. Do you remember? Can you imagine? And surely one of the most surprising, if not the most surprising episodes in all the gospel stories of Jesus.
Feeding hungry crowds? Helping cripples walk? Making new wine from water, and the blind to see?
Amazing as those things are, they are not surprising, given what we know of Jesus.
Making lepers whole and setting prisoners free? Absolutely in keeping with the loving, gracious, compassionate character of Jesus…
But withering up a tree? When it wasn’t even the season for figs?
I can only imagine it, think of it as a kind of displacement.
Do you know that term? You are mad at your spouse, but throw something at the TV. You are mad at your boss, but you snap at your children.
Displacement. When you are mad at one thing and take it out on another thing.
I can only imagine Jesus was angry at what he saw the day before, when he entered the Temple precincts… and took it out on the poor fig tree.
IV
The day before, Jesus and the
disciples had come into Jerusalem. Jesus was on a donkey. The crowds were
excited. The religious and political and maybe even the military officials were
a little nervous. But when Jesus arrived, after he looked around at everything,
he left and went to Bethany. I wonder what he thought, what he felt, being in the Temple again. Mark does not tell the story, but Luke says that when Jesus was a little boy, he had come to Jerusalem, to the Temple, had had good discussions with the Teachers of the Law. They were amazed at his understanding. For their part, Mary and Joseph were terrified. At least when they finally realized he was not with them. They went and searched for him… remember what he said? “I must be about my Father’s business.”
That was what the Temple was for. Even the boy Jesus could see that: discussing the scriptures, prayer and worship.
Years have passed since last time Jesus saw the Temple. And now, what did Jesus see?
Not the Temple’s business. But the business of the Temple. The buying and selling and unholy pandemonium of what had the appearance of worship. Pretty. Lush. Prosperous.
The Temple area was huge: 32 acres, the size of 34 soccer fields, and on special occasions it could hold 400,000 people. The Temple and its associated businesses were the main employer and economic engine of Jerusalem…and every day, just humming, like the great machine it was.
Jesus and the boys looked around at everything, then headed to Bethany. Next morning, they started back into Jerusalem.
On the
way, Jesus saw a fig tree, lush and green.
Jesus went to it, to get a fig.
Only it was not the season for figs. Did you get that? It was not the season for figs!
So, no real surprise, there were no figs. But, for some reason it ran all over Jesus. And he cursed the tree: “May you never bring forth figs again!” And next day, it was withered to its roots.
Why?
We might also ask why Jesus was so upset at the Temple mount. At the buying and selling. What the buyers and sellers and money-changers were doing was perfectly legal, and even necessary.
If you were coming from Nazareth, say… like that time when Jesus was 12… Mary and Joseph and the others were going to Jerusalem to sacrifice. But that was a journey of 65 miles. Can you imagine leading a cow, herding sheep, for 65 miles to the place of sacrifice?
So, instead, you sold your cow, or sheep, and took the money—mostly likely Roman money, most likely with an image of Tiberius on it—and came to Jerusalem with it, there to launder your money, to change the pagan currency into currency acceptable in the Temple. You bought a sheep or a cow, doves or a goat to complete the sacrifice.
There had to be money-changers. There had to be animal sellers. Thieves? Maybe. They did charge interest. Maybe some of them charged too much. Maybe the "business of the Temple" has supplanted the "Temple's business."
Which is to say, maybe there was a different kind of theft going on… not that the people were being robbed by the money-changers, but God was being robbed of the prayers of the people by the exclusionary practices of the religious establishment.
A house of prayer for all people that did not allow all the people close, and even determined who could and could not worship in the prescribed way. If you did not have enough money to buy even the doves, which were the poorests' offering, one had to walk away.
IV
And perhaps that is what we are angry about too, some of us. In this battle of interpretation raging across the church, it is not just "what is written in the law" but "how we read." And Jesus' anger seems to indicate, at least in Mark, that if our churches are excluding anyone, we are robbing God of God's rightful due--praise from all God's children. That said, Jesus' anger is not merely anger. It is rooted in love for God, for God's house, for all the people of God.
Without love, all our anger and cursing reveals is how our spirit is already withered to the roots.
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