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UCC Daily Devotional
March 6, 2026
by Quinn Caldwell
(saved for week of Earth Day)
Soil
Jesus told this parable: "A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, "See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil? He replied, 'Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it.'"
Luke 13:7-8
Everything I have I earned. Everything I've achieved is down to my hard work and nobody else's. If you've failed, it's because you're a failure. You didn't grind hard enough, don't have enough grit. Spent too much on lattes.
This is some people's line, isn't it?
It's nice for them, because it absolves them of a lot of responsibility. The responsibility to thank or acknowledge the world for the aid, privilege, boost that they receive. The responsibility to aid, privilege boot others.
Against this nonsense Jesus preaches this parable. The vineyard owner, a rugged individualist, an up-by-your-bootstraps kind of guy, has given this tree three years to produce something, and it hasn't. Three strikes, and it's out. The gardener, an arborist, however, knows that fruit production is about much more than the abilities of one tree. It's about all sorts of matrices and factors: water, light, pollinators, and of course, the structural and chemical health of the soil.
The individual (the plant) is only half of the equation. The arborist knows that the place where the tree is planted is just as important to its flowering as the tree itself.
The rugged individualist doesn't touch the tree for three years and then says, "Cut it down." God the arborist says, "Not till we see how it does in my kind of soil."
Prayer
Thank you God, for all the gardens and all the gardeners who have helped me thrive. Amen
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