The warnings are plentiful and blunt on the third Sunday in Lent. Lent is a season of repentance. Cut it out or get cut down! The warnings are accompanied by God’s invitation to attentiveness: “Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live.” The landowner’s ultimatum is forestalled by the gardener’s readiness to till the ground one more year. That is good news for all of us. Thanks be to God!
Everyone who thirsts, come to the water; seek the Lord
O God, eagerly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you.
(Ps. 63:1)
Israel, baptized in cloud and seas, ate the same spiritual food as Christians
Unless you repent, you will perish: parable of the fig tree