As the days lengthen (remember the meaning of Lent?) and get warmer, I begin to think about that game some of us play that keeps us humble -- golf. It is a game I find frustrating, challenging and fun all at the same time.

This last fall, I was playing a round with someone who is quite good at the game. I am always open to tips and pointers and we were having a very good time, until we ended up behind a foursome that was playing in front of us. They had one golfer who was not very good. He would hit three bad shots for every good one, and we ended up watching him most of the day as we waited to play our shots.

It ended up being a good day for philosophy. "Do you know how to tell a really good golfer?" my friend asked. "The really good golfer is the one who can recover from a bad lie. Say he hits the ball into the bunker 20 feet from the green. He doesn't throw down his club like that guy up there and mentally give up. He just hunkers down, concentrates, and hits it out of there, right up to the pin."

And I got to thinking, there is a lot of decent philosophy in that observation: "He just hunkers down, concentrates, and hits it out of there, right up to the pin."

What would happen if we applied that to life? We all have those days when we make downright lousy shots in life. Every business person makes some bad deals. Every parent makes bad decisions in child rearing. Every chef has a flop or two in the kitchen. Every preacher preaches some awful sermons.

The important thing, when you know you've hit a bad shot or you've made a bad beginning, is not to focus on what is past, not to fixate on the mistake, but to hunker down, concentrate, and hit the ball out in the right direction.

If we need a good biblical model for this philosophy, just look at Peter. Of all the disciples, the scriptures paint him as the most human -- so human, in fact, that we almost wince for him a time or two. It seemed he was always saying something he would later regret or taking a stand he would have to back away from when more evidence came in. When it came to understanding what Jesus was going to go through -- well, let's just say he flunked Theology of the Cross 101. "No, Lord," he said when Jesus said he must die on a cross, "this will never do." "No, Lord," he said when Jesus said they would all run away, "I'll never deny you." "No way," he said when the woman outside Caiaphas' house identified him as the follower of the Nazarene, "I never knew him." One bad shot after another!

But Peter didn't give up. He didn't give in to despair. Oh, he felt badly about what he had done. Scripture testifies that he went out and cried bitterly over it, but he didn't turn in his disciple's badge over it. He kept going on. He went back to the upper room with the others. When the women came in on Easter morning and said the Lord had risen, he raced to the tomb with John to see for himself. And he was there in the room when Jesus appeared to all of them, later that day.

When they went to Galilee, as Jesus instructed them to do, and Jesus called to them that morning from the shore as they were out in the boat fishing, it was Peter who stood up, put on his shirt, and plunged into the cold water to swim to shore and be there before the rest of them. Later that morning, it was Peter who walked along the shore with Jesus and was asked, "Peter, do you love me?" And Peter said, "Yes, Lord, you know that I love you" -- all of this, in spite of the bad shots, in spite of the bad lies, in spite of all his troubles.

Maybe Peter's swimming lesson is also instructive for us as we walk our days of Lent together. In spite of what has happened to us in our pilgrimage on earth, in spite of the bad shots we have made, in spite of the times we have found ourselves in sand traps with our best efforts, the right instinct is to try again and to always keep our sights on God. For the past need not bind us: There is forgiveness and grace for that. And the future need not panic us: There is God's presence and Spirit for that. So what is called for is hunkering down, concentrating, and hitting our next shot with confidence, always keeping our eyes on God -- for there is the strength, the courage, the confidence and the grace we need to go on.

The gospel text for today carries the same theme hidden in that parable of the fig tree. Notice what happens when the owner of the vineyard comes seeking fruit for the third time on that tree and finds none. The owner wants to cut it down and quit wasting time on it. It is a barren tree. But the gardener, the one who has the responsibility for the tree, begs for mercy. "Let it alone, sir. Let me try again with it. I'll plant some manure, and dig around it. I'll work with it. Give it another year." And the owner agrees.

Now, as you hear that story, who is the God-figure? Is it the owner, the gardener, or the tree, itself?

Well, it's a trick question in some respects, because, in telling this parable, Jesus seems to have cast two of the characters into the divine role. Who can deny that the owner of the vineyard, in the first place, is not a person to be reckoned with? This parable, by its very nature, is about judgment and accountability and crisis. But wait, here comes the gardener, the underling to the owner of the vineyard, to intercede. Now, who do you suppose he represents? Hearing the gardener's plea for mercy, the owner grants another year of life and it is the gardener now who will tend this tree to see that it produces fruit.

So, guess who we are in this story? And guess why we still live? Because of God's good grace and forgiveness in the intercession of the gardener on our behalf!

An important parable for us today? Well, I don't know about you, but in those days (and sometimes years) when I feel like that barren tree, I am glad that I know a gardener who will not only go to bat for me with the owner, but who will work with me in this next year I am given to see that I bear some fruit. And without making the obvious seem ridiculously simple, that is precisely what Jesus offers each of us today, this day, every day. He pleads mercy for us in our barren days and years, offers nourishment for us to grow in the grace period we are given, and stands by us with a love that will not let us be destroyed, no matter what life will bring our way.

The autobiography of G. Stanley Jones is titled A Song of Ascent, and is considered to be one of the spiritual classics. Jones was a great man: a missionary to India, a friend to Gandhi, a tireless world traveler, and a great writer and speaker.

Now, what is amazing to me is that this book was actually his third attempt at an autobiography. And he was 83 at the time. He had actually written two previous books but had been unwilling to publish them. The first, he said, was too filled with the little events of his life -- things he judged not worth telling. In the second attempt, he tried to take the events of his life and to use them to philosophize about life in general. But even this, he decided, was not the right focus. The third time, he determined, he was going to begin with Jesus, and that's what he did. You see, what he discovered after two bad attempts was that he had been working backwards; he had been working from events to the Christ Event. And now, in his third attempt, he found he had it wrong. As he would say in his introduction to that third book: "Christ has been, and is, to me the Event. An African, after he was baptized, changed his name, calling himself 'After.' Everything happened 'after' he met Christ. It was so with me."

In his first two attempts, said Jones, he had been too events-centered and not enough Event-centered. In the third and successful book he concentrated on the Event and worked back to the events, understanding his own life in the light of Christ.

Now, as a writer, I know how hard writing can be. And to think that Jones threw away not one but two manuscripts, the second of which was 596 pages long, because he had made a bad beginning of it. Well, that is almost incomprehensible.

But Jones had learned, what all of us can learn from his example, that none of us has to stay with a bad beginning. None of us has to live with a bad shot. None of us has to be content with the mistakes of the past, and any guilt that may tie us to them. We have an advocate, a gardener if you will, who will free us from such burdens, who will give us courage to try again, and who will stand by us in the efforts we make to live as his people.

Maybe this day the owner will come. What will his judgment be? Fruit? Maybe it has been a barren year?

But wait ... I hear some discussion about us going on. The gardener who has loved us from birth when he watered us into life and growth, the gardener is pleading for us.

And look! The owner has agreed.

Okay! Feed us, dear gardener, feed us. We are thirsty and hungry for what you have to give us. And we will seek to bear the fruit of your love and favor. Amen."