The Lord is kind and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in kindness. As we enter the third week of our Lenten journey, the Lenten observances which we picked up on Ash Wednesday have somehow become lighter by now as we “get used” to them. The observances have progressively become part of our routine. But even as we engage in them as our external mark of repentance, these Lenten observances should not be misunderstood to mean that we are engaging in them to “pay” for our sins and failures, or even worse, that we are engaging in them so that God can look upon us with a kind eye. We engage in Lenten observances as part of a spiritual discipline aimed at enabling us to stay true to the path that our faith has charted for us. Moreover, although these observances become highlighted during the season of Lent, they are not restricted to the Lenten season only. Prayer, Almsgiving and Fasting (as well as any other activity that we have picked up as part of our Lenten observance) should form part and parcel of our attempts to live out our Christian calling. The importance of these Lenten observances notwithstanding, and even as we engage in them in heightened tone during these days of Lent, the Church doesn’t want us to forget a very important fact: that our God is kind and merciful. We embark on the Lenten efforts of making a return to the Lord in gratitude to the merciful love of God. The merciful love of God towards creation is demonstrated in the way the Lord relates to creation. Ever since the first moment of creation, the Lord decided to enter into a relationship with creatures. It is a relationship that is characterized by the Lord acting salvifically towards creation. In the First Reading, we are presented with the calling of Moses, the great law-giver. The Lord God appears to Moses in a burning bush in order to prepare him for the task of liberating the children of Israel from the hands of the Egyptians who had enslaved them. It was a moment that would mark the beginning of one of the greatest acts of God towards a people. As a matter of fact, it was an act that is remembered among the people of Israel as the greatest event in the history of their journey with God. God decided to come down, rescue the people of Israel from their misery, and lead them to freedom. The liberation of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt was not the last time that God was involving the self in the lives of a people in order to lend them a saving hand. In the course of God’s journey with Israel, the Lord never tired of reaching out to save God’s people. Even when the sons and daughters of Israel found themselves on a path to destruction through their own doing, the Lord was always there to lend them a saving hand. For the Lord God is not only a Creator. The Lord God is also a Savior who never wants to see creation undergo annihilation. As the prophet Ezekiel reminds us, the Lord God does not take pleasure in the death of what God has created (cf. Ezekiel 18:23; 33:11). The Lord God is a Creator, not an annihilator. God’s relationship with us is characterized by the willingness of the Lord God to breathe upon us – time and again - the breath of life. God is not interested in our being separated from the source of life. As a Savior, the Lord God is a giver of second chances. As long as we ask, God will always give us a second, third, fourth, fifth, and even hundredth chance to come back to the source of life and once again live as a son or daughter of God. All it takes is to acknowledge our sins and to ask God for forgiveness (repentance). Our coming to God in repentance is all about asking God for a second chance. And God will never refuse our request. The extended arms of the Lord are always waiting to embrace us and welcome us back home. In the Gospel reading, Jesus reminds us that like the gardener of the fig tree, the Lord God is a loving Father who is interested in us remaining alive. Like the gardener, the Lord God is interested in the fruitfulness of God’s creation. When we become barren on account of turning away from him, the Lord doesn’t give up on us. Instead of cutting us and throwing us into the fire, the Lord gives us time even as he patiently waits for us to undergo conversion. As a good gardener, the Lord is always willing to give us unlimited second chances. These second chances are given us so that we can turn around and bear fruits. We bear fruit when we too afford others a second chance. The Christian values that set us apart- love, forgiveness, kindness, charitable acts- are all about giving second chances. Whenever we love and forgive unconditionally, show kindness, and act with charity towards our brothers and sisters, we proclaim Jesus' passion, death and resurrection through which he won for us a second chance. As we continue with our Lenten observance, let us ask ourselves: have I appreciated the many second chances that the Lord has afforded me? Have I reciprocated that gratuitous act of God on my behalf by giving my brothers and sisters a second chance? Am I approaching the table of the Lord while still stained by bitterness and failure to forgive and to love?