Month: February 2026

The following meditation was written by Dr. Doug Hood’s son, Rev. Nathanael Hood, pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Junction City, Kansas.

Early in the morning as Jesus was returning to the city, he was hungry. He saw a fig tree along the road, but when he came to it, he found nothing except leaves. Then he said to it, “You’ll never again bear fruit!” The fig tree dried up at once. When the disciples saw it, they were amazed. “How did the fig tree dry up so fast?” they asked. Jesus responded, “I assure you that if you have faith and don’t doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree. You will even say to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the lake.’ And it will happen. If you have faith, you will receive whatever you pray for.” Matthew 21:18-22 (Common English Bible)

In all the New Testament, few incidents are more famous than the time that Jesus Christ threw a group of money changers out of the Temple in Jerusalem. He’s so enraged by the sight of money changers and merchants selling animals for sacrifices that he flips over their tables and calls them crooks! The Gospel of Matthew goes on to describe that after turning the money changers out, Jesus started to heal those blind and lame people already there in the Temple, and yet in the face of these miracles, the Temple priests still challenge him and his authority! I don’t know about you, but I understand Jesus’ anger in that moment—how willfully ignorant must the Jewish authorities have been to witness literal miracles and yet still question the man performing them!

Yet Jesus’ anger doesn’t end there. Even after spending a night in the nearby city of Bethany to cool off, Jesus was apparently still in a fiery enough mood the next day that when he encountered a barren fig tree along the road back to Jerusalem he cursed it, causing the tree to dry up and die. His disciples, the men who had seen him heal the sick, raise the dead, and feed the multitudes, were amazed! How did that fig tree dry up so fast, they asked their master in bewilderment. To this, Jesus answered, “I assure you that if you have faith and don’t doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree. You will even say to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the lake.’ And it will happen. If you have faith, you will receive whatever you pray for.” These are wise words about the effectiveness of prayer and faith, but it’s important to note Jesus’ temperament during this lesson, for it proves an important point about when Jesus wants us to pray—that being when we’re angry.

See, this text is somewhat controversial among biblical scholars and people who are just starting out on their journey through scripture because it’s one of the only times—if not the only time—that Jesus does something destructive in the Bible. Strange, this, am I right? Now, commentators throughout church history have struggled to explain this bizarre event as somehow being symbolic. Perhaps. But I think it’s important not to ignore the surface of this text which is that, quite simply, Jesus was hungry and, not finding figs on a fig tree, got angry. We tend to shy away from expressions of anger in our society, particularly in holy places, but in this text we see God not just getting angry but acting upon said anger and then, presumably while still angry, discoursing about prayer. I think the simple lesson here is that anger is not incompatible with prayer. On the contrary, I believe that this passage illustrates that it’s precisely when we’re the most angry that we most need to communicate with God.

Why is that? Well, ask yourself what is anger, when you get right down to it? It’s an assertion, a demand to be heard. Anger disrupts, anger gets peoples’ attention, anger gets things done—maybe not always the right things, maybe not always the godly things, but it gets things done nevertheless. Remember—God is no stranger to anger. God spoke words of great fire and fury through the ancient prophets in the face of societal corruption and evil. God violently routed enemy armies and doomed God’s own kings for their wickedness. God gets angry! So it’s okay for us to get angry as well! Indeed, God demands our anger in the face of evil and injustice. What matters is how we use that anger. Do we let it consume us, hurt others, and destroy? No, may we instead take our anger and offer it to God, asking our Father in heaven how best to use it for his purposes, for his designs, for his justice.

Joy,

The following meditation was written by Dr. Doug Hood’s son, Rev. Nathanael Hood, Pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Junction City, Kansas.

“Ask, and you will receive. Search, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. Whoever seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door is opened. Who among you will give your children a stone when they ask for bread? Or give them a snake when they ask for fish? If you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him.” Matthew 7:7-11 (Common English Bible)

There’s a famous scene in Steven Spielberg’s Hook (1991) where the former Peter Pan—now all grown up and played by Robin Williams—sits down for a meal in Neverland with the Lost Boys he abandoned decades ago. The Boys’ new leader, the fiery, charismatic Rufio (Dante Basco) takes his seat at their long table and unexpectedly holds his hands together in prayer. Everyone, Williams included, does the same, bowing their heads and closing their eyes in reverence.

“Everybody say grace,” Rufio sternly commands.

“Bless this, Oh Lord…” Robin begins before he’s suddenly cut off by the sound of everyone at the table loudly shouting “GRACE!” then maniacally grabbing at the food in front of them.

It’s a wonderful moment, but one can’t help but wonder if this portrayal of prayer isn’t somehow an accurate one for many Christians. How many among us view prayer as just magic words or mystic incantations one says out of habit, not devotion?

Jesus addresses such performative piety in his Sermon on the Mount, specifically in a brief aside during a length list of moral commandments. “Ask, and you will receive,” Jesus commands in verse seven, “Search, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened to you.”There are three operative words in this verse, three words which break down exactly how the act of prayer should be done: “Ask,” “Search” or the more common translation “Seek,” and “Knock.”

Ask, Seek, Knock.

“Ask, and you will receive. Seek, and you will find.

Knock, and the door will be opened to you.”

But what exactly does it mean to ask, seek, and knock? First, to ask is to admit to ourselves that we have problems in the first place! It’s to admit that there’s something out of the ordinary in our lives that needs help we cannot provide ourselves. For some of us, that’s impossible. Many are overburdened with pride. For example, while working in an inner city hospital early in my career, I learned that some poor people refuse monetary aid or handouts because they report that accepting them makes them feel like they’re admitting to personal failure in their lives. Likewise, many of us are yoked with the terrible weight of vanity which balks at the suggestion that one might have any needs or weaknesses in the first place. The obituary pages are full of such people who let their vanity get the best of them. If only they had the courage to ask for help!

Second, what does it mean to seek and knock? Both are verbs that denote continued actions. If you lose something valuable you don’t give up the search after a few seconds. Likewise, when you knock on someone’s door you don’t just knock once and hope whoever is inside hears you. You bang on the door until someone responds! Therefore, to seek and to knock are to have perseverance when we pray. Even though we believe that God answers prayers, Jesus expects us to pray for things repeatedly, even the same things we’ve prayed countless times for. I think of Jesus’ parable in Luke 18 of the Persistent Widow who petitions a corrupt judge for justice over and over and over again until he finally relents. If an evil man will eventually do what’s right when asked enough times, how much more powerfully will our perfectly loving, perfectly just, perfectly righteous God respond to us if we are persistent in prayer? Only by being persistent can we truly establish a relationship with our God, and in that relationship we will find something greater than just an answer to our prayers. We will find in God a companion, a friend, a Father. Amen.

Joy,

“He lifted me out of the pit of death, out of the mud and filth, and set my feet on solid rock. He steadied my legs.” Psalm 40:2 (Common English Bible)

Here is a life that many of us understand. Life is characterized as being a “pit of death—a life of mud and filth.” This poignant description betrays that present circumstances did not simply fall upon the one who speaks. “Mud and filth” are not the consequence of disadvantage, not the result of some disaster or illness that comes without personal consent. Rather, this decay of a personal experience of life has been fashioned by intentional choices, one bad choice following another. Perhaps the choices made were hesitant at first, slow, and then questioned. But once a descent into careless living began, movement became more swift and confident. Delight in drinking, or gambling, or immoral behavior brought increasing pleasure.

Then comes the collapse of all self-worth, a reckoning of the internal depravity that begins to reveal itself in physical appearance and behavior. The face can no longer hide the ruin of the interior life. Others clearly see the writing of the unfortunate choices written upon the man or woman. The signs of rot and disorder grow stronger and clearer. Any good or decency that remains continues to diminish until it is nearly smothered as the tyranny of the immoral life assumes command. The individual—both body and soul—once a sweet habitation of all that is good, decent, and holy now entertains what is corrupt and evil. Choices, once deliberate, now are in control. The man or woman is now held hostage in a “pit of death.”

Then comes a cry for help. What once was pleasurable has become agony—what once was pursued has become a master. The cry of desperation is made to Almighty God. Some years ago when my daughter, Rachael, was quite young I overheard her telling other little girls her faith story. With four other sets of eyes mesmerized by the narrative that flowed from her libs I heard, “I was a slave girl in Egypt and Pharaoh was so mean to me. But my God is bigger than Pharaoh and God came one day, beat Pharaoh up, and brought me home.” For a four-year-old girl, this was her understanding of the Exodus story she had heard from her father so many times. The message was clear and certain. She could count on God.

The one who shares this faith story in Psalm 40 knows they can count on God. A cry of desperation is made to Almighty God to come, overwhelm the master that holds them captive in “a pit of death” and bring them home. The cry may be made at the eleventh hour but God comes. God comes without ridicule, and without mockery, or taunts of “I told you so.” God simply comes. From the place of captivity of whatever enslavement, whatever addiction that holds a grip upon the man or woman, the hand of God appears. That hand is stronger. Once more, the enslaved is brought home. His or her feet are set on solid ground, strength is returned to the legs, and life is steadied. A nightmare of horrible dreams ends.

Joy,