Let me sing for my beloved a love song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He digged it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it; and he looked for it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes.

This is excerpted from today's lectionary reading from Isaiah 4:2-5:7. What impressed me is the care that the beloved has for the vineyard, the preparation. Before any grapes were even yielded, a wine vat was prepared. Isn't this where we find ourselves during Lent? Taking a step back, I see the watchtower in my life - living in its shadow, I forget it. Look, there is the pile of stones in the corner of the field, all of the weights and burdens which have been removed. And there is the wine vat in the ground, ready-made for the celebratory culmination of careful vine-tending. The furrows are traced across the hill, the stakes are placed evenly and orderly, the wire is wound up between them - safety, structure, space, for growing.

And still, wild grapes.