Repentance is not actually an emotion or feeling, although it can produce strong emotions and feelings within us. What does repentance look like? Jesus helps us to understand this change of heart and mind, this returning to the Lord, with the parable of the fig tree in Luke 13. Repentane that is real can and will produce fruits of repentance - just as John the Baptist exhorted the people of his day: "Bear fruits that are worthy of repentance." The unproductive fig tree is a picture of our own lives - on the verge of being cut down by order of the Master! And yet the Gardener pleads for the unproductive fig tree. He will dig around it and put manure on it to fertilize it. In the same way, Jesus pleads for us, his unproductive people. His redeeming blood is the fertilizer of forgiveness that sinks down deep into our roots, nourishing our life with his death, so that we might bear fruits that are indeed worthy of repentance.