First Reading (Isaiah 55:1-9/NRSVUE)
Gospel Reading (Luke 13:1-9/CEB)
Second Chances — Rev. Brent Gundlah
Sure, things are kinda rough in our country and throughout our world these days, but, if Luke is to be believed, they were no picnic back in first century Galilee either. Not that this necessarily makes us feel any better; I mean, they do say that misery loves company but, honestly, when has knowing that someone else has suffered really made your own suffering any more bearable?
In any event, the people of Galilee have recently experienced two senseless tragedies in rapid succession. And so they’re angry; they’re sad; they’re confused; they’re hurting; they’re all of the things that people are when bad things happen that defy explanation.
Pilate, under whose thumb the people have lived for quite some time, apparently ordered the murder of some pilgrims who had gone to the Jerusalem temple simply to worship and to offer sacrifices to God. And if that weren’t bad enough, the tower of Siloam has now fallen and killed eighteen people.
We’ll have to take Luke at his word about all of this becaise none of the other gospel writers tells either this story or the parable about the fig tree that follows it, and no other sources from the period mention either the collapse of the tower or Pilate’s massacre of the pilgrims, but buildings do sometimes fall and this kind of oppressive behavior is completely on-brand for Pilate.
Yeah, things are pretty rough in Galilee. And the people, unsurprisingly, are demanding answers; they want to know exactly why all of this woe has suddenly befallen them. This is one of the things that people often do when bad things happen that defy explanation.
Oh look, here comes Jesus. Surely he’ll know what’s behind all of this. Surely he’ll be able to tell us what those misguided pilgrims had done to deserve what happened to them. Surely he’ll be able to explain to us why God decided to punish those poor souls who were crushed underneath that tower; whatever they did must have been really horriblein order to warrant them getting what they got. Thinking along these lines is, of course, another one of the things that people tend to do when bad things happen that defy explanation.
But these distraught Galileans who turn to Jesus desperately seeking reasons for these recent awful events are about to be really disappointed. Jesus knows what they are wondering (he is Jesus, after all), he knows what they want, yet he doesn’t give it to them. And this had to be incredibly frustrating.
But Jesus also understands the implicit assumption behind what they are thinking. If they believe that tragedy has been visited upon their siblings because they did something to deserve it, then they themselves are still here to speak of it because they didn’t do something to deserve it.
Because Jesus knows that this is exactly what’s going on here, he dispenses with the niceties and cuts right to the chase, and what he says had to be pretty tough for the Galileans to hear.
Regarding the pilgrims who were slain by Pilate, Jesus says, “Do you think the suffering of these Galileans proves that they were more sinful than all the other Galileans? No, I tell you, but unless you change your hearts and lives, you will die just as they did.”
“What about those eighteen people who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them? Do you think that they were more guilty of wrongdoing than everyone else who lives in Jerusalem? No, I tell you, but unless you change your hearts and lives, you will die just as they did.”
In other words, they were no worse than you are. And “they were no worse than you are” is just another way of saying that “you are no better than they were.” We’re all in the same boat — we must change our hearts and lives. It’s as simple, and as difficult, as that.
As you’ve probably noticed, Jesus talks a whole lot about the need to change our hearts and lives during his ministry here on earth, but what does he actually mean by that?
In the New Testament, the word we translate into English as “change your hearts and lives” or, more commonly, “repent” is the Greek word metanoia. This word can be broken down into two parts — meta means change and noia means mind, so metanoia literally means to change one’s mind, to understand something differently after reflecting upon it.
But there’s more to this whole changing your hearts and lives thing than just what going on in your mind. In the society in which Jesus lived, it was widely accepted that the mind controlled the body — and that’s certainly true, to some extent. So, what you thought and believed was reflected in what you said and what you did. So if your mind were truly changed, then your words and deeds would change too.
If you had truly accepted that Jesus was the Messiah, if you had actually believed all of his teachings about things like love and kindness and caring for the least of these — then you would actually get out there and love people and be kind to people and care for the least of these just like Jesus did and said that you should. And if you weren’t doing these things then you hadn’t really changed your mind, let alone your heart and life, and that didn’t really make for much of a life at all. It was true back then and it’s still true.
I can’t help but wonder what the surviving Galileans did in the aftermath of these tragedies that affected their community. Did they sit with all the widows and widowers and orphans as they struggled with their grief? Did they make sure that those who were left behind had food to eat and and a roof over their head. Did they do anything at all to change — for the good of everyone — the oppressive system under which they lived?
Or did they just sit around wringing their hands and gnashing their teeth, crying out to God about all the grave injustice — offering the victims and their families no end of thoughts and prayers — while secretly congratulating themselves that it hadn’t come for them because God thought that they clearly deserved better, because they were, in God’s eyes, somehow better?
We can’t really say for sure but, then again, maybe Jesus’s response to them here tells us all that we need to know.
The people who died didn’t do anything to deserve being here no longer; sometimes, bad stuff just happens. You didn’t do anything to deserve being here still, sometimes good stuff just happens. In this world, that’s just the way it goes.
And you need to change your hearts and lives. You need to change your entire orientation toward everything. You need to stop thinking of the world in terms of false binaries like reward and retribution, worthy and unworthy, us and them — and why you are (or ought to be) on the right side of that line. Because God’s reign doesn’t work like that.
You see, God’s grace truly is for everybody; and if you don’t believe me about that, have a listen to Jesus. In the very last line of Luke’s Gospel, after he’s died and risen again, Jesus tells his disciples “that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations.”
But here’s the catch — God’s grace freely bestowed upon us all is not a license for us to go and do whatever we want, it’s the reason for us to go and do what God is calling us to do.
Grace might be free, but it ain’t cheap. In other words, God’s grace toward us invites — dare I say even demands — a response from us to unlock its full potential. And once again, if you don’t believe me, just ask Jesus because this is what he’s saying in his parable about the fig tree.
It’s been three years and this barren tree has produced no fruit. “Cut it down,” says the frustrated landowner. By the standards of the world, under which all things are deemed to be either worthy or worthy, it doesn’t deserve to be here; and it’s hard to disagree with the landowner about that if those are the rules we’re playing by.
Not so fast, says the gardener. “Let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.”
The earnest gardener doesn’t even try to make an argument for the fig tree’s current worth because he really can’t, but that’s completely beside the point. For some unknown reason, he’s willing to take it upon himself to put in the effort in order to give this barren fig tree every possible chance to produce; basically, he’s saying, “I know this tree has a horrible track record, but let’s see if I can help move it in the right direction not simply by saying that I care about it, but by actually caring for it.” And this all begins with a gardener’s act of grace, freely and inexplicably bestowed.
Yet the tree isn’t off the hook here; it’s been given this gift of a second chance, but it must bear fruit in order to make it all worthwhile. The fig tree clearly can’t do it all on it’s own, but it clearly must do something in response to what it has been given.
So too must we. And the only response to the unmerited gift of boundless and unconditional love God has given us that truly honors that gift is to love God and to love others the way that God loves us.
Just a few chapters earlier in Luke’s Gospel, “a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.’ And he said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.’”
Change your hearts and lives. Do this, and you will live. Put aside old ways of thinking and acting and respond to God’s grace toward you by loving God and loving your neighbor. It’s that simple, really.
Remember, though, that for Jesus everybody is our neighbor.
And who is truly a good neighbor to their neighbor? The one who showed him mercy.
Now go and do likewise.