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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
When our Circuit’s pastors two Thursdays ago studied today’s Gospel Reading, much of the discussion centered on whether some sins are worse than others. As you might have noticed, however, today’s Gospel reading does not deal directly with that question but with the question whether some sinners are worse than others. (Some translations say “greater sinners” [NASB, NEB], but that can give the wrong idea!) And, Jesus negates any such comparison of sinners. Jesus’s focus in the Gospel Reading is on our need to repent while there is still time, and so this morning we reflect on the Gospel Reading under the theme “Time to repent”.
At the point in St. Luke’s Divinely-inspired Gospel where today’s Gospel Reading comes, Jesus had been talking about His coming and the final judgment, how it would cut across families and how His hearers should interpret the signs and reconcile with one another (Luke 12:13-59; confer Richert, CPR 26:2, 15). Then, at that very time, as we heard in today’s Gospel Reading unique to St. Luke’s account, some people present raise the matter of the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. St. Luke does not say who reported the incident to Jesus or why, but Jesus knows what they are thinking and answers them, offering another example, of the eighteen people killed when the tower in Siloam fell upon them. We do not know much about either event, but from both events we do have Jesus’s correct conclusion for His hearers and for us: unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.
When we hear the news or otherwise think about the world in which we live, do not we, like the people in today’s Gospel Reading apparently did, often think of “others as more evil and so more deserving of God’s judgment” than we are ourselves, as if the only wicked people are others “out there” (Richert, CPR 26:2, 15; confer Trench, Parables, 347)? In the end, who really are worse sinners than you are or than I am? Do we not also come to false conclusions about victims of crime or of so_called “natural disasters” in our world? Maybe we falsely suppose that, instead of just being general consequences of sin in the world, their specific sins brought on such things. Or, maybe we falsely suppose that, if God was really a loving God, then He would not allow such things. Or, maybe we falsely suppose that, when we are afflicted, then God has somehow abandoned us. Truly our fallen human reason can lead us astray. As Jesus says in the Gospel Reading essentially four times, we all are sinners and offenders against God, overtly committing evil acts and failing to do our duties (Just, 535 n.8; confer Bailey, Peasant Eyes, 78). The Galileans Pilate killed and the people the tower in Siloam killed likely had not repented and so perished eternally (Lenski, ad loc Lk 13:3, 724; Just, 531), and so Jesus says, unless we repent, we all likewise will perish eternally. And, now is the “Time to repent”.
Now is the “Time to repent”, and not only because we are in the season of Lent, but also because we do not know when the “Time to repent” will come to an end! In today’s Gospel Reading, Jesus tells what is called “The Parable of the Barren Fig Tree” (for example, SQE). Fig trees were reportedly the most important plant in Palestinian vineyards (Scharlemann, Parables, 63), and Old Testament prophets had similarly spoken of their not blossoming and bringing forth fruit (for example, Habakkuk 3:17). In the parable, the man came seeking fruit and found none. The man in the parable had every right to expect fruit, and from year to year He patiently sought it in hopeful expectation (Greeven, TDNT 2:892). Bible commentators debate the total number of years and their meaning, but the basic idea seems to be that the man already had waited long enough but mercifully allows a little longer for the tree to bear fruit (Hunzinger, TDNT, 7:755-756) before it might be cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 3:10; 7:19). God is so patient towards us, not wishing that any should perish in the eternal fires of hell as we deserve, but wishing that all should reach repentance (2 Peter 3:9). That Jesus does not tell how it turned out for the tree and that Luke does not tell whether Jesus’s hearers repented invite us to bring forth our fruit of repentance (Scharlemann, 69). Before our individual time of grace is over, before the end of our earthly life, or before the Lord’s return—before whichever might come first—now is the “Time to repent” (confer 2 Corinthians 6:2).
The “Parable of the Barren Fig Tree” gives us a listen, as it were, to a conversation between God the Father, the man who had the fig tree planted in his vineyard, and God the Son, the vinedresser. The tension is not between the Father’s will to damn and the Son’s will to save, but the tension is between God’s righteous wrath on account of our sin and His grace towards us for Jesus’s sake. That tension is only resolved in Jesus Christ. God’s divine Son, the man Jesus, intercedes or mediates for us, and ultimately saves us, because on the cross He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, shedding His blood as our sacrifice. We deserved to be cut down and perish, but instead He was cut down for us and, as we heard last week, in Jerusalem perishes in our place (Luke 13:33). In Him, we are forgiven.
In today’s Old Testament Reading (Ezekiel 33:7-20), the Lord God, Who takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked, tells Ezekiel and faithful watchmen of all time to preach His Word, law and Gospel, at the risk of their own salvation. So, we preach about both our unrighteousness deeds and the righteousness that comes by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. God’s wrath and eternal judgment may frighten us, as it should, but God ultimately intends for and enables us not to be frightened but by faith to lay hold of His comfort and peace in Jesus Christ our Lord (Luther, AE 77:84). That comfort and peace is found in Holy Baptism, referred to earlier in St. Luke’s Gospel account as a Baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sin (Luke 3:3). That comfort and peace is found in Holy Absolution, forgiveness from the pastor applied individually to those who confess their sins to him privately, even as the tree in the parable for another year was “let alone”, or better “forgiven” (they are the same word in the Greek). And, that comfort and peace is found in the Sacrament of the Altar, in which, with bread and wine, we eat and drink of Christ’s true body and blood, for the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. As St. Paul wrote in today’s Epistle Reading (1 Corinthians 10:1-13), like the Old Testament people of Israel, we are baptized into and eat and drink of Christ.
We live in a very environmentally-sensitive time, with activists especially emphasizing “the three Rs”: reduce, reuse, and recycle. The man in the parable arguably is an environmental conservationist, as he does not want the unfruitful tree to use up the ground, to condemn that soil to inactivity, as it were, by preventing something else from producing fruit. As trees of God’s planting, we are mindful both of our abiding in Christ and, as evidence of that abiding in Christ, of our bearing fruit (John 15:4), which fruit includes doing good works related to our stewardship of God’s creation. With turning in sorrow from our sin and trusting God to forgive our sin, at least a desire to bear such fruit and do such good works are arguably part of our repenting (Formula of Concord Solid Declaration V:7-8; Augsburg Confession XII:49; Apology XII:28; confer Pieper, II:502-503).
Through today’s Gospel Reading—and also through the other Readings—God has called us to recognize our urgent need for the “Time to repent”, and we rejoice in God’s saving mercy and grace for the sake of Jesus (Richert, CPR 26:2, 15). The afflictions that others experience and that we ourselves bear are ultimately less than we deserve (Luther, 42:133), they are not punishment for specific sins, but they lead us to repent and to see them in light of Christ’s suffering for us, His comfort, His peace, His redemption, and the eternal life He gives us (Just, 537), the ultimate escape from temptation. To that end, as we prayed in the Collect, God brings us with penitent hearts and steadfast faith to embrace and hold fast the unchangeable truth of His Word.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +