Sermon from 11th March 2007
Our Vicar, Cameron Barker, gives a sermon based on the reading from Luke 13 verses 1-9
40; 33; 67; 96; 215; 126; 59. That’s the number of civilian deaths each day of the past week in Iraq – a total of 636. It’s now become so routine that the only stories we heard about were the larger numbers, of Shiites who were killed on pilgrimage. The same is true of South Africa, where there are 300+ murders or violent attacks per day. But that statistic only came to light because of a protest march against crime there yesterday. Death has been prominent in our headlines once again this week. But what’s almost more shocking, I think, is what we don’t hear about until we go looking for it. Who read about Billy Cox this week, e.g?
I confess I was keeping a close eye on this week’s news because of the 2 stories in the 1st part of our reading from Luke. 1 story was told to Jesus, about group of Galileans executed while they offered sacrifices in the temple. The other was a story Jesus told himself – about 18 people killed when a tower collapsed on them in Siloam. Neither of these stories is recorded anywhere else in history: yet Jesus used them both to teach very important principles.
The first story was told to Jesus because of a comment he’d just made. Let your eye wander up the page, 96NT / 1046, to 12:54ff. Jesus had just told his hearers that they needed to read the signs of their times. And they wanted to prove they could. So they told him this rather gruesome story about the death of these Galileans in Jerusalem.
The Galileans had been executed in this callous way by Pilate, the Roman governor in Jerusalem. For Pilate to have done that, they must have been guilty of rebellion. It’s likely that the people who told Jesus this story were Pharisees. The Pharisees believed that any1 who rebelled against Rome deserved everything they got. So these Pharisees were telling Jesus they could read the signs of their times. These people had sinned, by rebelling against the authorities; they’d got their just deserts – hadn’t they?
As we’ll see, Jesus did answer that question – albeit in a rather unexpected way. But 1st he made a counter-point, by telling his own sad story. His story was about 18 people killed by a falling tower. Nobody knows the circumstances of this tragedy – but most commentators think these were Jewish workers collaborating on a Roman construction project. What’s certain is that one group of Jews – the Zealots – believed that to collaborate with the Romans was to sin against God. So Jesus invited his hearers to reflect of the fate of these people too: did they die in this accident because of their sin of collaboration?
Jesus also answered that question himself. We’ll get to that as well; but 1st lets reflect on what we can learn from what has – & hasn’t – been in our news this week. How do we read the signs of our time? What do we say about so many people killed in Iraq? Was it their own fault they died – even if only for being in the wrong place at the wrong time? Did some of them truly deserve to die, because they were involved in terrorist activities and had to be stopped?
I’m aware the real answers are likely much more complex than that. But lets leave that question in the air, and think instead about what hasn’t been in our news. What does it say about our society that so many deaths go unreported? Or that we seem to have forgotten about the teenagers, like Billy Cox, who were shot dead not far from here only 3 weeks ago? Are we so used to a youth culture of guns & drugs now that we accept it and move on with our lives as fast as we can? How do we read these signs? These deaths were all tragic. But did any of these people deserve to die because of their own sin, or stupidity? And what can we learn from these deaths before they’re forgotten by all except those directly affected by them?
Jesus certainly said that there were lessons to be learned from the deaths in his time; but maybe not the lessons we might think. Jesus told his hearers not to conclude either group of people deserved to die because of their sin. In the most emphatic way possible Jesus told his hearers to look instead to themselves, & to their own eternal futures.
It wasn’t that either the Galileans or the workmen were especially sinful – no matter what the Pharisees or Zealots might have thought. Yes of course people needed to read the signs of their time: Jesus had already told them to. But sometimes we need not to reflect on the wider issues of who dies or why. Sometimes we need to focus on the one key fact of all our lives – that one day we too will die.
Jesus told his hearers to concentrate on that: the fact that one day they would die. It’s a sobering message, I know; but it’s a message very suited to Lent. This is, in theory, a time for us to think on important and serious matters. And there can be nothing more important or serious than the certain fact of our own death. None of us know when it will happen – but we can be certain that it will. Most of us assume that we have time, that it isn’t going to happen for a while yet. But how safe, or wise, an assumption is that?
The Youth Bible makes a striking point on this passage. It suggests we all tell ourselves we only have two weeks to live. Then it suggests we ask ourselves what our priorities would be, if we knew our death was that close. The key point it makes is that maybe those should be our priorities anyway. And I think that’s well worth pondering this Lent. What are our priorities in life? And what should they be? Are there changes we need to make to them; & would we make those changes if we accepted the fact of own death?
Not surprisingly, Jesus had priorities in mind as he talked about what people needed to learn from these stories of people dying his time. The greatest priority, he suggested, was that people should get straight with God. Jesus believed that was so important he told them to do it twice – once after each story. Actually, because Greek is a more subtle language than English, there’s an added twist here to being straight with God. But lets start with the most obvious way of being straight with God.
Now I know that this isn’t a very popular idea, but it is a biblical 1. Jesus’ working assumption was that everyone was a sinner. Jesus assumed that everyone had done or said things to separate them from God. Jesus assumed that everyone needed to do something to get straight with God. That something was to believe in Jesus as God’s Son. He’d come for that exact reason – to give people a way to get right with God. Of course people didn’t have to – but if they chose not to, then Jesus said they would not spend eternity with him; instead death would mean death.
In 1 way, getting straight with God is a once-for-all event. All it takes is to accept Jesus for who he is and what he’s done for us. If that’s something you’ve never done, then today’s a very good day to do it. There’ll be some space to do that after I’m finished (& a chance to be prayed with afterwards). If that needs to become a longer conversation I’d love to have that with you, so call me in the week.
I imagine that most people here will already have made that once-for-all decision to get straight with God. That’s great – but it doesn’t mean we can sit back. As I’ve said recently, there’s more to repentance than that. That point is well made by the subtlety of the Greek – and by the parable that Jesus told in the second part of the reading.
Jesus recognised the fact that nobody becomes perfect by making that once-for-all decision to believe in him. We all go on doing & saying things we shouldn’t – and that’s something we need to put straight with God too. We need to go on repenting, to go on saying sorry to God, to go on asking for his help to be changed. So the 2nd time Jesus told his hearers to turn from their sins / repent, that’s what he meant – that we should go on being aware of our sin.
What we’ve been learning is that repentance needs to be a way of life. What Christians need to do is to spot where we’re going wrong – & then do something about it. So you may want to run through the 4 R’s of repentance when we take time to reflect shortly. What are the things you need to put right with God, to repent of, to turn from? God is always willing to help us see those areas, if we ask his Spirit to show them to us. (Again, if you want to be prayed with for that afterwards, that’s on offer too).
This is a point Christians need to take seriously. It’s part of our responsibility as believers, that we don’t presume on God’s grace. It’s a lesson Jesus then rammed home by telling this parable about the fig tree in the rest of our reading. And Christians need to listen to it very carefully – because it shows that God expects more from believers.
The man is this parable is clearly God. It’s God who does the work of making us believers, or planting us as his trees. It’s good soil he put the fig tree in, good enough for grapes to grow in. So he has a right to expect fruit from the tree, after a giving it a reasonable period to develop. In the parable God didn’t find the fruit he expected after that time – and so he ordered the tree to be cut down.
In the parable the owner is persuaded to give the tree 1 more year to do what it should. But not even the gardener said the tree shouldn’t bear fruit. He said he’d do the extra work – fertilise it – but if that didn’t work then the tree should be cut down. And that is a stern warning to those who are Christians. We need to know that God does expect more from us, that he does expect us to bear the fruit of repentance. And, if we don’t, he will take action. Yes, God is merciful: he gives us time to change; he will help us to change too; but he won’t stand for less than the best from us. He has given us all we need to live for him; so we must respond – by living changed, repentant lives.
These are sober & serious facts we need to consider on our faith journey this Lent. We must look at the disasters around us, & know that one day it will be our turn to die. What do we believe will happen to us then? How does the fact of death affect how we live now? What does it say to us about our priorities? How do they need to change?
For some people the main decision is whether to believe in Jesus for the first time. For those who have done that already the issue will be how to live a life of repentance day by day. We may well need to ask if we are bearing the kind of fruit God has a right to expect from us. God is merciful. Today he gives us a chance to get straight with him – in whatever way that we need to. But will we see reality for what it is – and accept this offer? Each of us must decide that for ourselves. So let’s pray …
40; 33; 67; 96; 215; 126; 59. That’s the number of civilian deaths each day of the past week in Iraq – a total of 636. It’s now become so routine that the only stories we heard about were the larger numbers, of Shiites who were killed on pilgrimage. The same is true of South Africa, where there are 300+ murders or violent attacks per day. But that statistic only came to light because of a protest march against crime there yesterday. Death has been prominent in our headlines once again this week. But what’s almost more shocking, I think, is what we don’t hear about until we go looking for it. Who read about Billy Cox this week, e.g?
I confess I was keeping a close eye on this week’s news because of the 2 stories in the 1st part of our reading from Luke. 1 story was told to Jesus, about group of Galileans executed while they offered sacrifices in the temple. The other was a story Jesus told himself – about 18 people killed when a tower collapsed on them in Siloam. Neither of these stories is recorded anywhere else in history: yet Jesus used them both to teach very important principles.
The first story was told to Jesus because of a comment he’d just made. Let your eye wander up the page, 96NT / 1046, to 12:54ff. Jesus had just told his hearers that they needed to read the signs of their times. And they wanted to prove they could. So they told him this rather gruesome story about the death of these Galileans in Jerusalem.
The Galileans had been executed in this callous way by Pilate, the Roman governor in Jerusalem. For Pilate to have done that, they must have been guilty of rebellion. It’s likely that the people who told Jesus this story were Pharisees. The Pharisees believed that any1 who rebelled against Rome deserved everything they got. So these Pharisees were telling Jesus they could read the signs of their times. These people had sinned, by rebelling against the authorities; they’d got their just deserts – hadn’t they?
As we’ll see, Jesus did answer that question – albeit in a rather unexpected way. But 1st he made a counter-point, by telling his own sad story. His story was about 18 people killed by a falling tower. Nobody knows the circumstances of this tragedy – but most commentators think these were Jewish workers collaborating on a Roman construction project. What’s certain is that one group of Jews – the Zealots – believed that to collaborate with the Romans was to sin against God. So Jesus invited his hearers to reflect of the fate of these people too: did they die in this accident because of their sin of collaboration?
Jesus also answered that question himself. We’ll get to that as well; but 1st lets reflect on what we can learn from what has – & hasn’t – been in our news this week. How do we read the signs of our time? What do we say about so many people killed in Iraq? Was it their own fault they died – even if only for being in the wrong place at the wrong time? Did some of them truly deserve to die, because they were involved in terrorist activities and had to be stopped?
I’m aware the real answers are likely much more complex than that. But lets leave that question in the air, and think instead about what hasn’t been in our news. What does it say about our society that so many deaths go unreported? Or that we seem to have forgotten about the teenagers, like Billy Cox, who were shot dead not far from here only 3 weeks ago? Are we so used to a youth culture of guns & drugs now that we accept it and move on with our lives as fast as we can? How do we read these signs? These deaths were all tragic. But did any of these people deserve to die because of their own sin, or stupidity? And what can we learn from these deaths before they’re forgotten by all except those directly affected by them?
Jesus certainly said that there were lessons to be learned from the deaths in his time; but maybe not the lessons we might think. Jesus told his hearers not to conclude either group of people deserved to die because of their sin. In the most emphatic way possible Jesus told his hearers to look instead to themselves, & to their own eternal futures.
It wasn’t that either the Galileans or the workmen were especially sinful – no matter what the Pharisees or Zealots might have thought. Yes of course people needed to read the signs of their time: Jesus had already told them to. But sometimes we need not to reflect on the wider issues of who dies or why. Sometimes we need to focus on the one key fact of all our lives – that one day we too will die.
Jesus told his hearers to concentrate on that: the fact that one day they would die. It’s a sobering message, I know; but it’s a message very suited to Lent. This is, in theory, a time for us to think on important and serious matters. And there can be nothing more important or serious than the certain fact of our own death. None of us know when it will happen – but we can be certain that it will. Most of us assume that we have time, that it isn’t going to happen for a while yet. But how safe, or wise, an assumption is that?
The Youth Bible makes a striking point on this passage. It suggests we all tell ourselves we only have two weeks to live. Then it suggests we ask ourselves what our priorities would be, if we knew our death was that close. The key point it makes is that maybe those should be our priorities anyway. And I think that’s well worth pondering this Lent. What are our priorities in life? And what should they be? Are there changes we need to make to them; & would we make those changes if we accepted the fact of own death?
Not surprisingly, Jesus had priorities in mind as he talked about what people needed to learn from these stories of people dying his time. The greatest priority, he suggested, was that people should get straight with God. Jesus believed that was so important he told them to do it twice – once after each story. Actually, because Greek is a more subtle language than English, there’s an added twist here to being straight with God. But lets start with the most obvious way of being straight with God.
Now I know that this isn’t a very popular idea, but it is a biblical 1. Jesus’ working assumption was that everyone was a sinner. Jesus assumed that everyone had done or said things to separate them from God. Jesus assumed that everyone needed to do something to get straight with God. That something was to believe in Jesus as God’s Son. He’d come for that exact reason – to give people a way to get right with God. Of course people didn’t have to – but if they chose not to, then Jesus said they would not spend eternity with him; instead death would mean death.
In 1 way, getting straight with God is a once-for-all event. All it takes is to accept Jesus for who he is and what he’s done for us. If that’s something you’ve never done, then today’s a very good day to do it. There’ll be some space to do that after I’m finished (& a chance to be prayed with afterwards). If that needs to become a longer conversation I’d love to have that with you, so call me in the week.
I imagine that most people here will already have made that once-for-all decision to get straight with God. That’s great – but it doesn’t mean we can sit back. As I’ve said recently, there’s more to repentance than that. That point is well made by the subtlety of the Greek – and by the parable that Jesus told in the second part of the reading.
Jesus recognised the fact that nobody becomes perfect by making that once-for-all decision to believe in him. We all go on doing & saying things we shouldn’t – and that’s something we need to put straight with God too. We need to go on repenting, to go on saying sorry to God, to go on asking for his help to be changed. So the 2nd time Jesus told his hearers to turn from their sins / repent, that’s what he meant – that we should go on being aware of our sin.
What we’ve been learning is that repentance needs to be a way of life. What Christians need to do is to spot where we’re going wrong – & then do something about it. So you may want to run through the 4 R’s of repentance when we take time to reflect shortly. What are the things you need to put right with God, to repent of, to turn from? God is always willing to help us see those areas, if we ask his Spirit to show them to us. (Again, if you want to be prayed with for that afterwards, that’s on offer too).
This is a point Christians need to take seriously. It’s part of our responsibility as believers, that we don’t presume on God’s grace. It’s a lesson Jesus then rammed home by telling this parable about the fig tree in the rest of our reading. And Christians need to listen to it very carefully – because it shows that God expects more from believers.
The man is this parable is clearly God. It’s God who does the work of making us believers, or planting us as his trees. It’s good soil he put the fig tree in, good enough for grapes to grow in. So he has a right to expect fruit from the tree, after a giving it a reasonable period to develop. In the parable God didn’t find the fruit he expected after that time – and so he ordered the tree to be cut down.
In the parable the owner is persuaded to give the tree 1 more year to do what it should. But not even the gardener said the tree shouldn’t bear fruit. He said he’d do the extra work – fertilise it – but if that didn’t work then the tree should be cut down. And that is a stern warning to those who are Christians. We need to know that God does expect more from us, that he does expect us to bear the fruit of repentance. And, if we don’t, he will take action. Yes, God is merciful: he gives us time to change; he will help us to change too; but he won’t stand for less than the best from us. He has given us all we need to live for him; so we must respond – by living changed, repentant lives.
These are sober & serious facts we need to consider on our faith journey this Lent. We must look at the disasters around us, & know that one day it will be our turn to die. What do we believe will happen to us then? How does the fact of death affect how we live now? What does it say to us about our priorities? How do they need to change?
For some people the main decision is whether to believe in Jesus for the first time. For those who have done that already the issue will be how to live a life of repentance day by day. We may well need to ask if we are bearing the kind of fruit God has a right to expect from us. God is merciful. Today he gives us a chance to get straight with him – in whatever way that we need to. But will we see reality for what it is – and accept this offer? Each of us must decide that for ourselves. So let’s pray …
posted by Parish Administrator at 9:09 pm
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