The Psalm: Psalm 63:1-8
The psalmist is now separated from God; and remembers him nostalgically; it is as though he is out in the lifeless desert. He allows the memories of God's abundance to sustain him in these harder times.
O God, you are my God, I seek you, my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live; I will lift up my hands and call on your name. My soul is satisfied as with a rich feast, and my mouth praises you with joyful lips when I think of you on my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night; for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I sing for joy. My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.
The Old Testament Lesson: Isaiah 55:1-9
Written during the Exile, after the fall of Babylon to the Persians. This section began with Chapter 40, and key themes presented there are repeated here: the way of the Lord, calling the people to enjoy God's gifts, a new deliverance, the word of the Lord, the king, heaven and earth, God's relationship with Israel, forgiveness, and the participation of other nations.In other words: Despite outward circumstances - Don't give up.
Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live. I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David. See, I made him a witness to the peoples, a leader and commander for the peoples. See, you shall call nations that you do not know, and nations that do not know you shall run to you, because of the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, for he has glorified you. Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts; let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
The Epistle Lesson: 1 Corinthians 10:1-13
Paul warns Christians at Corinth that some of them are not on the path to eternal life: "if you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall"! (v. 12) He uses events from the Exodus to illustrate their plight.
I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them, and they were struck down in the wilderness. Now these things occurred as examples for us, so that we might not desire evil as they did. Do not become idolaters as some of them did; as it is written, "The people sat down to eat and drink, and they rose up to play." We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did, and were destroyed by serpents. And do not complain as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer. These things happened to them to serve as an example, and they were written down to instruct us, on whom the ends of the ages have come. So if you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall. No testing has overtaken you that is not common to everyone. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.
The Gospel Lesson: Luke 13:1-9
It was commonly believed that pain and premature death were signs of God's adverse judgement. Now we read of two events where people died prematurely and unexpectedly: one group ("the Galileans", v. 1) doing God's will, killed intentionally as they sacrifice to him in the Temple; the other group ("those eighteen", v. 4, possibly construction workers) killed accidentally. In both cases, Jesus says, there is no link between early death and sin.
At that very time there were some present who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. He asked them, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did. Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them--do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did."
Then he told this parable: "A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, 'See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?' He replied, 'Sir, 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.'"
"Alternative Routes"
During the first two weeks of Lent we confronted two important questions: "Who are you?" and "Whose are you?" Today's question could be put in the following context: "Who needs to repent?"
In the Gospel lesson Jesus very clearly, like Paul in the Epistle seems to be addressing false confidence among his hearers. Jesus clearly warns of the danger of interpreting the fall of others as the judgment of God upon them. Just as Paul counters his hearers laxness in their appreciation of God's grace with the warning "So if you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall."
To further illustrate his point Jesus takes two events that had occurred in the recent history of his own people which were the subjects of great speculation regarding the vindication of God. The first was the slaughter of some Galileans during the festival, and the second the tragic deaths of some workers when the tower of Siloam fell. It is important for us to have some background information to understand the significance of both of these events.
Part of the theology of Israel was a particular understanding about the land. You may remember Dominic Crossan telling us that from the beginning Israel understood that the land belonged to God. Those who inhabited the land were to be good stewards of it, but never owners as such. So when King David chose Jerusalem as the holy city he set aside the highest point, a threshing floor at the time, for the future location of the Temple. His own palace was located below.
When Herod the Great redesigned the city not long beofre the birt of Christ he located his own palace along side the Temple, but still lower than it's uppermost walls. When the Romans took over they evicted
Herod and seized his palace as the official headquarters for the Roman garrison. They renamed the structure the Fortress Antonia after Marc Anthony. They raised the walls of the palace to be higher than the Temple itself so that guards posted on the walls could always look down on the activities taking place within the Temple complex. This of course was a great affront to the Jewish people, but there was nothing they could do to stop it. It was another outward sign of the domination under which they had fallen.
There were many things that the Romans detested about life in Jerusalem. In fact, Pilate built his own residence in Ceasarea on the northern coast and only came to Jerusalem when the large festival crowds demanded his presence there. One of the things they hated most was the water which was piped into the Temple and then descended by gravity throughout the city through a series of pools and waterways.
Pilate ordered the construction of a new aqueduct which would pipe water directly into the Fortress Antonia. Since the Roman coffers were already being stretched to the limits he had to find new ways to pay for this venture. He decided to skim some money off the top of the Temple collections and found little opposition from the Temple priests whose jobs depended on his continued support.
It was quite another matter for the common people who resented the use of money being given to God going for the support and comfort of the Roman garrison. During the festival of Passover there were massive demonstrations. Pilate ordered the troops to descend on the Temple complex and indiscriminately break up the mob. Many people were killed and it mattered very little whether they were among the protesters or not. Hence the "blood of the Galileans mingled with their sacrifices." Most Judeans thought of their own piety being a cut above their relatives from the north due largely to their daily association with the Temple. The loss of Galilean life was thought by some to be a sign that God felt the same way.
The construction, or deconstruction of the tower of Siloam had similar ties to the Roman occupation. In order to spruce up the appearance of some of the primitive housing they found in Jerusalem they ordered stones to be taken from existing structures and move to their own. One such building was the tower of Siloam. They wanted the massive stones from the base moved to adorn the entranceways to some of their new official building. They conscripted workers from among the poor and ordered them to do the dangerous work of removing these support stones. Clearly this was an accident waiting to happen, and it did. When it fell, eighteen workmen were killed.
Jesus question "do you think that they were worse offenders than all the other living in Jerusalem?" is aimed at a primitive, but ongoing view that tragedy, deformity, and death were punishments for bad behavior. Even in our more enlightened time people are still apt to ponder "What did I, or he or she do to deserve…" whatever misfortune befalls them. At that time many Jews believed that tragedy was a direct result of sin. Hence it explained the way they treated lepers, the lame, the blind, the deaf, etc.
It's very poor theology, but it did and does allow us to perpetuate the idea that some people deserve the bad things that happen to them based on their character. A useful tool in any kind of discrimination.
It is a kind of theology that is more easily sustained when one is talking about tragedies on a one on one basis. When however tragedies strike large groups of people, or whole nations it is harder to explain what they all did that was so wrong and offensive. Our individual loss can be rationalized much more easily than the loss of thousands when the Twin Towers fell, or hundreds when a plane drops from the sky or a bomb explodes in several train cars in Madrid. It was harder to sustain when massive pogroms were unleashed against the Jews, and later against the Christians, and this is a gospel that is written after the fall of Jerusalem and the final destruction of the Temple when thousands of men, women and children lost their lives.
Jesus obviously believed differently. Following his initial questions he tells a parable about the "near felling" of an unproductive fig tree. Remember that in parables about land God is always the landowner. Here Jesus is the merciful gardener who urges the owner to let the tree stand until he has nurtured it to the best of his ability.
At that time numerology played an important part in plant production. One allowed three years for a plant to take root and mature. Three years because three is a complete act. Then three more years were allowed the plant to produce for God alone. No harvest was done during this second three year period, for all produce during that time belonged to God. The final set of three years, this being the third set of three, one could rightfully expect a harvest. Therefore if at the end of this third period nothing was being produced the owner had every right in the world to cut it down. Remember that the sin of the tree here is not that it is producing bad fruit, but that it is producing no fruit at all!
The intervention of the gardener in this story, at this point, is an intervention of extreme mercy and compassion. No one would expect that extra time of tolerance and nurture. Such is the nature of Jesus' concept of Godly care.
All of us will make mistakes, just as all of us will die. Each and every one here, and all we love. The justification for death is the natural order of life and the dangerous nature of the world in which we live. What concerns Jesus is the loss of purpose and the loss of the understanding of what a great privilege and opportunity it is to be alive. Existence is one of the greatest gifts that God shares with us. The realization of a what a great gift that is---is the meaning of life itself.
It is derived from not leading the lives, that God desires of us.
That fig tree could easily have convinced itself it was thriving…simply because it was living…but it was not growing and it had never produced. Is that really life?
Perish has two meanings in scripture. One meaning is "to die," the other is "to be lost." To lose our lives is nothing compared to losing our purpose.
Who needs to repent? We all do. Life is a gift. Cherish it and use it well!
Pastoral Prayer:
Impatient Lover, You are a God who hungers for justice, truth, and life for all your children., Teach us once and for all that there is no time left for excuses, for blaming, for grudges, or even for grieving, until pressed for the only time that is left we open up to ourselves, one another and this wondrous mystery in which you have planted us. Hear our prayers today for all people and their families who are caught up in senseless tragedies - those who are killed on the roads and highways, those who fall victim to diseases and crippling conditions that severely affect their lives, those afflicted by fires and floods and other catastrophes, those who are victims of terrorism and war. Help us O God, to be especially sensitive as to what we can do to help those who are afflicted, and help us too to consider our own mortality, our own fragile state, and to use the time you have given us to take action to make sure that our lives today are as we and you truly want them to be. We ask these things in the name of the one who first showed us the way. Amen