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Third Sunday of Lent

Luke 13
Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. 2 Jesus answered, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? 3 I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. 4 Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? 5 I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.”
6 Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree growing in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it but did not find any. 7 So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?’
8 “‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. 9 If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’”


It’s either a giant nothingburger, or the biggest scandal since the Pacific Scandal of 1873.

What’s really fun is trying to describe the latest scandal in Ottawa, or getting other people to describe it: it’s sort of like standing around an abstract painting and trying to agree on what you see. And on this, the so-called “Mueller Day” weekend, and the weekend that may well see the end of Prime Minister May, our controversy seems pale by comparison.

Generally, scandal is what politicians fear most. Losing an election, as humiliating as that may seem, is really just the consequence of letting the voters decide. The peaceful transition from one government to the next, the end of a long tenure in government, even if it’s a case of ‘voting the bums out’—these can all be spun as positives.

Scandal, however, that’s another story. Scandal defines people, it creates the kind of historical shorthand that all politicians dread. Sometimes it’s a single word, too often ending in ‘gate.’ Sometimes it’s the name of a person, or a place, Lewinsky or Benghazi. And sometimes we resort to short phrases or quotes to sum up a scandal, like ‘kids in cages on the southern border’ or ‘very fine people on both sides.’

And none of this is new. The passage Kathy read, which begins with a short burst of headlines, also smacks of scandal: ‘Some were present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them.’ It might as well say “Prefect Pilate Pollutes Plasma,” or “Meet the 18 Who Didn’t Have to Die.”

The scandal involving Pontius Pilate leaps off this page this week, the same week we will be taking an indepth look at Pilate in our Lenten Study. Interestingly, among all the things we know about Pontius Pilate, among all the things recorded by Josephus and Philo, there is no contemporaneous source for the incident involving Galileans and their blood. That’s not to say it didn’t happen—Pilate was Judean prefect for a decade after all—so maybe it’s just one more outrage among many.

But to does fit a pattern. Pilate (without spoiling Thursday evenings study) was notoriously careless about Jewish sensibilities, apparently never missing an opportunity to offend the people he governed. And this will have some bearing on the most famous evening of all, and the second part of a trial that we relive year-by-year, but that’s all I can say until Thursday.

Sadly, these misused Galileans and the unlucky people of Siloam are just a vehicle for a larger conversation, an object lesson of-a-sort to illustrate something Jesus wants us to understand. And you can see it in the way these things are structured. It begins with “Do you think” followed by some outrage or misfortune. It continues with the question of deserved suffering, the very human response to every calamity. And it concludes with the same lesson each time: “I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.”

So let’s slow down for a moment and unpack these two things— the response that makes us human and the lesson that seems initially hard to hear. The human response to death is to search for reasons. People will find very creative ways to ask it, but it always comes back to ‘how did they die?’ Once in a while it’s morbid curiosity, but usually it’s an exercise in establishing some context—a reason or a cause—because nothing is more unsettling than random and inexplicable.

And it’s not just death: any kind of misfortune is met with the same kind of response. Think of John 9:

As Jesus went along, he saw a man blind from birth. 2 His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” 3 “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.

I remember the first time I read this passage, and immediately thinking ‘what kind of God is this?’ But then I read it again, slowly, and realized that it’s not about the man born blind at all— it’s about the question we ask every time we confront misfortune. And so, in the courtroom dynamic of ‘asked and answered,’ Jesus gives us a firm “No.” Yes, he was healed by Jesus and yes, it displayed the awesome power of God present in the Son of the Most High. But that’s not what the passage is about. The passage is about the firm “no” that Jesus gives when the topic of deserved suffering appears, a no for the Galileans, for the people of Siloam, and for the man born blind. No, no, and still no.

So Jesus says “I tell you, no!” And them this: “But unless you repent, you too will all perish.” Well, this one is interesting. You know that the current mortality rate among the human species is 100 percent? Even if you are among the super-rich and have plans to be flash-frozen right at the end, you’re still dead. So the “you too will all perish part” of the saying is a tad redundant. The Galileans, the Siloam 18, even poor Lazarus—raised from the dead in the miracle to likely got Jesus killed—even poor Lazarus eventually returned to the land of the dead.

So setting aside the idea that your repenting will prevent your departing—since mortality is running at 100 percent—there must be a deeper meaning here, likely hiding in plain sight. If the context is sudden and inexplicable death, then we’re really looking at a time question, meaning ‘when will you repent?’ or ‘if not now, when?’ And the clue is in the end of the passage:

6 Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree growing in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it but did not find any. 7 So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?’
8 “‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. 9 If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’”

If the question is ‘if not now, when?’ then maybe the answer is ‘one more year.’ The world says ‘cut down that unproductive fruit tree, it’s just taking up space,’ and God says ‘one more year.’ The world considers your return on investment or EBITDA margin, and God says ‘one more year.’ The world wants an answer today, or by yesterday, but God says ‘one more year.’

In effect, Jesus is reminding us that we live in the ambiguity of ‘one more year’ while an unfortunate few do not. Their misfortune is is only the result of misfortune, but for the rest us us, we have the blessing of ‘one more year.’ And how will we use it, this one more year held out to us one year at a time?

Well, repentance is a big topic when you only have a minute or two left in a 12 minute window. So, of course, I head for my Oxford and this time it seems less than helpful. Repentance is defined as ‘The action of repenting.’ Okay, say more: ‘sincere regret or remorse.’ Again, less than helpful, so it’s back to the Bible. This past week we looked at Roman soldiers in the gospels, and we heard this little exchange between John the Baptist and those seeking his baptism:

12 Even tax collectors came to be baptized. “Teacher,” they asked, “what should we do?”
13 “Don’t collect any more than you are required to,” he told them.
14 Then some soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?”
He replied, “Don’t extort money and don’t accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.”

So, two things here. First, the hated tax collectors and the even-more-hated-occupiers have a route to repentance, literally through John’s ‘baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.’ And second, see how specific the advice is going forward: collect the correct amount owing, or don’t run a protection racket, or you could simply say ‘do your job.’

In other words, use the moment of silence provided to do some tangible and realistic self-assessment. If you are a tax collector or a member of Pilate’s auxiliary, you already have your answer, but for the rest of us, it’s going to require some thinking. What part of my work, my relationships, my personality needs a tidy up? It’s unlikely to rise to the level of scandal, and it won’t be called something ending in ‘gate,’ but we can repent nevertheless.

After all, God says ‘one more year,’ so we have the time. Amen.

posted by michael jacob kooiman @ 6:25 AM