Luke 13:1 - 9
The other day I spent some time with
an elderly lady who had been hospitalized for about three weeks and
was now trying to get her strength back. She was a bit depressed,
and in the course of our conversation she told me that she knew why
God was doing this to her – she hadn't been to church for about a
decade. Then she went on to tell me that the reason she stopped
going to church was because they had changed everything from when she
was young. And then she told me that all the scandals going on in
our Church were because God was punishing us because of those
changes. She was pretty sure we got President Trump because we
aren't doing anything to put an end to abortion. I didn't have the
heart to ask her what God was planning to do to us because marijuana
is now legal.
The people of Jesus' time believed
that when bad things happened, it was all God's doing. You remember
when Jesus' own disciples asked him whose sin caused a man to be born
blind – his sin or his parent's sin? What did those Galileans do
that God allowed Pilate to kill them? What about those people
building a tower, what was their sin? We twentieth century
Christians are so much more sophisticated. We don't look for a
hidden sin when tragedy strikes someone. Except for maybe that
elderly lady.
The first thing we should notice about
this gospel is that Jesus more or less tells us that we can't blame
God when bad things happen, nor should we believe that if we become
ill or lose a loved one or go bankrupt, it's not because we are
sinners. After all, we are all sinners, we all miss the mark. There
is a whole branch of theology that tries to figure out how if God is
perfect, all powerful, all good, and all loving, why do we get sick
and die, why do children get cancer, why do typhoons wipe out whole
villages, why was there a holocaust? And we've all heard
explanations ranging from “God is punishing someone” to “God
has his reasons which we will find out in the next life.” I don't
believe either is the answer, but I don't have an answer. I think
Jesus is saying today, that isn't the question. The real question is
are you changing? Are you taking advantage of the time you still
have left on your meter?
Jesus says, “repent or perish”,
which sounds a lot like one of those old fire and brimstone
preachers. But repent isn't a dirty word; the original word in the
Greek language was metanoia, which means something like “get above
your mind” or “change your direction” or maybe simply “wake
up”. Because we know the natural tendency is not to change. I had
a friend once who would answer the question “how are you”? With
a percentage '' 80 %, 70%, whatever. He explained that the number
expressed how close things were to where he wanted them to be. But
the interesting thing is that most of the time he answered roughly
the same fraction. He must have been content with 75%. And I think
that's how a lot of us are in our spiritual lives. We aren't where
we want to be, but we aren't really willing to put in the effort and
time. And Jesus is saying that we risk “perishing” because the
reason most of us are content with 75% is that there are a lot of
little things we'd have to change to do better; Maybe we'd have to
give up some television time and get involved in some ministry.
Maybe we'd have to put down the book we're reading and pick up some
spiritual reading or the bible. Maybe we would, heaven forbid, have
to take 15 of our precious minutes to say the rosary. I'm not
picking on anyone; I am speaking from experience. And the trouble is
always what pulls us away from God can be boiled down to pleasure,
prestige, power, or wealth. And the pursuit of these will never get
us to 100% which can only be found in God.
If our lives are controlled by our urges, appetites and desires we
are perishing. If we are blind to the needs of others we are
perishing. If we cannot control our anger and lash out whenever we
are provoked, we are not living; we are perishing. If we cannot make
peace with the pains of our past, but keep rehearsing them in or
minds over and over again, we are not living; we are perishing.
Repentance isn't a prison sentence; it's the path that
liberates us from a life that just settles, a life that we could
never call “abundant” – which is the life that Jesus calls us
to.
The parable of the fig tree is meant
to be a wake-up call. At any moment the owner of the vineyard will
ask if I have fulfilled the purpose for which I was created, and
whether I have or have not, there will be no more opportunity. If
I'm only 60% of the way there, I hope I'll be graded on a curve. But
the parable also tells us of God's mercy. He is the God of another
chance, and today he is offering you and I yet another chance to
change our minds, to wake up, to repent. And the best news from the
parable of the fig tree is that he will give us everything we need to
reach that abundant life he wants for us, that complete joy that
Jesus wishes to share.
Some of you know I'm a bible geek.
This parable is only in the gospel of Luke. There is another acted
out parable in Matthew and Mark, where Jesus comes upon a fig tree
which was full of leaves, but had no fruit. Jesus cursed the tree
and it withered and died. I wonder if Luke is thinking about that
episode when he described this parable. He's reminding us that we
are called to bear fruit, but it's never too late to take advantage
of what God offers us to achieve this goal.
The bible doesn't tell us what
happened to this fig tree. Despite the efforts of the gardener, did
it still bear no fruit when the owner came back the next year? Was
it still just taking up space and exhausting the ground? Or did it
finally bear figs, did it finally achieve the purpose for which the
vineyard owner had intended when he planted it? We can only hope.
For the fig tree – and us.
