March 3, 2013
Lent 3
Psalm 63:1-8
Luke 13:1-9
(prayer)
I have noticed that when grief becomes part of a person’s life because someone they cared about dies or when a public tragedy hits the news, the conversation eventually includes the question of “why God did do this” or “why did God passively allow this to happen?”
There are some standard answers that people will offer:
· It was God’s will – part of a bigger plan;
· God wanted those loved ones to be with God in heaven;
· The people lives were not up to the standard God expected, so they were either being punished with these deaths, or at the very least God refused to protect them on principle.
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Each one of those answers disgusts me. They require me to believe in a god that I don’t like: a god who is dispassionate (not compassionate), selfish and petty.
And yet, I know that if part of the nature of God is that God is all powerful, all knowing, doesn’t it follow that God is fully capable of interceding in the course of human history (it is not unusual to believe that God does this regularly), that these answers make as much sense as when someone (who narrowly avoids a tragedy) can say that God made a special effort to save them in that moment.
The big “why” questions remain – why some and not other? – what is God’s criteria for this intervention?
It is a serious question of faith for me. I want to believe the words of our United Church creed, that “God has created and is creating”, but does that mean that God inserts God’s self into a natural course of events and changes ultimate history?
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Jesus was asked to weigh in on this subject in Luke chapter 13. Two examples are shared.
1. There was a slaughter of pilgrims at the Temple. People in Jerusalem from Galilee who were bringing sacrificial offerings to the temple – there was some kind of confrontation (we aren’t told any details) and Pilate’s soldiers responded violently, so that the pilgrim’s “blood was mingled with their sacrifices.”
2. And there was a problem with the structural integrity of the Tower of Siloam: it collapsed and eighteen people in or near the tower were killed by the falling debris.
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Even though the objective cause of these tragedies was human choice to be violent and the natural consequences of choices made around an inadequate or degraded construction, the question was, why did God plan for these things to happen? (or why did God not stop it?)
The presumed answer in the Bible passage was that these victims were unworthy of God’s intervention because of the depth of their sinfulness.
Jesus begins a response by asking the questioners in the crowd – do you really think that these victims were any more sinful (less faithful) than you? Do you believe that God kept you from harm because of your piousness?
Jesus implied message (and how I wish he had spoken these words plainly): No, everyone falls short of a life of perfect righteousness. You are all in need of repentance. What happened to these people at the Temple and at the Tower of Siloam had nothing to do with their sin. Sin is a separate issue!
Then… Jesus uses the opportunity to talk about how one should deal with sin, rather than wait for God to act.
Sin is the sum total of the choices we make to live in opposition to what we see as God’s way of faithful and righteous living. For the Hebrew people of Jesus’ day that meant living in adherence to the Law, the Torah – centred in the Ten Commandments:
1. I am Yahweh your God, have no other gods
2. Make no graven images or likenesses
3. Do not take Yahweh's name in vain
4. Remember the sabbath day
5. Honour your father and your mother
6. Do not kill
7. Do not commit adultery
8. Do not steal
9. Do not bear false witness
10. Do not covet
Jesus would later sum up The Law even more simply: "Hear, O Israel: Yahweh our God is Yahweh alone: you shall love Yahweh your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. And, Yahweh says: You shall not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love you neighbour as yourself." (Deuteronomy 6:4-5 and Leviticus 19:18)
Love God and love others as you seek to be loved. To do otherwise could be considered ‘sin’. We all fall short of the kind of constant love the Law demands. And so, we sin. But we are also invited to be mindful of that sin and seek to live more fully into the law – we are invited to repent (literally to change direction, to re-position ourselves).
That was the preaching point Jesus wanted make when people asked why God had (in essence) allowed the people to die in the Temple massacre and at the tower accident?
Jesus’ answer: “Well it wasn’t because of sin. Speaking of sin... you all are sinners, so you all need to repent!”
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And Jesus made his point (as he often did) by telling a parable: there was a man with a fig tree in his vineyard (now why would he be growing figs in the middle of the land set aside for grapes, I don’t know – we can only assume that he wanted figs to go along with his wine). But after waiting for three seasons, there was still no fruit and he was ready to give up: ‘cut it down’, he told the gardener. ‘Wait’, said the gardener, ‘give me one more year. I will give it special care – I will make sure the soil is good, that the tree has nutrients. Give the tree one more year to produce figs.’
That’s where Jesus ends the story, but, if you’re like me, as hearers of the parable, we assume that the effort pays off and the tree is saved from the ax when the calendar rolls around. I mean why tell the story if it is going to end – so a year later, the tree still had no figs and was cut down.
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Jesus’ message is not too hard to figure out – to live beyond our mistakes (beyond the selfishness that gets in the way of loving God and others), our sins, it takes some effort on our part. We need to set the stage for a more faithful way of living.
It’s not going to immune us from tragedy or illness or the myriad of ways we can be harmed as we interact with each other and the world in which we live.
Jesus is talking about our spiritual relationship with God – that is what is being saved.
By using a metaphor of the growth of plants, Jesus was showing us a level of truth in what he wants us to believe. The growth of plants is a miracle that we get to witness almost every day. The seed germinates and a genetic rollercoaster sets off on a path we didn’t create. And yet, we have learned that we can influence the growth – we can nurture or hinder. We can try and have an influence on potential outcomes. Our lives, Jesus says, are the same kind of miracles. We can nurture or hinder our growth. The question we are challenged to answer for ourselves is: Can we grow?
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Jesus was in good company tying the metaphor of the gardener to the need for nurture for our spirits. Psalm 63 is attributed to King David when we was out in the wilderness, experiencing the impact of the dryness and barrenness on his body. He was physically thirsty and it gave him cause to think about how his soul thirsts for God.
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One the animated movies my younger kids saw last year was “The Lorax” based on Dr. Seuss’ 1971 book. The book is about a young boy who learns from an old hermit why the land is so run down and empty. The boy learned that land was once filled with lovely trees that provided a home for animals. But the hermit once had a business that used the fruit of the trees to make a product that everyone “had to have”. When the last tree was cut down, a strange creature called the Lorax appeared. He said that he spoke for the trees because trees have no tongues. The Lorax led the exodus from the land.
A morale: if we take away growth’s potential – growth can’t happen.
The story has a hopeful ending (similar in away to Jesus parable): the old hermit gives the boy the last remaining seed and tells him to go and plant it.
In the movie that invitation is challenged by the head of the O’Hare Air Company, which provides breathable air to the land with no trees. Planting the seed would not be good for business.
Even if you didn’t see the movie (like me, I never saw it – I just researched it on Wikipedia), even if you didn’t see the movie, I bet you know what happened at the end.
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I simply do not believe that God plays god with the ins-and-outs of the human experience at any level other than the spirit. An all seeing, all knowing God does not have to be an all meddling God.
I just don’t believe that meddling in the nature of God’s relationship with creation.
I believe that God “has created” and the universe has its basic functionality. Created into this universe is the ability of some of its creatures to make choices that change the direction of history. God plants the tree and offer’s growth’s potential.
I do not believe that God gets in the way of this cosmic dance.
But I do believe that God is creating at the level of our feelings and at the depth of our longings for be people of mind and spirit as well as people of flesh and air.
Love God; love others; allow yourself to be loved. That is the goal of the full spirit. It involves choices we will make. When we get off track, we are invited to take the time to nurture the spirit within us that can the goal possible again.
Jesus says that it is not time to cut the tree down – it is time to let it grow.
For me, in times of tragedy, I won’t ask “where was God”, but I will thirst for God in my life so that I can be who I need to be in that situation. So that I can be the manifestation of Jesus’ great commandment: Love God, love others, allow myself to be loved.
That’s what I hope to grow.
Let us pray:
Life-giving God, may your model of love fill us and sustain us on our journey. Amen.
***offering***
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