Luke 13:1-9 - Jesus Interprets the News - March 20, 2022

If the season of Lent could be summed up in just one word, that word would be…REPENT. In Hebrew it’s “shuv” – which has the basic idea of turning back or turning around. In Greek it’s “metanoia” – literally “change your mind.” Throughout the Bible repentance refers to a change; a change of heart and mind and ways…from sin to holiness, from unbelief to faith, from death to life. In the first of his 95 theses, Martin Luther stated that the entire life of a believer is to be one of repentance. [1] Today, Jesus shows us how the news we consume is really a call to repentance.

Why are we so fascinated by the news? Why do our lives revolve around the morning newspaper or the news feed on our phones? One reason is that it allows us to “play God” – to sit in the safety of our homes and judge the thoughts, words and actions of others. We are invited to join similarly uninvolved reporters in assigning blame or shame or criticism or praise as we see fit. It’s an ego boost to see all these “evil” people paraded before our eyes and think: “I may not be perfect…but I’m certainly better than them!” It gives us a certain “entitlement” complex. That the news validates what we thought all along “other people may need to repent, but not me!”

Israel suffered from this “entitlement” complex. They knew they were God’s chosen people, his treasured possession (Deuteronomy 7:6). They had the Law, the temple, the prophets, priests and kings chosen by God himself. They had proof that God was on their side: he had rescued them from Egypt, led them through the Red Sea and the wilderness, and given them possession of a land that wasn’t theirs. And so they figured: “we’ve got the golden ticket…we don’t need to repent, to change our ways.” And yet, what did God commission Ezekiel to proclaim to Israel? Turn back, turn back from your evil ways, for why should you die, O house of Israel (Ezekiel 33:11)

The Christians in Corinth evidently had the same kind of “entitlement” complex. They were strong, they were spiritual, they were filled with knowledge and the Spirit, they enjoyed their liberty from the Law through the Gospel. They prophesied and spoke in tongues. They were young and hip and growing and…they were the congregation Paul had the most trouble with. They were divided. They abused the gift of the Lord’s Supper and each other. They boasted of their tolerance of sin and failed to carry out proper Christian discipline. They were sexually immoral and doubted the resurrection. Which is why Paul issued one of the sternest warnings in the entire NT: let him who thinks he stands be careful that he does not fall (1 Corinthians 10:12) That’s why he reminded them of Israel’s history; that Israel too had all the benefits of God’s grace – and yet God was not pleased with most of them. He had them die in the wilderness (1 Corinthians 10:5). Remember the lessons of the past, Paul was telling them; don’t take God’s grace for granted. He will eventually reject those who refuse to repent and return to him.

We need to hear this warning too because we still have a tendency to have an “entitlement” complex, to take God’s grace for granted. Don’t we tend to believe that bad things happen to bad people? Every time there is a disaster, some act of war or violence or abuse of power…a tornado, earthquake, or flood – we are inundated with 24/7 streams of speculation attempting to answer the question: “why did God allow this to happen to these people?” And the usual, if unspoken, answer is, “well, they must have deserved it.” (To be clear, sometimes this is the case. When a drug addict overdoses or a speeder dies in a crash, their death is clearly a direct result of their sin.) But the one thing that never changes, no matter what has happened in the news, is the comfort that it has nothing at all to do with me. Jesus challenges that theory in our text.

One day, some people came to Jesus with news about a barbaric act committed by Pontius Pilate. He had slaughtered some Galileans as they were offering their sacrifices at the temple in Jerusalem. It was probably no coincidence that this happened to Galileans. Galilee was the wild west of Israel; a hotbed of insurrection, political anarchists and terrorists. Pilate was probably hoping to make an example out of them. He was sending a message: “If you even think about plotting against my government, this will happen to you, too.”

So how were the people to interpret this? From Jesus’ response, it appears that they were expecting him to agree with their own interpretation: that God was punishing these Galileans for their sin. But Jesus gets to the heart of the issue: do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered these things? And then he does the one thing we never want him to do when we come to him for answers: he turns the question around: I tell you, no. But unless you repent, you will all perish too.

And then to drive the point home even further, Jesus adds a headline of his own: a construction accident which didn’t appear to have any political or religious overtones. A tower fell in Siloam killing 18 people. Just a freak accident. How was this to be interpreted? Do you think that they were worse sinners than all the people living in Jerusalem? Was God paying those people back for some sin they had committed? I tell you, no. But unless you repent, you will all perish too. And you could substitute any manmade or natural disaster, any tragedy you want; those with religious overtones – like 9/11 or the religious persecution occurring in the Middle East and China; or those without, like Russia’s invasion of Ukraine or the wildfires in Texas. How should you interpret that news? Is God punishing these people? Are they getting what they deserve? Jesus’ answer is: no – meaning that’s the wrong question. When tragedies happen we shouldn’t be asking “why did God allow this to happen?” But “what is God telling me?” According to Jesus, the answer to that question is crystal clear: repent! No matter what happened to who, every tragedy is a reminder that this entire world is under God’s curse and sooner or later he is going to bring everyone under judgment. Every death is a reminder that someday we, too, will die. So go ahead and watch the news, but remember that the news isn’t really about what God is doing to others (that’s above our pay-grade), it’s about what he’s telling us. And his message to us is clear: repent, otherwise you, too, will perish.

But the simple fact that we are still here to consume the news and not reduced to a few inches in the obituary section is evidence of God’s grace to us. Jesus illustrates this with a parable. A man had a fruitless fig tree that failed to produce for three years. He wanted to cut it down. It was taking up space, wasting soil and water. But the gardener intervened. Be patient. Give it one more year. He’ll work on it: aerate its roots, fertilize it. If it bears fruit, great. If not, go ahead: cut it down. This parable was clearly spoken against Israel. She was the fig tree God had planted in the Promised Land and when the Son of God came, looking for fruit, he didn’t find any. For three years Jesus had left his footprints on Israel’s highways and byways. For three years he had worked to seek and save the lost in Israel. For three years he had preached and taught and performed miracles. For three years he had searched for repentance and faith in Israel. Israel’s time was running out. But still Jesus was patient, he put up with their unbelief, their hostility, their rejection – because he didn’t want any of them to perish but to return to their God and be saved (1 Timothy 2:4; 2 Peter 3:9).

And that’s also why God puts up with the world at large today. That’s why he doesn’t seem to be on any big campaign to clean this world up. That’s why he doesn’t give this world what it deserves. That’s why in most cases it seems likes he doesn’t interfere or intervene when evil people do evil things and tragedies happen; why he allows felons to drive over Christmas parades, college kids to OD on spring break, and Russia to invade Ukraine. Each and every disaster is a public service announcement through which God is telling the world: Repent. Turn around. Change your mind and your ways. Return to the God who created you.

Most importantly, Jesus’ intercession is the only reason that God has put up with us to this day. His pleading with the Father for “one more year” is the only reason we are still alive, still watching the news and not subjects of the news. It’s why we refer to our lifetimes as our “time of grace.” It is the time Jesus has graciously purchased for us to repent, to return to him and be saved from the destruction that is coming. Both parts are important: repenting and returning. Why? Because we are incapable, by ourselves, of producing the good fruit God demands from us. Jesus makes this clear in John’s Gospel: I am the Vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in me and I in him is the one who bears much fruit, because without me you can do nothing (John 15:5). That Jesus is the one who produces good fruit in our lives is clear even in this parable: ‘Sir, leave it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put fertilizer on it. If it produces fruit next year, fine. But if not, then cut it down.’

This is the real reason we are still alive, still breathing, still walking and talking in this world – so that Jesus would have one more day to dig around the roots of our hearts with his call to repentance, to fertilize us by pouring his life-giving, fruit-producing power into us through Word and sacrament. To make us the fruitful trees God always intended. What does a fruitful tree look like? Paul says the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). Are those fruits present in your life? If God is watching the newsreel of your life – and he is – is he pleased with what he sees? If you have to confess with me that many days we’ve been fruitless trees just taking up space in God’s kingdom – then remember this: the call to return to Jesus, to receive his gifts in Word and Sacrament, isn’t primarily a call to come here to be fertilized and energized so that you can go out and prove your fruitfulness, your worthiness to God in your life. If that were true, we’d be better off giving up now – because our fruit will never meet God’s standard of perfection. No, the call to return to Jesus – especially in this season of Lent – is to trust that he came to live the life we have not, to bear the fruit we cannot, to be cut down on the cross in our place and to rise to life to justify us, make us worthy and righteous in God’s sight. We need to return to Jesus urgently because every day the one thing we need most is the forgiveness and righteousness only he can offer. Because while full and free forgiveness is no guarantee that we won’t be diagnosed with cancer or that some tragedy will put our names in the headlines – it does guarantee that we will be shielded from God’s wrath on Judgment Day. And in the end, that’s the real tragedy we need to avoid.

So…how should we interpret the news – the minute-by-minute reporting of tragic events from all over the world? Jesus says that we can’t – at least not in the way we’d like to. I hope Jesus has changed the way you consume the news forever. That instead of asking “why did God allow this to happen to those people?” we ask “what is God telling me?” Because now we know the answer to that question: repent! Turn around. Change your mind and your ways. Recognize that every tragedy is a shadow of the far worse tragedy that will befall every impenitent unbeliever on Judgment Day. And then return. Return to Jesus in faith – the one who shed his blood to shield you from the punishment of eternal death so that you might instead have the gift of eternal life. Amen.

[1] https://www.luther.de/en/95thesen.html