Repentance--asking the Gardner to compost the dung in our lives . . .

     Between my two trips this week, I had occasion to work out and get a couple sermon illustrations.  Who says God is not faithful?  Monday, as I was riding with my earphones in, a visitor, probably a bit loud to get my attention a second or third time, remarked I really did go to the Y.  I took our my earbuds and started talking to her.  Unfortunately, I guess the guys to my left thought maybe she was yelling at me as she was initially talking over my music.  Is there a problem?  What’s wrong?  Why are you yelling at him?  The lady explained she was just getting my attention.  She had visited my church a couple times and wanted to say hello.

     Well, that got them going.  You’re a Christian?  You should be going to his church all the time.  He may not look like it right now, but he’s a great teacher.  Now, that caused me to jump in.  “Whoa!  Let’s get off her back.  Y’all should be coming to my church, or any church for that matter.  And what do you mean I may not look like it right now?!”  She laughed nervously and they made their normal excuses.  It’s been an almost three-year running gag between us.

     The leader this evening offered the “but we were mad at you for blowing us off when we need you” excuse to their normal protestations.  I asked how I had blown them off.  Appealing to her as if she was the judge or arbiter, he busted my chops a bit for skipping my workout last Friday.  Naturally, I rose to my own defense and reminded them I had told them I would be gone late last week as I would be working in El Paso.  Oh yeah, the slavery stuff.  They nodded and pointed out among themselves why I did not work out at my normal evening hours.

     I should say at this point that the guys and I have a pretty good relationship.  I know their names aren’t John.  They probably think my only name is Father.  But we do tend to talk about serious things from time to time.  So I asked why they were mad that I had not worked out at my normal time.

     The leader for the evening said “New Zealand.”

     I asked why they were no longer mad at me, and the proceeded to tell me and the visitor that they had had the conversation among themselves last Friday.  They had figured out how I would have answered and were rather content now.

     Of course, I needed to make sure they should be content over my imagined answers regarding a terrorist attack in a mosque in New Zealand, so I asked how they thought I would have answered their questions.  They had been struggling Friday over the question of whether God had judged those in the mosque for rejecting His Son Jesus.

     I asked how they thought I answered that question.

     The leader said, “well, after some serious discussion and worry, we realized you would have pointed us to the Sixth Word of the torah.”  Thankfully, it is Lent and we do the Penitential Order each week, so I realized he meant we shall not commit murder.  He went on to explain to the visitor that I had taught them that God was not a fan of murder.  When God instructed His people to fight, He gave clear instructions.  Conversely, when God told His people not to fight, He also gave clear instructions.  Since the murderer was not claiming to have heard God’s instruction to kill, this was clearly murder and a violation of God’s instructions to us.

     Now, I should point out that the visitor just wanted to say hi.  She was there to do her own workout and just wanted to encourage me in my workout and point out that we shared a common interest.  I am fairly certain, based on her expression, that she did not expect a teaching on the Ten Commandments or the torah during a break in her workout.  But she was polite.  She told them that was cool that they had figured it out for themselves.

     Unfortunately, my friend was not done, and told her so.  Now she was stuck in a conversation because she had just told them their reasoning was intelligent and sound.  He took it as in for a penny and in for a pound and excitedly told her that he was not done.  Now, when they think of the Ten Words or the torah, they try to figure out how things relate to Jesus.  She, I assume having no other inspiration on how to remove herself from the conversation at this point just asked how they tied that massacre to Jesus.

     My friend told her that was even easier than tying the tragedy to the Ten Words.  Jesus’ second great commandment was to love our neighbor as ourselves.  One cannot love someone and murder them.  You just can’t.  That is hate, the very opposite of love.  So, the massacre would be condemned by Jesus and by God.

     To his credit, he seemed to realize he was making a judgment about God.  So he asked if they had worked through it the way I would have walked them through their discussion.  I told him I would like to think I would have.  I did not share with him that I had my doubts I would have been as eloquent as he was.  But they certainly had captured God’s heart in that matter.

     He, of course, was pleased to be validated.  They were proud of their success, at least they had the tone of those who are proud.  I’m not fluent in their language, so I cannot say for certain.  Her face, though, was a bit more challenging to read.  I asked if she was ok, and she said “man, when you say you have weird conversations at the Y, you have weird conversations with surprising people.”  We chatted a couple more minutes about their reference to the word and not the commandment and her shock that they were likely Christians who did not attended the denomination of their background.  After a bit, she begged off claiming she needed to finish her workout, but she promised I would see her in church again.

     Human beings have a need to connect events with meaning.  It is a statement that a famous bishop in our Communion made to me over beers in Chicago when he learned I was a Classics major, and it was a statement I shared with the students and parents of those students who study the Classics in the commonwealth of Virginia.  Classicists study the attempt by earlier men and women to give meaning to the events that were happening in the world around them a long time ago.  In the Church, we call that theologizing.  Why does this happen?  Why did that happen?  As you can all see from our Gospel lesson from Luke today, it was happening when people encountered Jesus.

     Before I really begin, understand we have no extant proof that the slaughter described by those engaging Jesus occurred.  For some who study Ancient History, that’s a deal breaker.  For those who study Pilate, or other governors in the Roman Empire, though, such an account is nowhere near unbelievable.  Just because records do not survive does not mean they did not occur—it’s kind of like all those receipts you lose that are the very key to your taxes being a return rather than a payment.  That same Pilate will condemn Jesus to death even though he understands the Jewish leadership has plotted against a wrongfully accused man.  Pilate was concerned with staying in power and staying alive.  He wanted the taxes paid to Rome, for there to be no civil unrest, and for Caesar to keep him in power.

     Those around Jesus ask if those Galileans who were killed and had their blood mingled with the blood of sacrifices were killed in that way because they were being punished by God.  It’s not that unusual a question in any time, but especially the 1^st Century Mediterranean cultures.  Gods were strongest in their temples.  Part of the sacking of any temple was a claim that your god was greater than their god.  All temples would have seen the mingling of worshippers’ blood as blasphemous.  Gods would have to act to preserve their power and glory.  Since God did not act to save the Galileans, the people wondered if this was His judgement on them.

     Think back nearly a year ago to the discussions about the shooting at the church in Antioch.  How surprised were we that someone would shoot up a congregation during worship?  How many people wondered allowed to me about why God allowed that to unfold the way it did?  How many Adventers wondered aloud or silently that the actions were God’s judgment on that church?  How many people thought that’s what happens when you build in Antioch rather than Brentwood?  Unfair?  Really, people said that to me during the aftermath as they struggled with the meaning of the tragedy.  And the idea of God protecting His flock in church was strong at the Y when it happened.

     Bad things happen in the world around us.  Bad things happen all the time.  Bad things are so common that I spend more time trying to figure out why “this bad thing” garnered so much more press or attention or empathy than “that bad thing” than I do looking for theological meaning behind each one.  For those outside the faith, those who want God to be a god who eliminates evil, such stories simply confirm their unbelief.  It is, from my perspective, unfortunate.  They really do not want God destroying all evil.  What they really mean is “I want God to destroy the evil of which I disapprove.”  It’s a big difference.  If God was really in the business of rooting out evil rather than wooing the evildoer’s, none of us would exist.  None of us would have the opportunity, while we were yet His enemies, to repent and turn back to Him.  That, of course, is a bunch of different conversations.

     Today, we are looking more intently at this idea of events happening in the world and whether they carry theological implications.  Our concerns, as it turns out, are not new.  Were their sins worse than others?  Jesus responds emphatically that their sins were not.  He is so emphatic that He points out an additional tragedy that seems familiar to the crowd around Him.  Even the eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them were not worse sinners than those around Him!

     Siloam, of course, had an interesting role in the fabric of Ancient Israel’s society.  It was from the pool of Siloam that the Levite was sent with the golden pitcher to draw water to pour over the sacrifice on the feast of Tabernacles.  This was done in memory of the water that gushed from the rock at Rephidim and likely in homage to Isaiah 12’s claim that “you will draw water from the wells of salvation.”  These connections to Moses’ actions and Isaiah’s prophesy caused some rabbinic scholars to teach that the pool of Siloam was the Messiah’s pool.  Now you know why some experts argue that it was the pool of Siloam to which Jesus pointed when He stood in the Temple and told the crowds “let those who thirst come to Me and drink,” a statement which would have confused most of the masses but enraged the leadership.  The pool was the spot where the man was sent to wash the mud off his eyes in order that his sight might be fully restored.  You get the gist.  Siloam had a long important history in Israel, and a tower named for it or around it, fell and crushed eighteen poor folks!

     Jesus is absolutely emphatic that these deaths are no worse than the deaths of anyone else.  In fact, Jesus instructs the crowd and us that unless we repent, they and we will all perish as did those folks.

     We are in a season we call Lent, where our focus is supposed to be on our sins, our walking apart from God.  How many of us truly understand Jesus’ teachings here?  How many of us truly understand that our sins led ultimately to our death?  Often, as Lent makes its way to us each year, people who are struggling with the notion and consequences of sin, will argue with God.  I’m a pretty good guy/gal; it’s not like I killed anyone.  I mean, have you ever read all those things that God counts as sin?  Who could keep them?  As the wrestling continues, and the Holy Spirit has a pretty good half nelson on them, they begin to notice Jesus’ teaching.  What do you mean calling someone a fool is just like killing them?  Jesus clearly never drove in Nashville traffic . . . in the rain!  What do you mean lusting after a hot young man or hot young woman is a sin?  It’s not like I can control what I think when I see something.  Plus, did you see how he or she dressed?  Put differently, we seem to be really good at excusing our sins and pointing out the sins of others.  Put in Jesus’ words, we are great at detecting the mote in the eyes of others even though we have logs in our own eyes.

     The outcome, though, for everyone is the same.  Unless we repent, we all perish.  And perishing is the real tragedy.  God is willing to forgive and redeem and resurrect, and so many of us would rather be confirmed in our guilt.  We would rather go about our daily lives, blissfully convinced of our own worthiness, our own innate value, than to confront the ugly truth beneath the façade.  Lent, my brothers and sisters, is all about digging under the façade and exposing those ugly truths to ourselves.  Put in simpler language, Lent is the season where we intentionally remind ourselves of a need for a Savior!

     I suppose, part of the reason I was drawn to the Gospel this week was a challenge.  One of my colleagues posted a sermon by Gregory the Great on this very passage and double dog dared us to preach like Gregory.  Gregory, as it turned out, preached more on the parable that followed the questions of the crowd, the parable that is meant to warn and challenge and comfort us as we continue this walk through Lent and life.

     Most of my colleagues and I were taken with Gregory’s use of the image of dung.  Our translators use manure, but dung does a better job of conveying Jesus’ teaching here.  Just to refresh your memory, a man has a garden with a fig tree that bears no fruit.  He wants to cut down the fruitless tree and plant a new one in its place.  The gardener asks for one more year.  He will tend it.  If it produces next year, well and good.  If not, the tree can be cut down.

     In the parable, human beings are the trees.  God is the owner of the vineyard;   Jesus is the Gardner.  Just as the Owner of the vineyard is angry that the tree is wasting space and soil, so, too, is God angry that we are not using our gifts to bear glory to Him.  I see some taken aback expressions.  Forget the scandal of the word choice for just a second, and read the parable.  The owner has planted a tree in a vineyard and it does not produce fruit.  Why should he let it continue to live?  Think to our liturgy of penitence a few minutes ago.  We prayed that God would forgive us our sins, known and unknown, things done and . . . left undone.  Why do we rightly pray that?  Because we recognize, each one of us present, that we have not done things which God has commanded, instructed, or called us to do.  We have been lazy or fearful or whatever, and so we have not born fruit for the glory of God in our lives.  We have been bad stewards of the gifts and talents with which He has blessed us.  We are sinners.

     Just as we are about to give up all hope, though, the gardener steps in on behalf of the tree.  Let me tend it.  Give it more time.  Notice a couple important Lenten lessons in this image.  First, as Gregory rightly points out, how will the gardener tend the tree?  He will work the dung into the soil.  To use more modern language, he will compost the dung and turn it into great life-giving soil.  Fast forward to us: what is the dung in our life?  Our sins!  How does the Gardener, Jesus, compost the dung we produce?  That’s right, through forgiveness.

     One of the most powerful tools we have been given, brothers and sisters, is the power to repent and to forgive.  The world teaches us to hold grudges, to never forget, to stick it to our enemies.  God has another way, a deeper way.  We begin by repenting to God of the sins we have committed.  We pray for the grace that the consequences of our sins will be redeemed.  Would that our sins could be measured by cost or fixable effect, but we understand that our sins have ripples that extend and extend and extend.  How do we stop that expanding set of ripples properly?  I see some confused faces.  Let’s try this another more concrete way.

     To use the example of the butterfly effect with sin, what happens when you give another driver the universal sign of respect when he or she thinks they are the most important driver or the only driver on the roads around Nashville?  Quit laughing for a second and seriously think about this.  Do we really know all their responses to our middle finger?  Did their anger or frustrations or myopic sense of self-importance end with their response to us?  Probably, they were not driven to road rage killings, or we would have heard of it in the press.  But how were their inter-personal dealings for the rest of the day?  Did they yell at or fire an employee unjustly?  Did they mistreat a child or spouse?  Did they fuss at a service worker to convince themselves they were worthy of the respect we denied them?  No doubt sitting there, you can think of other ripples.  Now, how do we fix the effects of the ripples?  In truth, we cannot.  Only Jesus, only the Gardener can!

     The uncomfortable truth of which we remind ourselves in Lent is that we cannot.  We cannot fix the ripples of our actions or inactions, our words or our silence.  Only God can redeem all our sins and all their consequences.  Period.

     A curious thing starts to happen, though, when we begin to repent and forgive others who repent.  The world begins to note we are a little off, a little different.  Oh, to be sure, some folks plot to take advantage of what they perceive as our newfound naiveite, but way more folks are drawn to it.  Why are you not more bitter about this wrong?  How were you able to move past that wrong?  How can you speak pleasantly to that jerk?  Maybe the southern version of all this is why don’t you use “bless his/her heart more” when you speak of that person?  What, you think I don’t know all that underlies that phrase?

     To use the same image as our parable today, the Gardener takes our repentance and begins to work it into the dung or muck of our lives; He takes our repentance and works it in with the sin.  Over time, if we are truly trying to follow Him, others begin to notice.  Maybe we are slower to give middle fingers in traffic?  Maybe we are less likely to steal from our companies?  Maybe we treat service folks like we expect to be treated by others.  Put in theological words blended with the image of our parable, we begin to be transformed.  People begin to notice changes in us.  At first, those changes may be subtle; heck, they may not believe we are at all different.  But over time, we prove the grace of our Lord Christ true and begin to reflect His character, His instruction of us, better.  We become the meek.  We become the peacemakers.  We become the sons and daughters that He calls us to be!

     But that composting begins with repentance.  We have to understand that we are not pointed to God.  We have to understand that we have pointed ourselves in a direction that leads away from His saving grace.  We have to choose to want to follow Him.  We have to confess our faults and sins and acknowledge our need of Him to atone for the wrongs we have done.  And we have t ask God for the grace to follow Him better, to point ourselves at Him and the things He loves!  It sounds ridiculously counter-cultural because it is.  At a fundamental level we must recognize that we are not captains of our own ships or masters of our own domains.  There is only one Lord, one God, one Gardener with the power to overcome and to redeem all our sins, and He is not us!

     Both the questions about untimely deaths and the parable share an important teaching to which you and I need to pay attention during this season of self-examination where we consider our sins and their effects on others.  Death.  In the crowd’s questions, Jesus is more concerned about their untimeliness of their deaths?  Unless y’all repent, all ya’ll will perish just as they did.  Yes, I retranslated that into Southern to remind you that Jesus was speaking to everyone.  Unless we repent, we all die!  That is the real tragedy in Jesus’ eyes.  None of us has to die.  God woos us, asks us to turn back to Him, to follow Him, but we so often reject Him, choosing death over life eternal.  We ignore the fact that the path to salvation begins with repentance and ends with acceptance of Him as the Christ.

     The parable He chooses to illustrate His point shares the same message.  The Gardener asks the Owner for one more season, but what’s the acknowledgement regarding the produce of the fig tree in question?  That’s right.  If it bears fruit, well and good.  If it does not, He can cut it down.

     Brothers and sisters, we take it axiomatic that we have all the time in the world to decide to repent and follow God.  Part of that is the patient nature He reveals in Scripture, part of that is the fact that we are going on almost 2000 years since His Ascension and promise to return.  But God’s patience is not endless.  Eventually, we will face an accounting for our sins before His throne.  Either we will have accepted His Son as our Lord and be given entrance into the land of saints, or we insist that we can do things our way, and find ourselves needlessly headed toward the death that so frustrates Jesus.  What choice have you made?  Do you follow Him?  Or would you rather do everything your way?  And make no mistake, thinking about it or putting it off until later is already making a choice, a tragic choice.  Because if we have not accepted Him, our fate is intertwined with those upon whom the tower collapsed or those whose blood was mingled with sacrifices.

     I get it.  I have seen the squirming this morning.  We no more want to talk about sin and judgment and death today than did folks in the time that Jesus walked the earth.  Yet it is precisely to that deeper consideration where Jesus takes us twice, but in the discussion of events current to His Incarnation and in the instructive parable that He shares with the crowd.  It is that conversation that He has with the crowds and with us gathered here in Nashville this third weekend of Lent.  How do we choose?  Do we trust God and His Son our Lord, the Owner and Gardener of the vineyard?  Do we believe His offer and accept His call on our life?  In this season of self-examination, that may be the most important question we prayerfully answer!

In Christ’s Peace,

Brian†