3rd Sunday in Lent - 2025c

Old Testament – Isaiah 55:1-9

New Testament – Luke 13:1-9

 

The One Word

 

INTRODUCTION: “What comes around, goes around.” 

 

“Well, she’s just getting her just deserts.” 

 

“Buddy, it’s time to pay the piper.” 

 

“Karma. That’s what’s happening to that guy. Karma.”

 

“You reap what you sow.”  

 

We’ve all heard such phrases before, if not actually uttered themselves ourselves, right? And each, in their own way, speaks to that universal idea that life, in some grand and cosmic way, always keeps score. And because of that, we sort of all get what we deserve in the end. Life, in other words, works on the principle of cause and effect. 

 

Live a good life, goes the notion, and you can pretty much expect to be blessed and free of troubles. Live a bad life, however, and eventually things are going to catch up to you. “Well, he’s just getting what he deserves. He’s just getting what deserves.” 

 

And sometimes, well, let’s be frank, sometimes we might even relish watching people get their just deserts. We watch some shady TV evangelist, or a greedy double-dealing financial con artist, get hauled away in handcuffs, and it’s easy to not have a sense of glee. “Serves him right,” we might coo, “Serves him right!” 

 

For as far as we’re concerned, the scales of life, more often than not, eventually balance out. While it might take a while, and we might not always see it ourselves, we tend to imagine everybody finally gets back from life what they put into it. 

    

ONE: And it’s not like we’re the first people to ever feel that way, right? Why even in Jesus’ day such a take on life was a pretty popular one.     

 

The righteous, went the theory, could expect to have a blessed life. Sinners, on the other hand, were going to eventually get what they deserved. If something bad happened to a person, well, rest assured there was a reason. Even when it might not be apparent, it was assumed they did something, somewhere, to deserve such treatment.     

 

And there were actually two pretty big tragic events in Jesus’ day that lent themselves handily to such an attitude.  

 

The first event involved the massacre of a group of Galilean pilgrims at the hands of Pontius Pilate. Although the facts are a bit fuzzy, it seems Pilate had a gathering of Galileans, who had come to offer sacrifices at the Temple in Jerusalem, suddenly killed by his troops. 

 

And the carnage was apparently so bad, the blood of the murdered Galileans ended up being mixed with the blood of the animals they had brought to be sacrificed.  

 

The second horrible event that also got people wondering about life involved the sudden collapse of a watchtower in the outer wall of Jerusalem called Siloam. Without warning it apparently came crashing to the ground in a cloud of dust leaving 18 people unexpectedly and tragically dead. 

 

And for some, there was an easy and simple reason for why such sad and sorry events occurred in life. Folks, in short, were just getting what they deserved. Even better, people were simply getting what they deserved from God. 

 

You might recall that’s the attitude of Job’s three friends Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. There’s poor old Job wondering why his life has turned into such a giant mess, and his three friends repeatedly assure him he’s just getting what he deserves from God. “Well, you’ve done something to get on the wrong side of God,” the men keep saying. “You’ve clearly done something.”

 

And so it went even for the people of old. They too also often believed there was a rhyme and a reason behind the tragic events of life. And those folks killed by Pilate and the falling tower of Siloam, well, they must have had it coming.   

 

TWO: Of course, the only problem with such a tidy and concise view of life is that Jesus, apparently, didn’t think too much of it. 

 

Turning to the gathered crowd, Jesus rhetorically asks those present if they really and truly think those who were killed by Pilate and the falling tower of Siloam were somehow worse sinners than anybody else and therefore more deserving of such punishment.

 

“Do you honestly believe,” asks Jesus, “that the Galileans killed by Pilate were somehow far worse than those who weren’t? And do you really believe those killed by the collapse of the tower of Siloam were in some manner worse than anybody else?”

 

Turns out, as Jesus sees it, the idea that such folks died because they were in some way paying for their sins is more than just a bit of self-righteous smugness; it’s just plain old, bad theology.

 

For all of us, claims Jesus, are broken creatures. And if such a system of reward and punishment was actually in effect when it came to God, then there clearly wouldn’t be anyone left on the planet. For God, correctly, would have done away with all of us long ago if that were the case. 

 

How does Paul put it in Romans? “For there is no distinction, since all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God…”      

 

So, for Jesus, the death of the Galileans and the collapse of the tower of Siloam had nothing to do with divine punishment being enacted. Because all of us, frankly, stand in need of judgment when it comes to God. 

       

THREE: So is it any wonder that Jesus then moves from a discussion about God’s judgment to one about God’s grace and mercy?

 

After all, since there are still humans running around the earth despite the fact that we all deserve judgment, God, it turns out, must be pretty darn gracious and merciful. 

 

Comparing humanity to a fig tree in a vineyard that should clearly be cut down because it refuses to bear fruit, just the opposite ends up happening. “Let me tend to it some more,” says the gardener to the owner of the vineyard. “Let me put some more fertilizer around it and make sure it gets plenty of water.”

 

And amazingly, the owner of the vineyard agrees to the request. A tree that is clearly barren and has no hope of producing any fruit is given yet another season. A tree that should rightfully be pulled up and thrown into a brush pile because it is using only good soil that another fig tree could benefit from is given yet more time.     

 

In Victor Hugo’s novel The Miserable Ones, Jean Valjean is bitter and angry after being released from prison where he was forced to do hard labor for 19 years. His crime? Stealing bread from a bakery one night to feed his sister’s seven starving children.    

 

Forced to carry a yellow passport that identifies him as a former prisoner, Valjean struggles to survive once released. Eventually seeking shelter on a cold night in a church, he is welcomed by the priest, who feeds him and gives him a warm place to sleep. During the night, though, Valjean steals some of the valuable silverware and plates as he dashes away.

 

Quickly caught by the police, Valjean is brought back to the priest to face his punishment, and no doubt, more prison time. But the priest does something amazing. Instead of berating Valjean and having him hauled off to jail, he tells the police officers he had given the silverware and plates to Valjean. And what’s more, the priest then picks up two prized candlesticks and hands them to Valjean saying more or less, “And here, you forgot to take these with you, as well.”

 

It is an act of unexpected grace. And as many of you might recall, Valean then spends the rest of his life striving to be a kind, dignified, and honorable man.  

             

FOUR: Is it any wonder that many folks have said over the years that the Christian faith, as broad and as complicated and deep as it is, can actually be boiled down to just one single word. And that one word is grace. 

 

So unlike those frothy-mouthed preachers who love to tell people they better repent or an angry God is going to get them, Jesus tells us to repent because God actually already has us. We can, in other words, seek to reorder our lives, we can seek to be ever more gracious and merciful and loving and hospitable because God is already doing those very same things with us.

 

There is a story about an elderly woman who was also a Quaker. Living alone, she returned one night after a Quaker meeting to find her house being robbed by a burglar. Coming into the house and turning on the lights, the burglar leveled his gun at her ready to take action if need be. 

 

But then after a brief, flickering moment of awkward silence the woman said, “Oh, for heaven’s sake, put that thing away. I can’t stand guns.”  Looking at her dismayed, the burglar was even more shocked to then hear the woman say: “Besides, if your need is so great that you need to steal, you must be pretty desperate so go ahead and take whatever you need.”

 

And with that, the elderly woman started loading some of her possessions into the arms of the wide-eyed burglar. Why, she even stuck a few bucks in the burglar’s pocket while ushering him out the door with a pile of her belongings swaying back and forth in his cupped arms.

 

Well, the next morning the elderly woman awoke only to find on her front porch all the belongings that she had tried to give to the burglar. What’s more, there was even a note from the burglar, which read as follows, “Lady, I can face anger and danger and even death. But I am powerless before your kindness.”

 

Well, not a bad way to think about our God, is it? For just like that elderly woman, when it comes to our sins, all God knows how to do is give and give and give and give. Why, God will even give until there’s nothing left but a naked and bruised Jesus hanging from a cross.  

 

CONCLUSION: So let us repent, brothers and sisters. Let us turn our lives back toward God with new found commitment and zeal. 

 

Not because we’re afraid God is going to get us, but rather because we believe God already has us. Even now, we live in the midst of God’s absurd and lavish mercy.

 

For when boiling our faith down to just a single word, there’s only one word that truly fits the bill. And that word is grace - marvelous, matchless, infinite grace. 

 

Now to the Ruler of all worlds, undying, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever! Amen.