Sunday Worship
Welcome to Sunday Worship in Leesfield Parish on the Third Sunday of Lent. Our Church Services this morning are at the usual times of 9.15 at St Agnes' and 11.00 at St Thomas'.
If you are unable to be with us in person, you will find resources below to worhip at home.
Our first hymn this morning is "Longing for Light, We Wait in Darkness"
Today's Gospel
Luke 13:1-9 Repent or Perish
At that very time there were some present who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. He asked them, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did.
Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them - do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did."
Then he told this parable: "A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, 'See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?' He replied, 'Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.'"
Reflection
The Gospel, for want of a polite word, is a pile of dung!
I suspect that’s not something you would expect to hear in a sermon let alone for anyone to try to make a case that it’s a fair comment.
Bad things happen. They happen to everyday ordinary people. They happen to the sinful and innocent alike.
A forest fire destroys hundreds of houses, thousands of animals and plants and many people. A massive flood does likewise in another part of the world or an earthquake or a Tsunami. Or maybe a gunman or a knifeman kills a young family or innocent children for no apparent reason.
People are shocked and devastated – they look for reasons and look for someone to blame. There’s always got to be someone to blame. It’s global warming that caused the fires or the flood or the Tsunami. It people destroying the planet! It isn’t the earthquake that’s the problem, it’s the building regulations that weren’t strong enough or folk making a profit by cutting costs.
Somebody should have known that a person with mental illness might have committed an atrocity, so why wasn’t he locked up beforehand? There’s always someone to blame!
Some people turn their ire on God, they question and even blame God…. How can such a powerful God allow this to happen to innocent people? Why does God punish people like this? People who were young, mostly good - people who might have had a young family or were in the prime of life – why did God let it happen to them?
Perhaps you might have thought that yourself, especially if tragedy has unexpectedly struck someone close to you. Sadly, I know of someone who has fallen out with God and refuses to come to church because of a very tragic incident. We hope and pray that individual will feel the comforting presence of the Holy Spirit and come back to Jesus.
There is a whole body of religious study that wrestles with this question of, ‘Is God to blame?’ It’s called Theodicy and has been debated for thousands of years. We cannot delve into this complex theological issue in a short reflection, but it’s fair to say that there are some people who think all bad things are a punishment from God for sin. To some extent that is understandable, because they look at Old Testament examples like God destroying the earth in Genesis and the story of Noah, or the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.
However, to assert that all people who suffer illness or death are being punished directly by God because they are sinners, is too simplistic an argument. If we go down that avenue, then we could argue that, as we as we are all sinners, we should all be punished in some way right now.
Jesus explores this in His preamble for today’s parable. The starting point appears to be, ‘bad things happen in life’. He cites Pilate sacrificing Galileans and a tower that collapsed in a nearby town. Amongst those killed would have been people of all ages and backgrounds, some who were gentiles or Jews. Some who were considered bad people and many who were considered to be good.
However, He uses these examples of random suffering to highlight about another tragedy that could happen, unless things change in our lives. That other tragedy is Judgement – the day when we all stand before God and answer for our sins and deeds. That day that will come at sometime for us all, and none of us know when that will be.
Like last week's sermon, this is not the gentle, charming Jesus we normally expect, it is a Jesus with sharp edges. He is delivering a ‘pulling no punches’ parable - a warning that we all have to acknowledge that we have sinned and done wrong to others and to God. He also warns that we do not know when judgement day will be, so we cannot wait forever to get matters of eternal importance right in our lives. If we don’t, then it is only when we face God, that we will see His justice for what we have or have not done.
But wait! This is still the kind and loving Jesus we love and adore After all, because He gives us hope and shows us how we might make things right.
Like the fig tree, God is looking for us to bear fruit and do what is righteous. To do good things and also acknowledge our sins and let God know we are genuinely sorry for dishonouring Him. In Mark 11:12-14, Jesus cursed the fruitless fig tree, that it would never bear fruit again. However, here He gives us hope. Like the gardener who wants to feed the barren fig tree with manure and give it one last chance to bear fruit before chopping it down and burning it in the fire; Jesus gives us the Gospel and His good news to feed and nurture us in the hope that we will bear fruit before it’s too late. Perhaps the Gospel is like manure after all. Full of goodness and richness that we can absorb and help make us righteous and worthy of God’s grace. Paul
