Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
If God is so good and if God is so great, then why (you fill in the blank)? If God is so powerful and if God is so loving then why (you fill in the blank)? Have you ever had someone ask you questions like that? I have— on numerous occasions. An earthquake suddenly sends people scattering, buildings shattering and hillsides sliding. Where’s the grace in that? A street party gets out of control and people end up getting hurt and even killed. Where’s the grace in that? An airplane crashes killing men, women and children. Where’s the grace in that?
Whenever someone wants to question the goodness and the greatness of the Lord our God they usually feel that they have more than enough ammunition on their side. And since our God often works in mysterious ways, since our God does not always explain to us exactly why He does certain things or exactly why He allows certain events to take place we sometimes get caught off guard and may not be sure how to answer the accusations that people bring against our Lord. Sometimes we might even be the one’s asking the question or bringing the accusation! Today’s sermon text gives us the answer to most if not all such accusations.
In the verses preceding our text for today Jesus had been somewhat critical of the crowd following Him because of their inability to “interpret this present time” (12:56). Perhaps as a response to this criticism some people tried to show Jesus that they could in fact interpret the events of their day. Luke tells us in our text, “Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices.”
Cold-blooded murder is a terrible crime no matter where, when or how it happens. The murder of these Galileans, however, was even more shocking since it took place while they were in church bringing their sacrifices to God! Surely, this massacre must have happened as a result of some terrible sin these Galileans had committed against God, right? Surely they deserved it, right? That would be an easy explanation to such a tragedy. That would be a nice “safe” way to explain why God would allow something like this to take place. Looking at such an incident from the outside and coming to the conclusion that “they” must have done something really bad to make God so mad, thinking that “people like that deserve what they get” gives our old sinful nature the opportunity to sit back and smugly say, “At least I’m not as bad as ‘those people.’”
Have you ever thought that way, my friends? Have you ever looked at another person— perhaps even a fellow Christian— and said to yourself, “It certainly does not surprise me that they got caught doing something like that”? Have you ever looked at someone else’s family— perhaps even a family here at church— and said to yourself, “I am so glad that my children would never do anything like that”? It has oftentimes amazed me at how quickly and how easily God’s own people can get caught up in the web of self-righteousness and pride.
To help take the focus off of “them” and put it back where it belongs, that is, squarely on “us” the Lord Jesus says in our text, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them— do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.”
Every time someone dies “unexpectedly” or “before their time,” every time a disaster strikes or an accident takes place we need to ask ourselves, “What if that had been me? Would I have been ready to stand before the Lord’s judgment throne or is there some unrepentant sin in my heart and life?”
For centuries the Christian church has referred to our life here on this planet as our “time of grace.” However much of the time the good Lord has allotted to us— whether that is one hour or one hundred years— a person’s life, a person’s time of grace is their opportunity to come into contact with the grace of God and then to grow in that grace. When a person’s time of grace is over— that’s it. They then stand before the Judge and hear where they will spend eternity. The importance of using our time of grace wisely is very clearly brought out in our text when we hear Jesus speak this parable: “A man had a fig tree, planted in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it, but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?’”
Like all of our Lord’s parables this parable is very easy to understand— when we simply apply it to ourselves. We are the fig trees. The vineyard is God’s church. The owner of the vineyard is our heavenly Father. The caretaker of the vineyard is our Lord and Savior. When by the power of the Holy Spirit we were brought to faith in Jesus as our only Savior from sin, we were “planted” in the vineyard of God’s church. Every day our heavenly Father looks at our lives fully expecting to see the “fruits of faith and repentance” in what we do and in what we say. If the heavenly Father does not see those fruits He exercises His divine patience and waits. He gives us a little more time to grow. He gives us a little more time to mature. He gives us a little more time to produce the fruits of faith and repentance in our lives. But at the same time, the patience of God does come to an end. We have ample evidence of that truth throughout the Scriptures. God’s patience with this world came to an end in the days of Noah and God destroyed the world by means of a flood. God’s patience with the northern Kingdom of Israel came to an end in 722 B.C. when God allowed the Assyrians to conquer the northern Kingdom and carry her people into extinction. God’s patience with the southern Kingdom of Judah came to an end in 586 B.C. when God allowed the Babylonians to completely destroy the beloved city of Jerusalem and carry the people of Judah into exile. And one day God’s patience with this wicked world will again come to an end and this world will be destroyed by fire.
Are you perhaps testing the limits of God’s patience, my friends? Are you living your life with the attitude that you will quit doing this or you will start doing that— tomorrow? You’ll quit being so focused on yourself and your own wants— tomorrow. You’ll start focusing more on your relationship with your Lord and on what He wants from you and for you— tomorrow. Remember that every single moment of every single day your heavenly Father looks at the fig tree of your life expecting to find the fruits of faith and repentance. If— God forbid— if day after day after day He does not see any fruit the day will surely come when He will say, “Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?”
Where’s the grace, my friends? There is no escaping the fact that the majority of this text is oriented towards the holy, just and perfect Law of our God. And unless we have spent the last fifteen minutes thinking to ourselves, “I am sure glad so-and-so is here today because they really needed to hear this,” or, “It’s too bad so-and-so isn’t here today because this sermon would have been good for them to hear,” unless we have wasted this time together thinking of how this portion of God’s Word applies to others we will realize how much this text convicts us of our sin.
Where’s the grace? The grace of God is found in the simple quiet words of the caretaker, “’Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’” The grace of God glows warmly from this text when we stop to remember who spoke these words and why He spoke them.
As we have already noted the caretaker of the vineyard is our dear Lord Jesus Himself. Over and over again the Lord reaches out to us with His holy Word and Sacrament to nurture and to strengthen, to feed and to fertilize our faith. Have you ever stopped to think of how many opportunities we have to strengthen and to nurture and to exercise our faith right here in our own congregation? We have a Sunday morning service and a Wednesday evening service every week of the year. We have two different adult Bible classes, one on Sunday morning and another on Thursday night, along with Sunday school and Youth Group.
Add to that list all the opportunities that you have in your personal life to grow in your faith, to exercise your faith and to share your faith with others and you will quickly see that as the Caretaker of the Church Jesus is working overtime to “dig around” our faith and to “fertilize” our faith and to give us the opportunities to produce the fruits of faith in our lives! And when we stumble in our walk with the Lord, when we fail to produce the fruits that our heavenly Father expects to see the good Lord patiently calls us to repentance and then diligently works even harder hoping that we will bear fruit before the time comes to cut us down.
I am sure that you have all noticed that the Lenten season has been an especially difficult time this year for many people in our country with the war in Iraq, the recent multi car pile up in Minneapolis and just struggling each and every day living in a world infected by sin.
Some people might look at all this and angrily ask the question, “Where’s the grace in that?” We look at situations like this in the light of Lent and say, “God’s grace is still right there— on the cross of Jesus Christ.” Let His cross be your guiding light especially during the dark days in your life, my friends. Let His cross be your source of strength especially on the days that you feel the weakest. Let His cross be your motivation as you strive to be faithful productive fig trees in the vineyard of God’s church. Keep the cross of Jesus Christ clearly before your eyes and not only will you know how to answer the accusations that people bring against our God, but you will never find yourself asking the question, “Where’s the grace?” Amen
