Repent Ye, not Repent He
A friend in church will often joke after a sermon from a particularly hard passage, “Too bad Ambrose wasn’t here today. He really needed to hear that one.” The tendency we all have to pass on the hardest requirements to the next person is not a first world problem; it’s a broken human problem. Jesus addresses this issue, in Luke, when the Galileans bring up the regional front page news about an incident in which some other Galileans had their blood mixed by Pilate with their sacrifices. The assumption made by those in conversation with our Lord is that these folks must have been uniquely bad to have gained such a unique judgment. Jesus turns this thinking on its head and demands that His followers ask these hard questions about judgment concerning ourselves, not others.
There were present at that season some that told him of the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And Jesus answering said unto them, “Suppose ye that these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay, but except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.” - Luke 13:1-3
The uniqueness of this death doesn’t strike us as anything at which we should be too horrified. We may think of the Romans and everyone else 2000 years ago as being into weird stuff. Is mixing the blood of Jews with their sacrifices that much harder for us to comprehend than having Pilate as your governor, or living in a time in which offering sacrifices was normal. It can feel far removed.
What is going on, however, is a superstitious interpretation of current events, based on the symbolic nature of the details of the event. The Galilean’s own blood was mingled with their sacrifices. This suggests a number of things at once: the inferiority of any worship they would offer, the supremacy of Pilate over that of the Galileans since Pilate offers them instead of animals, etc.
Even Biblical Law teaches us to see someone who has been openly shown to be under judgment as being someone who is cursed by God. Think Deuteronomy 21:23. So, why does Jesus seem to be saying that the Galileans trying to correctly read the paper are not understanding what the the text says? It’s because they are missing a basic understanding of judgment. Even with the visible display of God’s judgment, like with Christ on the cross, the end result was never supposed to only be, “Boy, God must really hate that guy,” but rather, “The judgment of God is right in front of me. Am I ready?”
The superstition of the living Galileans didn’t rest in the fact that they attributed tragic events to the judgment of God. That just means that actually believed God was in control of the details. That’s not superstition. That’s a Biblical faith. Is there such a thing as a miscarriage of justice? Yes. What Jesus is pushing against is the temptation to see God’s judgment on display and to distance ourselves from it, rather than belly up to it. We are tempted to analyze it rather than embody it. Jesus goes on:
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.” - Luke 13:4-5
We read books like Thornton Wilder’s The Bridge of San Luis Ray and we are struck by the thought that divine order might have led certain people onto the bridge and kept certain people off the bridge precisely in time for its collapse. We are fascinated by the idea that God might actually be that sovereign. Of course He is. That is not what Jesus is pushing against. The problem is that some people will witness judgment and be so preoccupied with the judged that they forget to own the reality of their own rapidly approaching judgment. “Your tower is about to collapse,” Jesus is saying, “Are you ready? Your blood is about to be let.”
When an earthquake strikes California yet again, there will inevitably be some ministry leaders who controversially declare that it’s God’s judgment on California because of their celebration of sexual immorality. This city was destroyed in a flood, that one by a hurricane because of certain legislation that was passed. Many Christians rush to God’s aid, declaring that God would never do such a thing because God’s a pacifist. Of course, this is not true. In order to best display God’s love for the world, many Christians have stripped Him of His power and holiness. God is sovereign over the destruction of cities, the collapse of bridges, and even the moment at which a barn swallow makes a last minute decision that causes it to collide with the front of the truck. We should expect that if a city or a nation or an individual continues in its rebellion against God that they will experience the judgment of God. A person is not crazy for seeing connections between flagrant immorality and temporal destruction. The issue is that we assume our ordering of such themes as judgment and repentance are correct and Jesus suggests that we should assume they aren’t.
“Boy, those people must have been really bad. They should have repented.” Perhaps that’s true; but it is not the correct response. The correct response is, “Oh man, that’s the end of it for them. Am I ready for it to be the end of it all for me?” The Lord goes on to warn that, in addition, we should have a posture that would desire the opposite of cursing for our neighbors. That’s what it would look like for us to love our neighbors, as C.S. Lewis has said. We should hope that in the judgment our neighbors will be vindicated. “I hope they’ve been forgiven,” is what we should be thinking . . . not, “Now they’re gonna get what they’ve got coming to them.” That’s not love. Does God advocate for mercy or condemnation in regard to sinners? That’s not even a real question. There would be no forgiveness of anyone if God wasn’t willing to advocate for mercy on behalf of those who don’t deserve it. This passage segues immediately into a parable about a fig tree that stands condemned.
Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree growing 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 fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?’ “‘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.’” - Luke 13:6-9
This shows us that Christ is wiling to advocate on behalf of the condemned, in order that grace might produce good fruit. If Christians habituated ourselves into a more cruciform pattern of reading current events, we may find ourselves fulfilling the second greatest commandment with more regularity. Hope for vindication when the judgment of God visits your neighbors. You’re next.
