God’s Mercy Never Fails
Luke 13:1-9[1]
How we view
“salvation” makes all the difference in how we view God. When we make it about
sorting out who goes to Heaven and who goes to Hell, it’s hard to see a loving
and merciful God in that. In fact, that whole way of looking at salvation seems
to fit more with a God who is “jealous” and “angry.” When we make salvation
about where we’re going to wind up in the end, we make God out to be a God
whose anger “devours” all who provoke him, a God whose “wrath” wreaks
“vengeance” upon those who go astray. That’s the God of “an eye for an eye and
a tooth for a tooth.” I would say that version of “salvation,” and the view of
God that goes with it, inspires more fear than it does hope.
While you can find
plenty of Bible verses to back up that view of God and salvation, I would say
it misses the whole point. The essential revelation of God’s character in the
Bible is what God declared to Moses in the “cleft of the rock”: “The LORD, the LORD,
a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and
faithfulness” (Ex 34:6). That message resounds throughout the Bible, especially
in the Psalms: “O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his
steadfast love endures forever” (Ps 136:1). And the message of salvation is
that this God whose very character is mercy and grace is working to draw us all
into his infinite kindness, and his love that never fails. This understanding
of salvation, and the view of God that goes with it, inspires hope!
Once again this may
seem like a strange way to introduce the Gospel lesson for today. But I would
say that how we view God is at the heart of making sense out of this passage. We
hear Jesus saying, “unless you repent you will all perish,” but I think we must
do a double take because it doesn’t sound much like Jesus! I believe what’s
going on here is that Jesus was confronting the self-righteousness of the
people who brought up the fate of the Galileans. In the setting of Luke’s
Gospel, Jesus has been talking about the importance of the proper response to
the kingdom of God: repentance and faithfulness. These folks came to Jesus
assuming that because they agreed with him, they were much better off than the
“poor” Galileans who “must have done something to deserve their fate.”
I think that’s why
Jesus adopts a rather harsh tone here: “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” (Lk 13:2-3). I think he was confronting them with the casual way in
which they painted those Galileans as “worse sinners” because of what happened
to them. God doesn’t work that way. And Jesus was confronting them for thinking
of themselves as if they didn’t need to repent. But in Luke’s Gospel Jesus
proclaimed that God’s love demands a change of heart from all of us that
changes our lives!
The fact that Jesus
emphasized the urgency of this change for everyone may still sound strange to
us. But I would say that’s why Luke’s gospel combines Jesus’ warning about the
urgency of repentance with the parable of the fig tree. It might not seem
obvious, but I would say that the parable is meant to balance the demand for
repentance with the assurance that God’s mercy never fails. The reason we might
miss that is because we tend to think that the owner of the vineyard who came
expecting fruit from the fig tree represents God. And we think that the
gardener seeking more time represents Jesus. I don’t think that’s the point. In
the parable of the fig tree God is both the one who demands that we change our
hearts and lives, and the one who patiently draws us toward that change in his
kindness, mercy, and love.
There’s a balance to
be struck here. It’s true that God’s love demands of us all a heart-felt change
that results in a different way of living. But it’s also true that the God who
is working to make all things new is kind beyond measure, infinitely patient,
and merciful without fail. That means God never stops seeking to draw us to
himself. Like the gardener in the parable of the fig tree, God is continually
“cultivating” our hearts to produce the “fruit” of living in a way that lines
up with God’s love.
Of course, if God is simply sorting out
sinners and saints, none of this makes much sense! I realize that view of
salvation has been around for a long time. But it’s way too simplistic. And the
end result is that people live in fear of their “eternal destiny” all their
lives. The biblical view of salvation is that the God whose very character is
mercy and grace is always working to “cultivate” our hearts, always working to
draw us into his infinite kindness, and his love that never fails. We may have
to wait to see the fruit of what God is doing in our lives, but it all flows
from who God is. I believe that’s worth waiting for!
Yes, when God’s love
takes hold of our hearts, it demands that we all change our lives. I think
that’s why Jesus spoke the way he did to those who came to him looking to be
congratulated for their “righteousness.” Jesus was reminding them that God’s
love demands that we all change our lives. But at the same time, the Bible’s
primary teaching about God is that he is infinitely patient, and merciful
without fail, giving us the time we need to make that change. I don’t believe
we have to live in fear that we may at any moment step over some line that will
exclude us from God’s love. Rather, I believe we can remain hopeful as we wait
to see salvation fulfilled, because God’s mercy never fails!
[1] ©
2022 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, Ph. D. on 3/20/2022 for
Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.
No comments:
Post a Comment