Tuesday 01 November 2011

Background

After Jesus' challenge to the people (see yesterday's passage), he is told about someGalileans offering a sacrifice at one of the Jewish festivals, whohad been killed by the order of Pilate. Josephus, a Jewishhistorian of the time, records several massacres during this periodwhen the Roman garrison had to deal with turbulent crowds. Theincident was reported to Jesus for his comment on the disaster. Itwas commonly agreed that when such things happened the peopleconcerned must have been the worst possible sinners. Sin broughtpunishment. But Jesus does not go along with that way of thinking.Instead he uses the opportunity to challenge the people around himabout their own sin, taking universal sin as basic. Unless theyconcerned themselves with their own need to repent and turn theirways to God's, they too would perish. The time is now, when Jesusis amongst them, for them to address their ways.

Jesus backs this up by referring to the men working on the towerwho died: they were not worse offenders than others living inJerusalem. Perhaps both groups of men had no time to repent due tothe sudden violent nature of their deaths and Jesus wants to remindthe people to use the time that they have to return to God. He usesthe parable of the fig tree to reveal God's offering of anopportunity for repentance. There is time for the fig tree to bearfruit once more and the gardener will look after it and watch overit, but if it does not then bear fruit it will be cut down. It isalso possible that the parable refers to the nation of Israel,which for years God had looked after in order to bear fruit, butnone was forthcoming. Now Israel was perceived as rejecting God'sson, but God would give them more time to turn back to him beforebeing cut off.

To Ponder

Can you remember a time when you had cause torepent and turn back to God? What did you learn about God at thattime?

How can we begin to understand senseless death ina suffering world of hunger and war?

If you were aware that someone was watching youto see if you would bear fruit during the next year, would youchange your life? And how would you do that?