Have you ever had tickets to a show, or to a movie, and ended up being late, for whatever reason?
I use a show or movie and not late to church, because I know no one here ever comes late to church, and if I used the analogy that way, no one would understand it!
Anyway, as you sit there watching the show, you say to yourself, “I think I’m missing something.” The reason for that is because you have missed something, and to understand the show, you are going to have to watch it again, or have someone explain what has already happened.
Our Gospel reading is a lot like that today.
What we have just read from the beginning of the 13th chapter of the Gospel according to Luke, is the end of a long public teaching discourse beginning in the first verse of chapter twelve, and the seed of the parable of the fig tree was planted in the beginning of that teaching. There is a theme Luke is establishing, and the parable of the fig tree drives that theme home.
Let’s set the stage, as chapter twelve begins. People are coming by the thousands to see Jesus, and before he addresses them, he turns to his disciples and gives them this warning, “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. Nothing is covered up that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known. Therefore, whatever you have said in the dark shall be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in private rooms shall be proclaimed on the housetops.”[1]
So, before Jesus teaches the thousands, he warns the disciples to not be hypocrites.
Jesus then goes on to teach the multitudes. Some of the lessons he teaches are: don’t fear man, fear God, and acknowledge Christ, and Christ will acknowledge you. He teaches the parable of the rich fool, and not to be anxious about your life, but to be anxious about seeking after God, he says to be ready for judgment because the son of man is here. Jesus says he comes to bring division, not peace. He asks the crowd,”How can you interpret the weather, but not interpret the current times meaning Jesus’ ministry?” That is a key point, because when Jesus asks that, he also calls the crowd hypocrites. He teaches to settle with your accusers before the judge judges you, and then we come to today’s gospel lesson.
Hypocrisy is a key theme throughout this public discourse. Jesus says it outwardly twice and uses an illusion for it once. The Greek word for actors was hypokrites. “The Greek word itself is a compound noun made up of two Greek words that translate, ‘an interpreter from underneath.’‘[2] That makes more sense when you know that the actors in ancient Greek theater wore large masks to mark which character they were playing, and so they interpreted their character from underneath their masks.”[3]
For those who heard these teachings of Jesus, and for the early readers of Luke’s account, they would understand that Jesus was comparing the Pharisees, and those who don’t recognize him, to actors on stage wearing masks. The leaven of hypocrisy is living a life where you appear to be following the law of God but are, in fact, abusing it, and the people around you. Nothing we do is hidden from God, and all of us will have to account for our lives before our judge Jesus Christ.
If you all are anything like me, you’re thinking right now, or have thought at some point in your life something like this: well I’m not as bad as that person over there. They are a total mess. I feel sorry about some of the things I have done, but at least I haven’t done, INSERT SIN HERE. We can all find someone else who is a better, or greater sinner than we are.
That mentality is what Jesus is addressing at the beginning of the reading today. People ask Jesus about some Galileans who Pilate killed during their time in Jerusalem while on pilgrimage. Then Jesus turns their question on them and compares what Pilate did to the tower of Siloam falling on natives in Jerusalem, and says to everyone, “unless you repent you will all likewise parish.”
After that Jesus gives us the barren fig tree! The fig tree throughout the OT and NT is used as a stand-in for the people of God. The fig tree is our final hypocrite. A barren fig tree and a fig tree that bears fruit look the same unless it is the season to give fruit. Fig trees were “appreciated for their delicious fruit, and for their dark deeply lobed leaves.”[4] A fig tree that does not bear any fruit still has those dark colored leaves. So, on the surface, a productive fig tree will look exactly the same as a useless fig tree. Remember the fig tree is a stand-in for the people of God. Jesus, whose “ministry takes place on the edge between mercy and judgment”[5] is calling us to repentance, to self-examination, not to an examination of those around us. Not to the judgment of those around us. Not to feel better about ourselves because someone else is a more miserable sinner than we are. But to focus on ourselves as the people of God, and what are we producing as a community? Are we producing people who hear about cheap grace, and continue to live a life of hypocrisy before God? Or are we producing a people who recognize their own sinfulness and in doing so, can’t help but have love, compassion, and forgiveness for their fellow community of sinners we call The Church?
To know we are productive Christian’s bearing fruit, is to be a community of people who seek God’s will and not our own. To be a people who leave judgment to Jesus, and come to Him for forgiveness, while modeling that forgiveness to each other. The process of growing closer to God involves “a break from sin and a production of fruit,”[6] that sounds a lot like the season of Lent.
As we are now at the halfway point of Lent this year, I ask you all: What are you focusing on, comparing yourself to others, or growing closer to God? Take off your masks, and stand naked before your Lord, for he knows whatever you have said and done in the dark, and all that you have whispered in private, and he loves you anyway. If he didn’t, he would not have paid the insurmountable price he did for every single one of us.
[1] Luke 12:1-3 ESV.
[2] https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/hypocrite-meaning-origin
[3] Ibid.
[4] Dictionary of Biblical Imagery Ryken, Wilhoit & Longman p283.
[5] Stories with intent Klyne Snodgrass p 264.
[6] Ibid.
sermon preached by the Rev. Christian Wood
Church of the Redeemer
Sarasota Florida
Third Sunday of Lent
31 March 2019