Only feasting on God will keep us going

Only feasting on God will keep us going in bringing his love and truth to a needy world.  When all is dying, we need to see the living God.  When all is sad, we need to see the joyous God.  We need to look away from ourselves and look toward his glory.  Then, as we admire the excellence of his being, from afar as it seems, we need to hear the good news afresh that he has come near to us to share this eternal, glorious, divine life with us!  We can look at the payment in precious filial blood to be reassured that this utterly unexpected miracle is true.  By faith we know glimpses of that shared Trinitarian life now, in this life, and by hope we look forward to the fullness of the kingdom when Jesus returns.  It is only in this knowledge that we can love God and each other in this meantime called human history, called 'everyday life'.

Luke 13:22-35

Luke 13:22-30

Jesus doesn’t give a direct answer to the question to satisfy our curiosity, but instead warns his hearers to think about their own salvation, not the sum total of all to be saved and whether it is a ‘majority’ or ‘minority’.  I think this makes it pretty clear where our attention should be focused.

Furthermore, whilst his warning does allude to final judgment, he is also warning his listeners in the more specific and immediate context of Israel, her Messiah, and her Roman overlords.  Will they side with Jesus in the kingdom of God or face the wrath of Rome as the judgment of God on their unwillingness (that comes to pass in the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70)? 

In both cases Jesus does make it clear that this is not a ‘wait and see’ situation where you can side with him once he’s later vindicated by saying you once were acquainted with him.  He called the Israelites then and all people through the ages to surrender to his good Lordship now, in the moment, following him henceforth.  Any hesitation and lack of tenacious commitment to him just shows a lack of understanding or willingness on the part of the person faced with Jesus.  If we really see him for who he is, we will gladly (even if painfully) lay down all to know and follow him. 

Though Jesus clearly sees salvation as a ‘narrow gate’, he just as clearly sees a massive, worldwide multitude pouring through that gate by God’s grace. 

Thus we are left with two vivid pictures to ponder:  on the one hand, a few stubborn Johnny-come-lately idlers standing outside the shut doors of the wedding feast, exposed to the elements and grinding their teeth and weeping.  On the other hand we see multi-ethnic multitudes streaming into God’s kingdom from every direction of the far reaches of the planet to a joyous feast with the Old Testament people and prophets of God. 

And we are also left with a humbling paradox:  ‘first’ and ‘last’ in this life do not necessarily equate to ‘first’ and ‘last’ in God’s kingdom, here and hereafter.  Maybe we shouldn’t really be thinking in these categories at all?  Rather, we should rejoice in God’s grace for us, receive it with joy and thanksgiving, and then offer it freely and copiously to all others. 

I think this passage hits just the right note about questions of ‘how many will be saved’:  it humbles us to the mysterious nature of any kind of answer to such a question but also warns us sternly that there is real salvation and damnation at stake.  But rather than worrying about how many others are saved, we are made to consider whether we ourselves might be breezily strolling past the ‘narrow gate’?  No one will casually, accidentally meander into God’s kingdom.  Jesus shows us we must intelligently and willingly respond to his call on our lives to be his disciples and God’s children.  It takes decisive intentionality and focus and obedience from us as God graciously enables us to respond to his gracious summons.

Luke 13:31-35 

Right on the back of questions about the number of people saved we see Jesus demonstrating his (and therefore God’s) tender compassion for unwilling sinners, his great desire to shield them from the consequences of their own sins at the cost of his own skin.  Clearly there is no divine glee at damning sinners going on here.  Quite the reverse:

‘When a farmyard catches fire… some species have developed ways of protecting their young.  The picture here is of a hen, gathering her chicks under her wings to protect them.  There are stories of exactly this:  after a farmyard fire, those cleaning up have found a dead hen, scorched and blackened – with live chicks sheltering under her wings.  She has quite literally given her life to save them.  It is a vivid and violent image of what Jesus declared he longed to do for Jerusalem and, by implication, for all Israel.  But, at the moment, all he could see was chicks scurrying off in the opposite direction, taking no notice of the smoke and flames indicating the approach of danger, nor of the urgent warnings of the one who alone could give them safety.  This picture of the hen and the chickens is the strongest statement so far in Luke of what Jesus thinks his death would be all about.’ (Wright, 171-72)

(Semitically, the ‘fox’ imagery is probably one of danger and sets up the chicks and hen scenario with another deadly force to shelter the young from.)

The imagery of third-day completion of work together with this image of the life-giving protective hen combine into a powerful proclamation of salvation through the cross of Christ. 

Furthermore, in relation to questions of who is saved we also see Jesus here holding out hope to the unrepentant sinners to the very end.  They are on the brink of destruction and taking no heed of God’s mercy, yet Jesus still proclaims to them the means by which they can escape judgment. 

Notice too that as the previous passage opened with a question of whether only few would be saved, this passage closes on the note of the urgent solicitation for sinners to repent and be saved.  The atmosphere created by the language here is not one where our lives are forced to fit into predetermined, fatalistic grooves of doom or glory, but rather a dynamic atmosphere of urgency, warning, danger, hope, and decision.  And it is the Lord himself who creates this wide-open, momentous scenario, who sets the stage for this drama in which he himself will be the sacrifice to save any who are willing to receive such a priceless gift.

So, as with the previous passage, we are again left with a sense of our need to assess our own response to Jesus.  Are we trying to ‘fox’ Jesus or in any way impede him with our own illegitimacy (as was Herod’s attitude)?  Are we mindless chicks running madly from his compassionate call to shelter under his wings from the wrath to come?  Or do we welcome Jesus with glad, open arms and words of blessing in the name of the Lord?  

Luke 13:18-21

Luke narrates that Jesus says this 'therefore' - based on what's gone before.  How so?  Ponder this as we consider Jesus’ words.

Part of our continuing quest as we read, study, and inhabit Luke’s Gospel is to know, believe, and participate in what the ‘kingdom of God’ means, since Jesus tells us to seek, pursue, chase after God’s kingdom rather than anything else in life (12:31).

Last weekend I heard Ellis Potter, a former Buddhist monk and friend of mine, teach on artists in the kingdom of God.   

·         He noted that in the Gospels Jesus says the kingdom is ‘coming’, ‘near’, ‘here’, ‘among you’, and ‘in you’.

·          He reminded us that the Greek for kingdom is basileia, which he believes indicates more of a kingship than a kingdom (more about the person’s influence than a place, I think is what he meant). 

o   The kingdom, then, is ‘the rule of God’, an ‘administration’ (and this latter term is exactly what Tim Keller brings out in his teaching on the kingdom – a new ‘order’)

·         He also noted what we see here:  that Jesus often paused to involve the minds and imaginations of his hearers with phrases such as ‘the kingdom of God is like...’ and ‘What do you think...’, followed by stories and imagery. 

o   Here he challenged us that one of the tasks of an artist who is a Christian is to follow Jesus’ example here and to publicly invite analogy and thought about God’s kingdom.

·         The kingdom of God, he further warned, is not about us saying sort of ‘whatever’, but rather saying ‘I bet my life on this!’

·         Finally, he noted that in his rule, his kingdom or kingship, God gives himself to us.  That is why the Old Testament laws were continually punctuated with the phrase ‘I am the Lord’.  

o   It seems to me that in this way God is always connecting us directly the person and presence of God himself, not keeping us distant through rules and regulations, but through those holy laws drawing us into communion with his holy goodness.

o   It also occurs to me that because the Father so generously gives to his children (Luke 12:32), we are thereby enabled to generously give ourselves to each other, to the world.

The words ‘like’ and ‘compare’ are, as we’ve noted, analogical language.  We’ve seen previously in Luke’s Gospel how Jesus sees the world under God’s good rule as Creator and Sustainer and Redeemer.  For example, Jesus sees the world being:

• ‘Charged with God’ and thus able to teach us about him through creation (flowers, birds, seeds, soil, weather, etc.)
• Amply and faithfully provided for by God (which, again, we can see in how he feeds and ‘clothes’ birds and flowers)
• A history that is meaningful and can be interpreted in our own day and time (12:56)

Here we see Jesus’ worldview perspective on human language and perception, especially as regards its capacity to describe and comprehend the spiritual, heavenly, and divine.  In using the analogical terms of ‘like’ and ‘compare’ Jesus at one and the same time acknowledges that human language and thought about the divine are both difficult as well as effective.  He shows that talking about and understanding the kingdom of God are at one and the same time not just naïvely ‘straightforward’, yet there is a sense in which they’re ‘comparable’.  Ultimately, this linguistic and conceptual ‘play’ gives a fuller definition than merely analytical or abstract terminology that might be too ‘precise’ in the wrong way—locking down and caging in meaning to too narrow an understanding.

Ellis Potter spoke about these definitional matters at the weekend also:  he observed that definitions are not, as we often think, points but are rather circles containing an infinite number of points within their circumference.  In this conception, definitions do have ‘boundaries’ – there is an ‘outside’ to the circle.  Yet the ‘inside’ is wider and richer than a mere solitary point. 

So Jesus, in all his varied teaching on the kingdom of God, in all his analogies and stories, and in all the miraculous and gracious actions that dramatize this teaching, is drawing a large circle filled with many diverse points of what the kingdom is ‘like’.  What ‘points’ does he give us here in this passage?  He gives us imagery to dramatize the kingdom’s character.  He shows us what the kingdom of God looks like, how it operates. 

The 1st picture:  a small seed is sown in a garden, grows to become a tree, so that birds nest in its branches.  (Cf. Ezekiel 17:22-24; Daniel 4:10-12.)

The 2nd picture: a little lump of leaven is taken by a woman, hidden inside three measures of flour, until all of the flour is leavened.

What is being communicated about God's rule, God's administration here?  Both the mustard seed and the lump of leaven are small things that, when ‘planted’, expand, enlarge, grow, permeate, and have a huge and beneficial effect on other things.

In regard to Jesus own actions here in terms of the kingdom of God, healing just one woman on the Sabbath, straightening out what Satan has perverted, enlarging the boundaries of the people of God to let more in—just one kingdom of God act is a small seed sown or a little leaven hidden.  It will have its huge effect in time.  In the gracious and awesome presence of God in the person of Jesus Christ straightening out one human being, undoing satanic influence, we have an instance of the kingdom of God is ‘coming’, ‘near’, ‘here’, ‘among you’, and ‘in you’.

It seems the people are rejoicing in these glorious events and Jesus takes the opportunity to continue to expand their vision, to provoke them to see what God is doing and that it’s only going to grow.  The implication is that he is inviting them to follow him in the expansion of God’s kingdom and be participants in God’s glorious work on earth.

And he shows them and us that the kingdom of God is not a ‘top down’ sudden and decisive arrival (which many of the Jews may have been expecting), but, perhaps surprisingly, a ‘bottom up’ process and gradual appearance.  That is why he is inviting all the people, not just certain ‘types’.  The kingdom of God always grows from small beginnings in this way and never arrives through heavy-handed force, even well-meaning programmes and the like. 

We can have hope and confidence that it will grow in time to something ‘big and beautiful’, but it always begins as a seed planted and it will always continue to retain this characteristic in terms of its on-going spread and growth in the world.  Jesus gives us vivid, real-life examples of how very small things really do have a huge effect when planted.  It’s something we can picture, imagine, comprehend.  It’s not beyond our grasp or totally unbelievable because we’ve never seen anything like it. 

But it is calling forth our faith, our deep trust and dependence on God, because he is calling us to believe him that he can use us to accomplish this sort of thing we see in the creation around us but at the human level:  individuals, communities, cultures, nations, the world—palpably experiencing God’s healing grace and love and truth and justice, turning to Christ as Lord and Messiah and Saviour, surrendering all to his Lordship, seeking his kingdom, loving and trusting the Father through faith in Jesus, becoming a worldwide community of spiritual and physical shelter and provision.  It all begins with a mustard-seed act of kingdom-shaped love in our own small world of influence.  That is the sowing or the ‘hiding’.  That is our small part in God’s awesome plan.  We must trust God he works and develops his plans for the world in this way and we must therefore not resort to some more man-made way that will actually end up counterproductive. 

When you think about it, this is such a strange way for a kingdom to ‘arrive’!  It is counterintuitive to the militaristic expectations we might naturally have of a kingdom.  Indeed, it is perhaps strange to think of a kingdom in organic terms at all, seeing it as a growing, living organism.  Or to see it as being like bread rising, a fruit of the earth that serves to nourish people.  But this is consistently communicated in the Bible as being the uniquely divine nature of God’s kingdom.  It is a rule that arrives through the planting of seeds, that permeates all else in time as it spreads, as its branches stretch out to accommodate all, as it expands to feed the creation. 

Luke 13:10-17

13:10

From outdoor teaching to indoor, synagogue, Sabbath-day teaching. 

13:11

‘disabling spirit’ – without necessarily looking for demons in every medical problem, we can still recognise, in conformity with Jesus’ own worldview, that physical ‘disability’ is due to a Fallen world of spiritual as well as physical evil.  God made the world utterly interconnected and there are no hermetically sealed parts that do not affect one another. 

Picture and ponder the woman: she was ‘bent over and she could not fully straighten herself.’  She had not stood up straight for two decades.  Imagine.

13:12

Compassion, Involvement, Authority, Liberation

Jesus sees her, Jesus calls her; he goes out of his way to notice, pay attention to, understand, and have compassion on her.

With utter and total authority Jesus then succinctly and dramatically speaks his healing words into her life of suffering. 

Jesus announces her physical healing in terms of liberation and freedom.  Sickness, disease, and disability are evil and dehumanising prisons of suffering that come from all that is an enemy to the goodness, holiness, glory, truth, and love of God.  Disability is one more unjust oppressor from whom the Lord comes to set us free, to deliver us from its captivity. 

13:13

The Words and Hands and Creativity of the Lord

Though Jesus seems to be able to heal in just about any manner he chooses (as long as there is a modicum of faith in the recipient), here he combines both word and touch and lays his hands on the woman as the sequel to speaking to her. 

And thereby the healing is effected:  ‘immediately she was made straight’.  (Note the creative, creational connotation of the word ‘made’ – restored to the original upright intention of creation.)

The Bent One Made Straight

As with all of Jesus’ healings and other miracles, this one too dramatises central elements of his teaching:  that we are sick sinners in need of the healing of our ‘sin disease’ by the good physician (5:31-32).  As already dramatised in the healings of the untouchable leper and the helpless paralytic and in the exorcism of the outcast demon-possessed man, so here we see a picture of our sinful condition before God and his gracious salvation in the midst of our misery.

Cf. Ecclesiastes 1:15 and 7:13, 29—we can’t straighten ourselves out.  Only God in his Son Jesus Christ can un-bend, un-twist, the tragically crooked condition of humanity made in God’s image but fallen and distorted through sin.  (Note that Satan is called the ‘Bent One’ in C. S. Lewis’s Cosmic Trilogy.)

Signs of the Kingdom Present and Foretastes of the New Creation Yet to Come

Again, we have here a foretaste of the full arrival of the Kingdom of God in the Eschaton.  This healing, as with the others, signals that the kingdom of God has arrived, is present in Jesus, and yet it is also only a foreshadowing and foretaste of the full and final healing of the whole cosmos that is yet to come, our hope (Romans 8:18-25). 

See how these things relate to the full ‘Manger-Cross-Crown’ gospel outline from Tim Keller’s ‘Dwelling In the Gospel’ talk.  Jesus’ liberation and new creation demonstrated here in this woman’s healing are why we do what we do as gospel people and gospel churches [see slide].

Glorifying God in Response to His Liberating Voice and Touch

What does the woman do in response to Jesus’ liberating word and restoring touch? 

As with so many others in Luke’s account so far, ‘she glorified God’.  What does that mean?  What precisely did she do from her heart for this to be said of her? 

She credited and thanked and praised God for his merciful healing of her condition through the presence and power of Jesus Christ.

How does this further help us understand what it might mean for us to glorify God?

If glorifying God is in some part a response to his healing liberation in our lives, then how we do fulfil Paul’s command:  ‘whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God’ (1 Corinthians 10:31)?  It seems we have to relate everything we are and do in life—every role, relationship, task, etc.—to God’s loving liberation in our lives, to his healing of our sinfulness and its consequences, so that all we are and do is offered up to him as thanksgiving and praise for his kind and gracious salvation in Christ. 

Every piece of art created or culture made, every relationship joyfully and self-sacrificially fostered, every field of research studied, every vote cast, every political involvement, every charity given to or worked for, every purchase of wants and needs, every business transaction, every hammer nailed, every dish washed, every game played, every entertainment enjoyed, every meal eaten, every drink and sweet and snack we are refreshed by, every kiss and hug given and received, every song listened to or sung, every professional decision, every day worked in whatever work—each and everyone of these innumerable things is a ‘thank you’ to God, a praise to his name, in remembrance and tribute to all that he has done for us in Christ, if we ‘do all to the glory of God’.  (Cf. also 1 Timothy 4:4-5; Philippians 3:17, 23-24.)

We must ourselves experience God’s loving, liberating, healing word and touch in our lives to be able to live all of life from this place of thankfulness and praise and glory.  Have you experienced God’s gracious salvation?  In what ways?  Do you see it, recognise it?  How are you responding?

Read aloud again Luke 13:12-13.  Can this be a parable of our own lives?

13:14

Opposing Christ’s Mercy and Power

‘But’ – Into this joyous scene enters conflict yet again.  So many of the good works that Jesus does are met with opposition!  And usually from the very spiritual leaders who are supposed to lead God’s people into his goodness, grace, and mercy!

This is something of a repeat of the scene in 6:6-11.  The synagogue ruler does not have the repentant heart that John the Baptist and Jesus have called for.  He has not made his heart tender and open and ready to hear from and follow the Lord.  In the face of this release of divine power for freedom and healing in people’s lives all he can see is a broken rule.  Where is his sense of awe and wonder and worship at the majesty and mercy of God?  There’s not even a tension for him—say, a half rejoicing at God’s gracious power and compassion combined with half confusion at the seeming breaking of a God-given commandment.  He is therefore not teachable.  He lacks the humility to be surprised, shocked, and to learn.  He is not ‘declaring God just’ but instead ‘rejecting God’s purpose for himself’ (7:29-30).

13:15

Again, Luke as narrator slips in a reference to Jesus as ‘Lord’, peppering acknowledgement of his Lordship into the narration, so that the final destination of his ‘ground-up’ portrait of Jesus is being anticipated all throughout.

The Sabbath is the Perfect Day for Doing Good and Saving Life

Jesus calls them out on their hypocrisy.  They know perfectly well that the meeting of basic creational needs is perfectly acceptable, desirable, and even necessary on the Sabbath day.

His vivid, down to earth example of liberation and ministry done on the Sabbath here is an excellent embodiment of the question he posed in the earlier similar scenario:  ‘I ask you, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to destroy it?’ (6:9). 

Jesus reminds them that they do good tc o and save the lives of their very beasts every Sabbath!

13:16

If the beasts are privy to this care on the Sabbath, how much more ought a ‘daughter of Abraham’ be? 

Either Satan has directly been divinely permitted the power to bind humans to a degree with disabilities and other afflictions or due to the malignant God-defying influence he is allowed in the world, afflictions result as ‘collateral damage’.  Either way, Satan binds and Jesus looses, sets free, unbinds, liberates. 

The Divine Warrior Sets Captives Free from Satan's Bondage

Here again we see the Divine Warrior motif at play:  Jesus conquering the demonic, Satanic forces of evil by his mighty deeds of liberation.  Jesus sets free Satan’s military captives and slaves by attacking, overcoming, and taking the armour of the ‘strong man’ and thereby Jesus ‘divides his spoil’ (11:21-22).  He ‘steals back’ what the enemy has stolen from the Father.  He shatters the fetters on those bound by Satan’s wicked oppression and gives them freedom again.

13:17

For the moment, Jesus wins a public victory in terms of approbation and ‘popularity’.  All these scenes where Jesus is publicly vindicated and those who oppose him are morally and spiritually shamed add up to a testimony of his goodness and his innocence of sin or wickedness, making his later trial and execution all the more clearly an unjust travesty and tragedy. 

Will we too rejoice ‘at all the glorious things… done by him’ and continue to do so even in the face of opposition and persecution?  Or will we be a fickle crowd, eventually swayed by the opinion against him, or simply be too cowardly to stand by him because we know he’s good and right and the Lord though the world may reject him?

Will we ‘interpret the present time’ aright in terms of Jesus’ true identity and mission (12:56)?

Luke 13:1-9

Opening: read Isaiah 5:1-7.

13:1-5

13:1

It seems something of Jesus’ warnings about being firm through persecution got through to some of the crowd. They bring up an instance of persecution from Roman overlordship. They seem to do so to see if he can illuminate this troubling and tragic occurrence. They essentially bring him a test case of ‘interpreting the present time’.

13:2

As so often, he responds first with a counter-question, jogging the brain cells of his listeners and getting them to examine their own hearts, not just try to figure out what’s right or wrong about ‘those people’.

Jesus perceives that they have a certain perspective on this event. Is it a Job’s comforters-like equation between personal suffering and personal sin? Is it that they saw this as a warning of the judgment God was bringing on his people who don’t follow his will?

‘In the ancient world, unlike the modern, people were slow to attribute evil to the deity’s carelessness or non-involvement. Certainly they believed in evil spiritual forces, but they assumed that tragedy generally reflects God’s judgment for sin committed. If tragedy comes, responsibility lies with the person who experiences the tragedy.’ (Bock, 237)

Their ‘problem of evil’ lay in the exact opposite direction to the modern version! They were too quick to see suffering as God’s retributive judgment applied to personal sin.

13:3

Just as with the inheritance dispute brought to him in 12:13, Jesus brings the question posed to him (or news brought to them) here into his current discourse. He won’t be thrown off topic: he continues to urge vigilance and faithfulness in a world full of disastrous distractions and false visions and hopes.

Similar to the wording in 12:51, if this is what they were thinking, Jesus outright contradicts it.

Jesus warns us: don’t look at the calamities of others and your own lack of calamities and think ‘well, they’re obviously doing something wrong and I’m obviously doing something right’. (These people may have thought those who were tragically killed by Pilate must be the ‘unfaithful’ stewards of Jesus’ parable that had been ‘cut to pieces’ in judgment.)

‘No’, he says. All are in the same boat of suffering in this life due to humanity’s overall sin-disease – the choice of humanity to place themselves above God and its dire consequences. ‘Repentance’ is the way to receive the cure, the way to avoid ‘likewise perishing’.

Jesus is here giving another stern warning and urgent call to humility of attitude and action, turning from being self-centred to God-centred, turning away from any humanly concocted agenda to seeking instead the kingdom of God.

Repent = ‘turn’, ‘turn back’, or ‘return’ in Hebrew (i.e. away from one thing and to another) and ‘think differently afterward’ or ‘change one’s mind’ in Greek.

Change your mind, turn around, or you too will perish tragically.

13:4

Jesus adds another tragic example to the one already mentioned and applies the same line of questioning about their interpretation of the event. ‘Rather than a political tragedy, this is a natural catastrophe, something akin to a hurricane or tornado… Jesus’ interpretation is exactly as before. Without repentance all die similarly. What is imperative is that each person repent.’ (Bock, 239; see his following paragraph also.)

13:5

He then repeats his contradiction to this interpretation and interprets it aright.

There is an interesting emphasis on geography and/or demographics in both instances – Galilee and Jerusalem respectively. Some might think one people group or demographic ‘deserved’ judgment more than another. But Jesus’ use of ‘all’ four times in this segment emphasises the universality of the human scenario under God.

‘There is a more fundamental issue than “them” and “their sin.” Mortality is evidence of the presence of sin in our world (Gen 3). More important than the timing or cause of death is this: only repentance can change death from a tragic end into a bridge to a new kind of life… The event shows life’s fragility. Disaster looms for the unresponsive.’ (Bock, 238)

Death at any time is a reminder that we are all doomed in a fallen world and our only hope for resurrection is repentance and faith in Jesus.

Jesus also here forestalls the future criticism that because he was executed by Roman authorities at Jerusalem, he must have deserved it, must be cursed by God. Calamity in one’s life does not equate to God’s direct judgment on an individual for his or her own personal sins, as the cross supremely shows (for Jesus was personally sinless and suffered rather for the sins of the world). All suffering in this life, however, is a result of sin and the Fall and we all suffer under the overall cursed nature of the earth at this time, due to our own sins, the sins of others, and the state of a Fallen world awaiting its Redemption (remember the Manger-Cross-Crown gospel outline).

However, it is probably also right to see this as, for God’s people of that time, a ‘terrifying warning, about the political and military consequences of not heeding his call’ (Wright, 163). If they allow themselves to be led into a national rebellion against Rome instead of following Israel’s true Messiah into God’s true way of peace, then they will perish in the eventual destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD.

Does this apply to us today in some way as well?

13:6

Keeping on the theme of repentance and salvation from perishing, Jesus enters storytelling and imagery mode: he tells a parable.

Picturing the Context

The fruit tree is ‘planted’ in a ‘vineyard’. (Cf. Isaiah 5:1-7 – but a more direct allusion is found later in Luke 20.)

What is the man’s relation to the fig tree and what does he have in mind and what are his resources for this? This scenario speaks of prior intention and purpose as well as copious provision and care in a context of ownership and plenty and order and fruitfulness.

Perceiving the Goal

The man came ‘seeking fruit’. His goal is revealed. The purpose of planting the fig tree was to produce figs.

What role does the tree play in this story? The tree’s purpose was to grow and produce the fruit appropriate to its nature and good for the world in which it played a part.

Encountering the Seeker

It is awe-inspiring to think of God ‘seeking’ us. (We often speak of people seeking God, but what of God seeking us?)

He comes to us, seeking the fruit he made us in his own image to produce, the product of his wise and kind and gracious cultivation and husbandry.

Just think of what God has provided and is providing for you to grow spiritually and humanly. Do you see his provisional, cultivating hand in your life? Are you aware of his coming to you, seeking the fruit he desires of you as the purpose for which he created you?

Neither we nor he are static, as if ‘seeking’ one another were optional, a luxury perhaps. We are made to seek after God and he graciously chooses to seek after us too.

Finding Fruitfulness

We seek from God our source of life and fruitfulness and he seeks from us the fruit he made us to produce: trusting love, obedience, and worship of God, loving our neighbours as ourselves, wisely and righteously stewarding God’s world and glorifying his name in all of life.

This ‘fruitful’ theme has been rather massively emphasised in Luke so far: 3:7-9; 6:43-45; 8:4-15.

Finding Nothing

Now consider the gravity and tragedy of the fact that the man seeking fruit from the tree he planted in his vineyard ‘found none’. Feel the weight of that.

It’s kind of like the moment in a film where something pivotal is revealed: perhaps someone is found missing when they should be there, or someone’s hitherto unknown identity or role becomes suddenly clear and momentous, etc. It’s that moment where we stop, perhaps startled, unconsciously hold our breath, sit forward, cover our mouths with wide eyes, etc.

In this context of all this provision and purpose, feel the shock of finding no fruit.

13:7

Feeling the Loom of Doom

Vineyard-owner and vinedresser confer: This fruitlessness was not a one-off, but a repeated occurrence. The man has exercised patience in waiting year after year to see the fruit for which he planted the tree.

It here becomes clear that if the tree is unfruitful, it does not serve its purpose and must be excised to make room for something more fruitful. It has no meaningful place in the vineyard. ‘If his plant does not bear fruit, he can find other ways to get fruit.’ (Bock, 240) Cf. Romans 11.

Again, we feel the gravity of this situation. Doom looms.

13:8

Surprised By Mercy

Yet more time and patience is requested. More investment, more cultivation, more depth and moisture and fertiliser are promised.

One thing Jesus is driving at is that it is not our ‘sanctity’ keeping us from judgment, but God’s mercy. We are proud and self-deluded to imagine otherwise. Comparison with this same imagery used in similar parables by others of that time apparently shows ‘what a novelty the motif of clemency would have been’ (Green, 515).

Why so much investment for something so fruitless? Clearly, this tree is not a whimsical, throw-away purchase or planting! It is a well-cared for tree (‘his pleasant planting’) and its intended purpose is very hard to thwart. Setting it aside from its intended fruitfulness is not easily or readily done. Cutting it down is an absolutely last, ‘no-other-option’ action to take.

What is being communicated to us here? (Cf. Isaiah 5:4 – ‘What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it?’.)

The Triune God is prepared to go on making all things possible for our deepening and watering and ultimate fruitfulness. What will we do in light of such persistent mercy and grace?

13:9

Final outcomes: ‘Well and good’ or ‘cut it down’

The ‘well and good’ outcome is for the tree to bear the fruit it should. It is only when this is finally ruled out after much effort from its cultivators to avoid this end that cutting it down can really be considered as an option.

Why? Because we deserve it, we have a right to this time and investment? No, but because God is gracious and merciful and longsuffering. May we not presume upon his patience and love.

Looking for the Resolution of the Drama

Note how the parable is open-ended. Jesus gives us a total cliff-hanger! ‘What will happen next?’ we want to know. How will it end?

The ending emotional note is simultaneously ominous and hopeful, a highly dramatic tension left unresolved. Interestingly, the parable definitely gives the distinct impression that the tree has a responsibility to respond to the gracious and merciful care of its owner and will be held to account for its response.

‘Not incidentally, the parable also holds forth the possibility of fruit-bearing in spite of a history of sterility—or, in human terms, the possibility of change leading to faith expressed in obedience to God’s purpose. If it announces a warning of judgment, then, it also dramatizes hope… Now is the time to repent and live fruitful lives’ (Green, 515, 516).

How Will We Respond to God’s Gracious Cultivation of Our Lives?

This is the crowning passage of all that Jesus has been saying about ‘vigilance in the face of eschatological crisis’ (Green, 513) from 12:1 onward. His finale? REPENT and LIVE! (Cf. Ezekiel 18:32; see also 2 Peter 3:9.)

As well as to individuals throughout time, this passage had a specific application to the people of Israel at that time: God would give them over to judgment and use other nations of the world for his mission in Christ if they did not repent. And, tragically, this is what happened historically. But again see Romans 11 for the future hope of Israel.

Will we heed Jesus’ warnings? Will we repent and thereby avoid perishing? Will we humbly and gratefully receive the copious cultivation the Lord is patiently providing for our lives and bear the fruit he desires and requires of us? He ‘has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing’ (Ephesians 1:3). See also 2 Peter 1:3-11; Galatians 5:22ff.

God delights to graciously and powerfully enable us to be fruitful. We need but trust in his Messiah, Jesus, the Son of God, Saviour, Lord. This is entering and seeking the kingdom of God.

Luke 12:49-59

Opening: read Luke 1:79; 2:14; 7:50; 8:48; 10:5-6 (cf. Acts 10:36).

12:49-53

v. 49—‘I came to…’: the very proclamation and mission of 4:18-19 kindles judgment when people respond to it one way or the other (cf. 5:32).

v. 50—Cf. Mark 10:38-39, 45

Prince of Peace or Prince of Division?

v. 51—‘peace on earth’ (note opening verses)

v. 52-53—borrowing language from Micah 7:6, Jesus continues with his household theme of the previous passage. This time instead of an image of household servants abusing one another, we see real family members divided from one another in their loyalties.

Jesus ‘has already made clear, a decision to adopt his canons of faithfulness to God would require a deeply rooted and pervasive transformation of how one understands God and how one understands the transformation of the world purposed by this God. This would involve Jesus’ disciples in dispositions and forms of behavior that could only be regarded as deviant within their kin groups.’ (Green, 509)

Whereas 12:4-12 prepared disciples for persecution from society and authorities, here Jesus warns that disciples will also have to endure deep family tensions. Cf. Luke 8:19-21; 9:59-62 (14:25-33; 18:28-30). The family of God in Christ takes absolute priority over one’s blood relations.

Doesn’t God Like Families?

Why? Does God not care about shalom in our families? He does indeed, but he knows that giving top allegiance to family members who oppose Christ will only do more damage in the long run for you and for them.

Imagine being born into a mafia family and being called by an Authority you morally respect to freely choose to practice a different way of life! That would not happen without ‘tensions’, to put it mildly.

There is no loyalty greater than our loyalty to Jesus. Only allegiance first and foremost to God’s family will bring any hope of healing, reconciliation and peace to our own families and all the families of the earth.

12:54-56

Poetry of Crisis

Notice the chiasmic parallelism of Jesus’ twin sayings about judgment here:

Fire (49)

Baptism (50)

Showers (54)

Heat (55)

(a, b, b, a)

As C. S. Lewis remarked, Jesus was soaked in the poetry of his country. You see that here in the memorable and thought-provoking Hebraic form of his speech.

Images of two kinds of cleansing, scouring, and testing agents are echoing in our minds and imaginations as we take in Jesus’ teaching here.

These images communicate that the ‘heat is on’ as it were. Jesus is issuing a ‘severe weather warning’.

This is what divine judgment is all about. This is the ‘division’ of v. 51. Just as John the Baptist had said (3:16-17), Jesus baptises with fire and ‘winnows’ the nation into wheat and chaff. (Cf. 1:52-53; 2:34-35; 6:20-26, 46-49; 7:29-30; 9:24-26; 10:13-14; 11:29-32; 12:8-9, 43-48.)

There is a crisis coming for Israel in their relation to their overlords and to the Messiah. This event will sift them.

Our Response to Jesus Shows Us Which Side of the Divide We Are On

And throughout the generations and today, to encounter Jesus is to be thus deluged in fiery testing, scouring, and cleansing. It is to find out who you are, of what stuff you are made.

So, Jesus is clarifying the angelic announcement: he brings not ‘peace on earth’ under just any circumstances, but through the grace of God transforming lives and communities and nations and the world. Those who will join his divine justice and peace movement will share in its benefits, but necessarily those who oppose his justice and peace will be brought to justice through judgment.

Indeed, the very peace that Jesus proclaims and creates is what sparks the division – e.g. 7:36-50.

The Present Time Should Be Something We Are Deft at Reading

In 12:22-34 Jesus showed us his worldview of God’s care in creation. Here he shows us the additionally crucial feature of that worldview: God’s purpose in history.

Just as God designed the world to run on certain life-giving patterns, so the unfolding of human history itself does so according to his life-giving plans and purposes. Therefore, just as we can ‘read’ and ‘interpret’ the meaning of (say) weather conditions, so we can and ought to read and interpret the meaning of historical events and eras. (E.g. these events and circumstances will likely lead to this or that—historical cause and effect and significance.)

We were just learning in English Literature lectures about ‘naïve readers’ such as Frankenstein’s monster who reads Paradise Lost and various novels as literal history, completely unskilled and ignorant of genres such as poetry, fiction, and so on. Are we as God’s people monstrously semi-literate in our in our ability to interpret our own times according to God’s word, Jesus and his gospel of the kingdom?

This is an amazing concept and prospect and responsibility that Jesus lays on the people of God.

‘The church has from early on read this chapter as a warning that each generation must read the signs of the times, the great movements of people, governments, nations and policies [and I would add cultures to his list], and must react accordingly. If the kingdom of God is to come on earth as it is in heaven, part of the prophetic role of the church is to understand the events of earth and to seek to address them with the message of heaven. And if, like Jesus, we find that we seem to be bringing division, and that we ourselves become caught up in the crisis, so be it. What else would we expect?’ (Tom Wright, Luke for Everyone, p. 160)

Do We Know Which Way the Wind is Blowing?

Jesus is basically warning them: you don’t even know which way the wind is blowing! This generation of Israel that he’s talking to needs desperately and urgently to discern just what’s happening in the ministry of Jesus and, rather than criticising, condemning, and dismissing him as the religious leaders do, they need to fall in with him as the disciples do.

Do we know which way the wind is blowing? Especially in regard to trusting and following Jesus in the world today, in a society and culture that may reject or try to ‘co-opt’ him?

If we are not fundamentally aligned from our hearts with God and his messianic-salvific agenda (think of the arc of the ‘Manger-Cross-Crown’ gospel outline), then we will be unable to read our times rightly. In fact, we’ll out and out read them erroneously. We will misunderstand our own times that we’re living through.

Conversely, of course, in following Jesus wholeheartedly and being shaped thoroughly by discipleship to him, we will understand the times we’re living through and be skilled in graciously and prophetically living and speaking into our generation.

12:57-59

Think For Yourself!

Observe how Jesus wants us to make a right judgment for ourselves! We must individually think, discern, conclude. We cannot rely on the governing, ‘authoritative’ judgment of our given cultural context, especially regarding the will of God and the person and mission of Jesus. We can’t just go with the flow, in church culture or the wider culture. We must personally wrestle with God ourselves and in community.

Peace with God

The people of Israel must act now rather than later and avoid this eschatological judgment. Just as the Israelites at that time, so we need to make it our priority to ‘make peace’ with God through faith in Jesus. This very warning is God’s gracious, loving hand held out to us in Christ to save us and make us fully human forever in his kingdom.

He has paid the ‘last penny’ of our debt for us, received the fiery judgment due us into his own person, so that we need not suffer debtor’s prison for our damning transgressions but can instead rejoice in the good news of our forgiveness and reconciliation and restoration to God’s family and kingdom: Luke 7:41-43; Colossians 2:13-14. (This is the ‘atonement’ or ‘cross’ part of the Incarnation-Atonement-Resurrection/Re-Creation or Manger-Cross-Crown gospel outline we looked at recently.)

This is where real ‘peace on earth’ comes from and will be found. Cf. Ephesians 2:13-22; Colossians 1:20; Isaiah 53:5). (Cf. Luke 19:42; Acts 10:36.)

Luke 12:35-48

Remember that the sobering command to vigilance in this passage comes straight out of the compassionately reassuring words of the previous passage: ‘Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom of God.’ (12:32)

We’ve been instructed to seek not food and clothing but the kingdom of God. Now Jesus gives us a picture of the attitude this will require and something of what we are seeking.

35-40

35-36

‘Make sure you’re dressed and ready with your lamps alight’ (N. T. Wright translation).

Dressed for Action, Lamps Burning, Waiting to Open the Door when the Master Knocks

‘dressed for action’ – literally, ‘keep your loins girded’ (love that phrase!)

This takes preparation. This is an attitude of readiness. This doesn’t happen randomly or spontaneously. It is planned for. It takes prior resolve, a decision that this is the perspective you will take that will shape how you live your life.

Dressed for a sudden journey – Exodus 12:11. See also 1 Kings 18:46 (2 Kings 4:29; 9:1); 1 Peter 1:13; Ephesians 6:15.

Ready to move, to up and go. Jesus is telling us our faith is active, not static, in process, not finalised. Christians have not arrived. We are on pilgrimage to our true home rather than at our stopping point (cf. Hebrews 11).

We have not settled in to this world in its present un-redeemed state. We are looking for our Master’s return, ready to go with him into New Creation, the resurrection and renewal of the world.

‘lamps burning’ – watchful at all hours, ready in all seasons and circumstances; everything we are and everything we do at all times is geared toward, directed toward, God’s kingdom coming on earth as it is in heaven. Every square inch of life is lived for the glory of God, so that there is no dark corner that is not prepared and ready and waiting to open to the Master when he knocks to take us with him.

In our work, our rest, our play, our relationships, our creativity, our thinking, and so on we surrender it all to his will and his glory so that we are in all ways at all times ready and waiting to go with him at his return.

‘waiting’ (to ‘open the door to him at once when he comes and knocks’) – so oriented to Christ’s return that we could respond instantaneously with welcome and obedience when he comes.

Darrell Bock calls this being ‘prospective’ in our attitude: ‘We can act now in light of what we hope will happen in the future… That kind of perspective is harder, because it requires faith and counts on events that have not yet occurred. It is very different from living strictly according to present needs and gratifications. Christians are supposed to live prospectively. Believers know that Jesus is returning and that all will give an account for their stewardship… The nature of the future helps to determine present priorities… Faith means trusting God, not only for the present but also for the future, by walking faithfully with him until he returns. What God will do affects what we do.’ (Bock, 230)

The Wedding Feast of the Master

As so often in Luke (both metaphorically and literally), we again have a picture of feasting and celebrating.

Jesus in this scenario is the Master, the Lord, the One who calls the shots, the One we live to serve in total allegiance and full obedience. But note that he is a joyful Master here, returning home with his Bride and we serve that purpose. We are members of his household who await and live for that moment and reality, who share in the love and joy of our Master.

37-38

Blessings Come to Those Who Stay Awake

‘Blessed’ – a lesser known beatitude – sometimes ‘blessed’ is translated ‘Oh how happy’. Do you know what ‘blessing’ and ‘blessed’ means? If we think this just means ‘bonus points’ or you’ll feel pretty good or something, then we’ll never take any of the Bible’s beatitudes at all seriously.

To be blessed is to be enlarged and enriched and made whole and totally at peace in the joy of the Lord without fear – to be ‘approved’ and accepted and provided for by the Granter of the Blessing. It is granted by the Most High and cannot be revoked by anything in creation. It is the opposite of being cursed. (For those cursed, nothing can go right in the end. For those blessed, then, everything will go right in the end.)

‘awake’ (‘when he comes’) – alert; vigilant

Blessing, as defined above, is what is promised to those servants who stay awake.

What, more specifically, is the nature of being blessed, what does it look like? Jesus actually gives us a vivid picture of it here. What does the opposite of being cursed look like? Here it is:

‘he will come and serve them’ – I find this picture amazing: as if it wasn’t already enough that the Lord of all the universe came and served us in the incarnation and crucifixion (Mark 10:45; Philippians 2:7), he will come again and serve us yet more as a reward to our life of lovingly serving him in his world as his faithful stewards.

Note the typically Lukan topsy-turvy, role-reversing theo-comedy! The Master waits on the servants who had just been waiting on him! What a beautiful joyous joke! What divine slapstick! What holy farce! (I mean here a ‘joke’, not in the sense of being either pathetic or untrue, but in being fun and funny and unexpected and pleasant and happy.)

But, of course, really what we’re seeing here is the very heart of the Trinitarian God overflowing in salvation just as it does in creation. Whenever you see something in the Bible and in the gospel about God serving us, or the Son serving the Father or the Father honouring the Son, or the Holy Spirit glorifying the Son and the Father and so on—what you are seeing is the overflow of the Trinity, the spilling out of the abundance of the Divine Life, what ancient theologians called the perichoresis at the heart of all things, the ‘dance of God’. This Trinitarian divine life is the everlasting, omni-abundant source of all God’s grace and love toward his creation.

Really this service that Jesus will perform for us when he returns is all part of one great cosmic motion of service toward his creation that springs from the Eternal God into time, from Beginning to End. The service to us that comes at Jesus’ Parousia (the Greek word for his ‘coming’ or ‘appearance’ or ‘arrival’) is just the completion or fruition of the service he rendered us in the Incarnation and Atonement. God delights to serve his creation and we haven’t even seen the half of it!

Now can you understand what kind of divine aura surrounds all this talk about God’s people being his ‘servants’? Do you realise we are being invited into the eternal, divine dance? We are being drawn in to the very life of God almighty!

I find being a servant one of the single most challenging things about the call to discipleship to Jesus. But he shows us there just is no other true life or meaning. This is dynamic, interpersonal energy at the centre of the universe that makes it run. This is where the power and glory and beauty and joy and fullness are found. Nowhere else.

‘at table’ – it is always about the fellowship feast of the Father’s love; this is pointing forward to a joyous and beautiful and celebratory occasion; this is our hope (cf. ‘the marriage supper of the Lamb’ – Revelation 19:7-9).

Emphatic repetitions: ‘he comes’; ‘awake’; ‘blessed are those servants!’

39-40

‘the thief’ – this rather strange image seems to suggest the possibility of loss if we are not living lives in readiness for Christ’s return. Loss that could be prevented. (Or is it only used to denote the sheer unpredictability of the Master’s return and nothing more?)

Ready for the Unexpected One

‘be ready’

‘the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect’

This is about living every moment for the kingdom of God, a life that always anticipates the fullness of that kingdom when he returns.

41-48

41-42

In keeping with so many other encounters with Jesus so far in Luke, Peter here addresses him as ‘Lord’, thus acknowledging that he is the Master of the parable. Asking questions is important to discipleship for it is conversational and participatory, but a disciple does this from a place of humility and loyalty and obedience. We ask our questions of the Lord.

Note that Luke himself as narrator at this point also echoes Peter’s confession of Jesus as Lord by narrating that ‘the Lord said’. And thereby Luke also acknowledges that Jesus is the master of the parable.

As so often, Jesus answers a question posed to him with his own question posed in turn to the questioner. If we can identify the person he describes to us, then we know the answer to the question of who Jesus is addressing in this parable.

‘faithful’

‘wise’

‘manager’ – ‘A steward in ancient culture was a slave who was left in charge of domestic affairs when the master was away… The steward’s major responsibility was to care for the other servants’ welfare, especially to allot food to them. Food might be handed out daily, weekly or monthly. A steward’s job was to serve, not to exercise power.’ (Bock, 232)

This probably has some special application to leadership in the church, but the end of the parable makes it clear that it is applicable much more widely.

What has God put you in charge of, given you management of? How does he expect you to ‘spend’ what he has given you? How are you handling that God-given stewardship?

Are you being faithful with God’s gifts (roles, skills, abilities, talents, etc.), holding onto them, guarding them, developing them, using them in service of God, his people, and his world?

Are you being wise with what God has given you? Do you understand it at all? Are you becoming knowledgeable and skilful in managing God’s gifts? Have you considered what goal you are using them toward and the best way to get to that goal? These are the questions of wisdom.

‘set over his household’

‘to give them their portion of food at the proper time’

We usually all have some responsibility for someone else in some sense to some degree. Again, though this most likely speaks somewhat directly to the pastoral role, we are probably all involved in ‘feeding’ one another in some sense.

Cf. 1 Corinthians 4:1-5 (cf. 3:10-15)

43-44

The Master's Blessing On the Servant 'Caught' Being Faithful and Wise

The Promotion: Luke 19:17; 1 Corinthians 6:2-3; Revelation 20:1-6

45-46

The Punishment of the Unfaithful and Abusive Servant

This is about not living in the light of Christ’s return and thereby wasting what God has given you charge of on things other than the kingdom of God. Jesus wants us to understand what’s at stake here. As so often, he paints the end points of two opposite roads (recall, for example, 6:20-26; 47-49; 11:34-36; 12:8-9).

‘This steward had no faith in the master, only selfishness. The fact that his stewardship went so totally in the opposite direction of the master’s request evidenced this. There had been no heart-change indicative of a genuine faith. Instead the unfaithful steward seems to represent someone who had associated with the new community without any genuine, heartfelt commitment. To feel no accountability to Jesus in light of his return is evidence of absence of relationship with him. The fruit only indicated what the heart had always lacked.’ (Bock, 234)

The one exposed as an unbeliever and ‘cut in pieces’ (dichotomeo) in the end seems to be speaking first and foremost of false teachers, but again is applicable more widely. Ultimately, for such intractable unbelief and opposition to the Lord’s way there is a final severing and Jesus is warning us to save us from that end.

47-48

To Whom Much is Given, Much is Required

There are also, however, those true believers who either knowingly or less knowingly disobey the Lord’s will and receive the just discipline.

What has been given to you by the Lord for you to steward for him? What has he entrusted you with? What do you know is his will for you? That much is what is required of you. You must take what he’s given you and ‘get ready according to his will’. Are you employing his gifts for his kingdom purposes in readiness for his return and the full arrival of that kingdom? Or are you using his gifts for your own selfish pursuits or neglecting them altogether?

All is given; hence it is grace. This is about responding in loving obedience and trust and creative activity to that grace and by that grace. This is not about justifying ourselves through our works.

Darrell Bock calls this being ‘prospective’ in our attitude: ‘We can act now in light of what we hope will happen in the future… That kind of perspective is harder, because it requires faith and counts on events that have not yet occurred. It is very different from living strictly according to present needs and gratifications. Christians are supposed to live prospectively. Believers know that Jesus is returning and that all will give an account for their stewardship… The nature of the future helps to determine present priorities… Faith means trusting God, not only for the present but also for the future, by walking faithfully with him until he returns. What God will do affects what we do.’ (Bock, 230)