How long will I cry?

Lent 3 Year C, March 23, 2025

Seminarian Shawan Gillians

 “King of my life, I crown Thee now, Thine shall the glory be; Lest I forget Thy thorn-crowned brow, Lead me to Calvary.”[1]

I come to you in the name of our god, who is our creator, our kinsman redeemer, and our comforter. Amen. Please be seated.

Believe it or not, Lent is my favorite liturgical season of the year. That may seem weird to say of a penitential season but it's not so much the act of penitence that matters to me, though that certainly matters. For me, it's appreciating that even though there's nothing I can do to earn heaven, there's a savior who loves me so much that he died the most excruciating capital punishment of his time to be a complete and final sacrifice for my sins. That's love.

Today's gospel lesson may seem a little frenetic to you—it certainly did to me. It begins with what sounds to our western ears like an incredibly callous reaction by Jesus to the suffering of his kinsmen, a group of Galileans. This is a group who suffered mercilessly at the hands of their government. Jesus's response, “Be mindful the same thing doesn't happen to you.” And, after Jesus reminds the crowd of the group who died in a man-made disaster, he again says "you could be gone too." It's got a little Job on it, doesn't it? Where is the Jesus who beckoned the little children and said "forbid them not"? Can you can that guy back? I mean, this dude seems a little harsh to me.

Then, in that abrupt kind of way Jesus does, he executes an about face and launches into a parable about a fig tree that doesn't bear fruit. This parable tends to be the highlight of the passage. In fact, although these nine verses that we've read this morning (chapter 13 1-9) are always read together, they are also usually given a single title: “The title of the parable of the fig tree” or “The parable of the barren fig tree”, leaping wildly over the first five verses like they were the setup to a punchline. That tends to be the approach most sermons take but friends, we've known one another for the better part of a year now and you would no doubt be disappointed if I took that approach. In my humble estimation, the bible doesn't take up enough space and Jesus didn't have enough time in his earthly ministry to waste his time telling us things that aren't instructive and important to our lives. So come along with me as we try to unpack the full nine verses, very briefly, in hopes of discovering what “thus saith the lord.”

Father Adam, Mother Julia, and I were talking about the verses. I said, you know, it's one of those verses either you can preach for an hour or you could preach for 10 minutes and know you're just not going to get everything. You'll be happy to know we're going to go with the 10 minutes this morning. So as we as we pan out of the scene, we note that we find Jesus on the tail end of a discourse that begins with chapter 12 in verse one in which Jesus, through the use of parables, is compelling those who have come to hear him preach to repent because the end would come soon and without warning and that makes sense. That sounds like Lent. That's good.

Now if Jesus is wrapping up a lengthy sermon that stresses repentance to a foolish and evil people, and I would submit for your consideration that he is, we should expect that when someone in the congregation shouted out "Jesus, did you hear about what Pilate did to our Galilean siblings?" This would have been a golden opportunity for Jesus to respond, "Yes because god punishes the wicked," but that's not what he says. Instead Jesus turns the tables and announces that those people weren't any bigger sinners just because they died in a terrible way, and the same was true for those who died in the recent tragic construction accident when they were crushed by the tower of Siloam. Those folks weren't any bigger sinners just because they died in a terrible way. Which begs the question, “What could that possibly mean for us?” Saints, what Jesus explains to us here is the beauty of the Lenten season. The point is not to ask, “why me?” The point is to ask, “Why not me?” None of us is going to work our way into heaven and, at the risk of harshing your episcopal mellow, being a nice person won't get you in either.

The point this morning is a beautiful one, something that takes the pressure off us to be the perfect people we could never have been in the first place. The point is that mercy shows up when justice is what we deserve. We all say we want other people to be served justice to reap what they sow, but when it comes to us? We want justice to take a holiday so we can have some mercy and, in my lawyer's mind, I can't help but see myself in a courtroom at the defense table knowing full well I'm guilty of every charge being leveled against me. So when justice stands up on behalf of the prosecution, I expect to be convicted. But then mercy stands up and says "I can't let you have her." When I think of all the people whose joy I murdered with my words because they don't think the way I think and justice could have swallowed me up, I'm grateful that mercy stood in front of me. When I think of all the ill I've wished on people I've judged to have done me wrong, and I know God should have let justice throw the book at me, my soul cries out in praise that mercy said, “Not so”. So we shouldn't let the fact that Pilate didn't get us, the fact that the tower didn't fall on us make us think we're better than anyone else. That's not justice; that's mercy. Oh, we claim to want justice but thank God for mercy.

Now I know what you're thinking. I know what you're thinking. “Shawan, you're right. I'm thankful for mercy but this parable of the fig tree? It isn't screaming mercy at me. Can you wrap that up while you're talking about your nine verses? I mean, we're talking about chopping down a tree that's just minding its own business and you're right! But you're wrong! This fig tree got three full years of mercy. The warning Jesus is giving is implicit but it is clear. There may be a wideness to God's mercy but there's also a limit to God's patience. Can i hear you say amen to that?

And I hear the voice of the prophet Habakkuk echoing down through the ages, “Oh lord, how long will I cry for help and you will not listen or cry to you violence and you will not save.” But then I hear the Prophet Martin, thousands of human years later, calling back: "How long? Not long!” Things seem dark now, and the Pilates of this age may be persecuting you, but “How long? Not long!” 2025 is starting to look like 1925 but “How long? Not long!” As I take my seat, thank God for mercy. Mercy is what allows an imperfect person like me to tell the story of a perfect and unconquerable God. And yet I'm not so foolish that I think only people who think like me or act like me can or should receive some mercy. God allows the rain to fall and the sun to shine on the just and the unjust alike but make no mistake. Justice delayed is not justice denied. We can and should count on the train of justice to pull into the station before too long. For the Bible tells me so. Let the redeemed of the Lord say "amen." Amen.

 [1] Lyrics to “King of my life, I crown Thee now.”

© 2025 Shawan Gillians

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