Lectionary for March 23, 2025
Third Sunday in Lent
Isaiah 55:1-9; Psalm 63:1-8;
1 Corinthians 10:1-13; Luke 13:1-9
It seems like adults face a lot of ultimatums, some of them for good reasons. Eat better and work out or you’ll face health issues. Listen to your kids when they bring issues to you, or they’ll stop telling you what they really think. Treat people as they would like to be treated, or they’ll stop giving you the opportunity to mistreat them. Ultimatums can be frustrating, but they have their usages. In this week’s readings, Jesus and Paul issue ultimatums, not to gain control over others but to help people turn away from destructive actions.
In one of my favorite passages from Luke’s Gospel, Jesus completely demolishes the fallacy that bad things only happen to bad people. As if reading the book of Job weren’t enough, Jesus severs the experience of disaster from the moral standing of the victim (TV preachers, please pay attention). Pilate killed Galileans while they worshiped in the temple. This happened not because these particular Galileans were more evil than others, but because Pilate was so evil that Rome eventually recalled him from service. (How bad do you have to be for the evil Roman Empire to say that you’re too violent?) Being evil or holy is no protection from the Pilates of the world. The capriciousness of imperial violence, however, should serve as a reminder to everyone that we need to repent, lest we face spiritual death.
In much the same way, the tower of Siloam fell on people and crushed them, not because they were evil but because it wasn’t maintained properly and sometimes towers just fall. Indiscriminate death happens and should be a reminder to all of us to repent or face spiritual death.
We are called to joyfully embrace and receive grace in sufficient measure that our hearts are changed and we passionately pursue repentance.
About a decade later, Paul tried to teach the Corinthian church the same lesson: repent or else.
Paul draws out a long redemption and salvation narrative from Exodus and Numbers to make his point. The spiritual ancestors of the Corinthian gentile Christians, and the physical ancestors of the Corinthian Jewish Christians, were baptized as they journeyed through the Sea of Reeds (Exodus 14:22). They ate spiritual food—bread from heaven—on their journey (Exodus 16:4). They drank spiritual drink—water from the rock that rolled along with the Israelite camp everywhere it went (Exodus 17:5-6 and Numbers 20:9-11). Despite all this, almost all of them died in the wilderness (Numbers 14:29).
Paul draws comparisons between the lives of the wilderness generation and the ritual celebrations of Christian life to argue that, as we heard last week, proximity to preaching and ritual doesn’t save us. A person can be baptized and celebrate the eucharist without repenting and following God.
To further his point, Paul lists some of the things that the people in Corinth were doing that the wilderness community had done before them. Just as the people in Corinth meddled with idolatry, the Israelites had meddled with idolatry in the golden calf episode (Exodus 32:6). Just as the people of Corinth engaged in prohibited sex, especially in soliciting sex workers (1 Corinthians 6:13-20), the Israelites had engaged in sex with women who had been specifically instructed to draw their hearts away from God (Numbers 25:1-9, 31:16). Just as Corinthians put God to the test, the Israelites had tested God and were punished with flaming serpents (Numbers 21:4-9). Just as the Corinthians grumbled against their teachers and their rules, the Israelites had grumbled against God’s rules and guidance through Moses, and a destroying wrath swallowed up the people (Numbers 16:41-48).
Paul argues that the new Christians shouldn’t imagine that they are more special than the generation that God had rescued from slavery in Egypt with the divine hand. When God’s chosen people rebelled and refused to repent, they faced stark punishment. Paul insists that those who join the Jesus movement but refuse to repent of their wicked behavior will come to the same end.
Look, there is always grace in Jesus. God always welcomes sincere repentance. At the same time, God will not be mocked. Folks who are committed to using the name of Jesus and enjoying the eucharist from time to time but hurt and abuse folks for whom Christ died are in for an unpleasant surprise. Proximity to grace is not enough. We are called to joyfully embrace and receive grace in sufficient measure that our hearts are changed and we passionately pursue repentance.
