This week's readings are Isaiah 55.1–9 and Luke 13.1–9.

There are moments, if we’re honest, when it can feel like Jesus is being particularly obtuse. This week’s gospel reading looks like one of them. When questioned about the grisly demise of some Galileans, his response seems to cut both ways:

‘Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did.’

So were their deaths a consequence of their sin, or not? ‘No… but…’ doesn’t feel particularly helpful as an answer.

I wonder, though, if paying a little more attention to the context may help. I freely admit I’m about to start speculating, so feel free at any point to form your own conclusions! Look, though, for a moment, at the very end of Luke 11:

‘When he went outside, the scribes and the Pharisees began to be very hostile towards him [Jesus] and to cross-examine him about many things, lying in wait for him, to catch him in something he might say.

We then turn the corner into Luke 12 – a collection of Jesus’ teachings, some of which are rather incendiary. He starts with an accusation of hypocrisy aimed at the Pharisees (v2); calls his followers to allegiance in him (v8); tells them that comfort in this life is less important than service to God (vv20–21); promises rewards in heaven (v33); readies the crowd for ‘action’ (v35); informs them that he came ‘to bring fire to the earth’ (v49) and, rather than peace, ‘division’ (v51); then gives advice on avoiding trial in court and prison (v58).

Imagine for a moment that you are living in an occupied state, waiting for a leader to appear who will spearhead an armed rebellion in the name of God; who will incite and triumph in a holy war. What might you hear in those teachings? Perhaps things that, sadly, continue to be echoed in our world today to justify terrible violence in God’s name.

Now imagine that you are listening to all this, looking for a moment to charge Jesus with treason, lying in wait, perhaps, to catch him in something he says. Each time, he stops just short of voicing what everybody is thinking. If only there were a way to push him over the edge… Then you remember what Pilate, the Roman governor – the figurehead of tyranny and oppression – has just done. And so we reach Luke 13:1:

‘At that very time there were some present who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.’

I am fairly convinced this is a deliberately manipulative question, designed to elicit a political response that will condemn Jesus from his own lips. But Jesus, as we see time and again in the gospels, is one savvy guy. He knows what this game is, and he isn’t going to play.

‘Do you think this is about sin?’ he asks.

Of course, it doesn’t actually matter if that’s what they meant – it’s still going to be what he talks about, because bringing in this language allows him to reframe the question. Instead of making it about the powers that be on earth, he makes it about relationship with God. By phrasing his question the way he does, he generously allows his questioners to include themselves, if they choose to, in that reframing.

Then he offers two answers to two different questions, though it’s easy to miss that: because we are so accustomed to assuming the words ‘sinner’ and ‘repent’ must go together, and so we conflate the answers into one.

The first is to his own question (perhaps just to get it out of the way): ‘No, I tell you.’

Straightforward, and completely in agreement with his teaching elsewhere in the gospels (e.g., John 9) – this human-crafted suffering has nothing to do with the victims’ sinfulness (or righteousness, for that matter). That’s not how God works.

The second answer is to a question that is implied rather than asked. The question, of course, is: ‘What do you think we should be doing about the Romans?’ The answer is: ‘Unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.’

Remember that repentance is not about saying sorry, nor is it tied to any particular sin – properly undestood it means a renewal of the mind and self, a reorientation of one’s being and intentions toward God and his ways. Or, as our reading from Isaiah so helpfully puts it:

‘Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts; let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.’

If that’s the case, this second answer could well mean something like this:

‘Why do you insist on playing these games? Why do you hear everything I say as being about the Romans? Why are you twisting my words and trying to catch me out? I’m preaching love, not hate; acceptance, not exclusion; peace, not war. If only you could see that! Of course, it’s divisive – it’s asking you, and everyone around you, to forget the bias, bigotry, and indoctrination you’ve grown up with and learn again the unforced rhythms of grace. That won’t be easy (and not everyone will be willing), but if you could manage to shift your minds and refocus on God and his good, pleasing, and perfect will, then maybe you wouldn’t keep trapping yourselves, and your children, and your children’s children into an endless cycle of violence, retribution, and death.’

‘Unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did’ is perhaps a little more succinct, a little more stark. But it’s not a threat – it is an invitation. Jesus is not laying down an ultimatum, he’s pleading for a change of heart, a turning that can break the cycle of political and nationalistic violence. There is another way. We can ‘repent’, we can turn ourselves back to the God who abundantly pardons, and leads his children in the ways of peace. The choice lands with us, just as it did with Jesus’ first hearers – whether we, like them, are his friends or his critics: will we keep feeding the cycles of division and violence, or will we seek the Lord while he may be found, and call him upon him while he is near?

Will we do it because we hold fast to the promise of heaven, and long to see it here in earth as it is in eternty? 

Will we do it even when the road is hard, and asks of us our comfort, and maybe even family and friends?

Will we join God in loving the world with a ferocity that outburns hate, and outlives death?