Not Your Fault 10.23.16

"It's Not Your Fault"

10/23/16

Luke 13:1-5 "About this time Jesus was informed that Pilate had murdered some people from Galilee as they were offering sacrifices at the Temple. 2 “Do you think those Galileans were worse sinners than all the other people from Galilee?” Jesus asked. “Is that why they suffered? 3 Not at all! And you will perish, too, unless you repent of your sins and turn to God. 4 And what about the eighteen people who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them? Were they the worst sinners in Jerusalem? 5 No, and I tell you again that unless you repent, you will perish, too.”

The Galilean's mentioned at the beginning of our text were a group that insisted on God--not Caesar--being the only Sovereign, and they also believed they shouldn't pay taxes to Caesar.

Pilate took action against them and had them killed while they were right in the middle of their religious observances.

Jesus sensed that those who brought this report to Him were insinuating that those who where killed had been worse sinners than others.

So He asked the informants, "Do you think those Galileans were worse sinners than all the other people from Galilee?”

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Then next, Jesus used the opportunity to also mention a well-known, local accident where a large tower in the town of Siloam had toppled over and killed 18 people...

He asked again, "Were they the worst sinners in Jerusalem, and that's why this terrible thing befell them?"

In both instances Jesus answered His own questions with,

"No...if you think the bad things that happened to these people was because of God's judgment, you're misreading it."

Emphatically Jesus informs them, "This was not the result of God's judgment!"

--Then He brings His point home, "Unless you repent, you will perish, too!"

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So first, Jesus warns us...

I. Don't misread the cause of other people's troubles...

The tendency people have to attribute someone's trials or personal tragedies to some kind of judgment from God is as old as time...

When old Job lost his home, his children, and his health, the worst thing that happened to him afterward was the arrival of three "friends" who insisted all of these things had befallen him because of some secret sin in his life...

One of them named Eli'phaz said to him, "Stop and think! Have you ever known a truly good and innocent person who was punished? Experience teaches that it is those who sow sin and trouble who harvest the same" (Job 4:7-8).

In other words, "Job, you're reaping what you've sown! Clearly your sin has found you out because truly good and innocent people are not punished....

You're being punished, Job. C'mon, fess up and repent that God might forgive you and take this suffering away!"

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But we know from Scripture that Job wasn't being punished at all! None of this was his fault!

In fact, at the beginning of the book we find God bragging on Job, calling him "blameless and upright," and the "greatest man of all the people of the east!"

Yet this is how his friends judged the situation--"He must have done something really, really wrong to have come under these terrible circumstances," they assumed.

--And likewise, the Galileans that were killed had not committed some terrible act bringing God's judgment on them, nor was it because of some particularly awful sin that the eighteen were killed in the tower accident.

--Both Job's friends and the informants that brought the report to Jesus of the killings had misread the cause of the tragedies...

So.....

When someone's house burns down, or they experience loss of health, or their children die, or they lose their job...it is a mistake, says Jesus, to read God's judgment into that!

Were those who happened to be in the twin towers on that terrible day, when Islamic terrorism attacked us on 9/11, worse sinners than the rest of New Yorkers?

No! Says Jesus.

Or were those 239 people who were on the Malaysian jetliner that crashed into the Indian Ocean under God's judgment for being worse sinners than most?

Jesus says, No!

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Then secondly, Jesus warns us that the real issue is...

II. We're all in danger of perishing without repentance...

He says, "Here's the deal--you're all sinners, and will all one day die from one thing or another, and will all perish in your sins....UNLESS you repent!"

To Jesus the issue isn't HOW you die, but are you right with God WHEN you die!

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According to Jesus, the whole human race is in just as much danger as the eighteen that were standing too close to the tower when it fell...

An unexpected accident or sickness can bring your last day on earth in a moment's time...

And the accident or sickness is not your fault!

It is NOT, in most cases, due to the judgment of God!

--Now, a person CAN bring a lot of trouble on themselves by bad decision-making...but that's more an issue of sowing and reaping than God's direct judgment.

Those involved in the tower accident didn't cause the tower to fall...

It wasn't their fault...the issue to Jesus is, WERE THEY READY to meet God!

This is why James warns against assuming you have all kinds of time to get right with God:

"You know not what tomorrow may bring. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. Instead you ought to say, If the Lord wills we shall live..." (4:14-15)

Only one writing of Moses is included in the Psalms and it talks about this very thing...

Speaking to God in prayer, Moses says, "3 You speak, and man turns back to dust....We glide along the tides of time as swiftly as a racing river and vanish as quickly as a dream. We are like grass that is green in the morning but mowed down and withered before the evening shadows fall. 8 You spread out our sins before you—our secret sins—and see them all...10 Seventy years are given us! And some may even live to eighty. But even the best of these years are often empty and filled with pain; soon they disappear, and we are gone."

Moses concludes with this advice:

12 "Teach us to number our days and recognize how few they are; help us to spend them as we should."

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This is Jesus's point with both the murder of the Galileans and the accidental deaths of the eighteen when the tower fell...

Be ready!---For unless you repent and get right with God, you will perish in your sins, which is far worse than being murdered or dying in an accident!

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Then finally, rather than assuming someone has been judged by God...

III. We should judge ourselves first...

One commentator writes, "When people are disposed to speak about the great guilt of others, and the calamities that come upon them, they should first inquire about "themselves."

Paul said exactly the same thing to the Corinthian church:

"Check up on yourselves. Are you really Christians? Do you pass the test? Do you feel Christ’s presence and power more and more within you? Or are you just pretending to be Christians when actually you aren’t at all?" (2 Cor. 13:5)

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Jesus never told us not to judge, He just emphasized judging ourselves first...

"And why worry about a speck in the eye of a brother when you have a board in your own? 4 Should you say, ‘Friend, let me help you get that speck out of your eye,’ when you can’t even see because of the board in your own? 5 Hypocrite! First get rid of the board. Then you can see to help your brother" (Matt. 7:3-5).

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I've often said that the church has a grapevine the winemakers Ernest and Julio Gallo would envy!

Meaning--rumors, unfair judgment, criticism, and gossip all too often characterize church life...

ILLUS: The story is told of a woman named Mildred---the church gossip and self-appointed arbiter of the church's morals---who kept sticking her nose into other people's business.

Several members were unappreciative of her activities, but feared her enough to maintain their silence.

But she finally made a big mistake when she accused George, a new member, of being an alcoholic, after she saw his pickup truck parked in front of the town's only bar one afternoon.

She commented to George and others that everyone seeing it in front of the bar knew what he was doing--if he wasn't a drunk, his pickup wouldn't have been there!

George, a man of few words, stared at her for a moment and then just walked away. He didn't explain, defend, or deny. He said nothing.

Later that evening, George quietly parked his pickup in front of Mildred's house.......and left it there all night.

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So FIRST, don't read God's judgment into other people's troubles, SECOND, we're all in danger of perishing in our sin unless we repent, and third, judge yourself first--Are you right with God?

LET'S PRAY