Living on borrowed time

Luke 13:6-9 — “Living on Borrowed Time”

Announcements: Just a couple of things before we begin —

We are kicking off our Apologetics class, “Let Us Reason Together,” this coming Wednesday, July 15th.

We’ll be discussing how to defend our faith with both conviction and respect.

This first meeting will focus on developing a format that works for everyone — a practical environment where we can learn and practice together.

Also, we are moving Movie Night to the first Friday of each month. On August 7th at 6:30pm, we begin a three-part series — A Band Called Love Song: The Music and Movement of the Jesus Revolution — tracing the roots of Calvary Chapel worship that later gave rise to Vineyard, Integrity, Hillsong, and Contemporary Christian Music as we know it today.

We handed out flyers as reminders. Now let’s pray.

An old farmer survived a terrible accident when a tractor nearly rolled over him.

The doctors told his family, “It’s a miracle he’s alive.”

Months later, a neighbor asked, “How are you doing after that accident?”

The farmer smiled and pointed to an old clock hanging on the wall. “See that clock? Years ago, it stopped working. So, I wound it up and somehow it started ticking again.

It’s never been perfect time since, but every tick feels like a gift.

That’s how I feel. By all accounts, my clock should have stopped. Since then, every sunrise feels like borrowed time.”

Then he grinned at his neighbor and said,

“When you realize you’re living on borrowed time, you stop wasting it on borrowed worries.”

Pretty good wisdom from a farmer. They have a way of saying in one sentence what the rest of us need three podcasts and a self-help book to figure out.

And whatever generation we belong to — whatever stage of life we find ourselves in — it is all borrowed time.

I can think of at least three people I knew well this past year who had no idea they would not be alive today.

Maybe you can as well.

We never know when that day will come for us. God hasn’t shared that information and honestly, if He did, some of us would spend all that time eating nothing but brownies and ice cream.

Scripture tells us repeatedly: not to fret, not to worry, not to fear, not to be anxious.

We must not waste our time on borrowed worries.

Half the things we worry about exist only in our imagination. And if we’re being honest, we are gifted at worrying about things that will never happen.

“Life is not measured by how much time we have, but by what we do with the time God has given us. Every day is borrowed time. Every day is a gift.” – so true!

That’s what we’re going to talk about this morning.

Set the Scene

Jesus is now less than a year from the crucifixion and the resurrection, so there is a sense of urgency in everything He says and does. It doesn’t mean he’s running out the clock — it’s quite the opposite.

Every conversation from this point forward seems loaded with eternal significance.

After the Pharisees committed blasphemy against the Holy Spirit — the one unforgivable sin — Jesus turned His attention to the common people, urging them to repent. Their fate was being sealed & they didn’t even realize it.

A spirit of complacency had settled over them. They took pride in their own religious performance. It was a works-based religion — heavy on ritual, light on genuine transformation.

And from a historical standpoint, the nation of Israel had been living under Roman occupation with no awareness that they were only “one” generation from total obliteration. They were unaware that they were living on borrowed time.

So, Jesus begins to speak to them plainly.

In Luke 13:1-5, the crowd raised two recent tragedies — A group of Galileans who were slaughtered by Pilate, and eighteen people killed when the tower of Siloam collapsed on them.

They seem to be asking the questions we all ask: “Did those people deserve it?

Were they worse sinners than everyone else?”

But our hero Jesus refused to play that game. Instead, He turned the spotlight on everyone listening:

“I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all perish.”

He said it twice — once for each tragedy — and He meant it both times. Let’s read verses 6-9

Luke 13:6-9

“A man had a fig tree which had been planted in his vineyard; and he came seeking fruit on it and did not find any.

And he said to the vineyard-keeper, Behold, for three years I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree without finding any. Cut it down! Why does it even use up the ground?’

And he answered and said to him, ‘Let it alone, sir, for this year too, until I dig around it and put in manure, and if it bears fruit next year, fine; but if not, cut it down.’”

Before we walk through the story, why Jesus is telling it?

Two Purposes for This Parable

1] Paints a picture — a clear, concrete image that reveals a principle of truth accessible to everyone listening, whether they were scholars or shepherds.

2] Fulfills a prophetic sign –

In Isaiah 6:9-10, God warned that when Messiah came, the people of Israel would hear but not understand, see but not perceive — their hearts would grow dull and their ears heavy.

Jesus quoted this passage in Matthew 13

The very fact that He must use parables to reach these people who should have recognized Him is itself a fulfillment of Isaiah’s warning.

A hard-hearted people had been tended, cultivated, and given every opportunity, and still bore no fruit.

As one writer put it: “Whenever Jesus starts a story, somebody is about to get lovingly convicted.”

So, what does this parable mean?

The owner of a vineyard comes seeking fruit from his fig tree and finds none. As a rule, a healthy fig tree bears fruit within three years of planting.

It passed and three full years of patience, expectation, and nothing but disappointment.

To be fair to the owner wasn’t impatient. There weren’t three days of checking and complaining but three entire growing seasons of waiting and watching with nothing to show for it. In modern terms he might say: “This tree is taking up valuable real estate & providing absolutely nothing. Cut it down.”

But the vineyard-keeper makes a plea:

“Give it one more year. Let me loosen the soil around it and add fertilizer.” The Bible calls it manure or dung.

Let’s call it for what it is. Both fertilizer and dung smell extremely similar. Both work by replacing the nutrients that soil loses over time, giving the essential elements to grow strong roots, healthy leaves, flowers, and fruit.

If the tree bears fruit after this intervention, it will be spared. If not, it will come down. Thus, the tree is living on borrowed time.

This parable is not a lesson about patience with fruitless fig trees.

The fig tree represents the people of Israel — specifically its leaders. The vineyard represents the nation of Israel as a whole. The owner is God the Father. The vinedresser is Christ Himself.

If you go back to Genesis 12. God chose Abraham and made extraordinary promises:

“I will make you a great nation. I will bless you and make your name great. I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you. In you all the families of the earth will be blessed.” Keep in mind — his wife Sarah was barren. By any natural measure, the promise was impossible.

But the owner of the vineyard was going to change a barren woman into a nation of chosen people! God is just the opposite!!

Centuries later, the Apostle Paul wrote in Galatians 3:16

that the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed — not seeds, plural, but seed, singular — and that Seed is Christ.

This means God’s covenant with Abraham pointed to God’s Son over four hundred years before the Law was given! And you know the story, Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness” (Genesis 15:6). Salvation by faith — before the Law

So, that promised Seed came to the house of Israel first as God promised.

But much to the chagrin of the religious establishment, it was often the Gentiles — outsiders, foreigners — who believed & received their Messiah with open arms.

Meanwhile, for three years of ministry, God was watching Israel remain fruitless. Not only fruitless — actively rejecting and cursing the very Seed God had promised Abraham to send.

By this time, YHWH had seen enough and was ready to cut down the nation. But Yeshua who became our Great High Priest always lives to make intercession pleaded for His father’s mercy.

The seed of Abraham pleaded for more time. And as the fruitless nation shouted in violent hatred, “Crucify Him! “Crucify Him!” and mocking Him in His agony. Even surprising Pilate who washed his hands of this act meaning “this isn’t on me”.

That from the cross, Yeshua prayed: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

Aren’t you grateful God is patient with us? If God dealt with us the way we deal with slow Wi-Fi, most of us would’ve been in serious trouble a long time ago.

Even after the resurrection, grace was extended nearly forty more years, as the apostles preached throughout Israel. But the resistance continued.

Stephen stood before the Sanhedrin and preached the entire history of Israel’s relationship with God — and concluded: “You always resist the Holy Spirit.”

That is not the kind of message that gets you invited back for a second engagement. In fact, they killed Stephen with stones before he could finish.

By 70 A.D. — within one generation of the crucifixion —

Rome destroyed Jerusalem and the Jewish people were scattered across the world in what became known as the Diaspora which lasted nearly two thousand years.

AND JUST WHEN YOU THINK THAT WAS IT.

Something happened that Isaiah wrote many centuries before, and it seemed impossible.

Isaiah 66:8 asks: “Shall a nation be born in a day?”

On May 14, 1948, Israel was reestablished as a sovereign nation — in a single day — fulfilling both Isaiah’s prophecy and Ezekiel’s vision of the valley of dry bones coming back to life.

I’m going to read Ezekiel 37:24-28 because it points beyond even that restoration to something greater still — an eternal fulfillment in the coming Millennial Kingdom: “My servant David will be king over them, & they will all have one shepherd…

They will inhabit the land that I gave to Jacob My servant, which your fathers inhabited; & they will inhabit it, they, & their sons & their sons’ sons, forever I will cut a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant with them… My dwelling place also will be with them; and I will be their God, and they will be My people. And the nations will know that I am Yahweh who sanctifies Israel, when My sanctuary is in their midst forever.”

Now those who believe the church has replaced Israel obviously haven’t read this…. but Israel Is Still on Borrowed Time

Today, Israel is still the fig tree. The soil is being loosened.

Many Jewish people are coming to faith in Yeshua — more than at any point in modern history. But many still reject Him.

God Himself described Israel as a stubborn, stiff-necked people — but His promises remain unconditional.

Meanwhile, the manure of anti-Semitism is rising — even, tragically, in some corners of the church.

Some Christians are blindly dismissing Israel’s theological & prophetic significance.

Paul addressed this directly in Romans 11:

If God did not spare the natural branches, He will not spare you either. And if they do not continue in their unbelief, they will be grafted back in — for God is able to graft them in again.”

Israel is the root that supports us, the church. You do not cut down the root and expect the branches to thrive.

Every gardener knows fruit doesn’t appear because you stare at the tree harder.

The church is like another fig tree — one that is known for seasons of fruitfulness as well as barrenness.

Healthy roots always come before healthy fruit.

How much more should we be praying and supporting Israel?

I believe the church is being given space to repent — just as Israel. But the voices calling for Christians to be cut down are growing bolder and louder. As followers of Christ, we want the heart of Yeshua — the heart who intercedes, who loosens the hardened soil, who believes fruit is still possible.

This is why 1 Peter 4:17-19 speaks directly to us:

“For it is time for judgment to begin with the house of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God? And if it is with difficulty that the righteous is saved, what will become of the godless man and the sinner?”

Judgment begins at home. God holds His own people to a higher standard — not to crush us, but because He expects fruit from those who have received the most care, the most tending, the most grace and the greatest opportunities to flourish.

And what about our nation? Some voices are calling for this nation to be cut down and promising to take over - Progressives say they are trying to fix the nation; but if they got their way those fixes would break it. – A kingdom divided against itself shall not stand.

So church, it appears we are all living on borrowed time. The question is not how much time remains on our clock?

What kind of fruit will we produce while time is still ticking?

Jesus did not come to earth cut us down.

He came to lay down his life that we might bear much fruit — if we abide in Him.

He did not leave us church folks here to hide the gospel or hoard it. He left us here to share it with everyone who is hungry for it.

So may we spend less time worrying and more time praying. Less time hiding and more time loving. Less time shouting at the darkness and more time turning on the light of the gospel.

Nobody in this world knows how much time is left on their clock.

But we know this — the clock is still ticking. And that means God is still giving us opportunity. Let’s not waste it.

Let’s pray. – then pray for food – ask Richard to explain the set up.

70 or older goes first….