THIRD SUNDAY IN LENT
7 March 2010

This morning's Epistle is a curious one. In it, Paul refers to the common Jewish belief that the rock from which the people of Israel drank water in the wilderness was not stationary, but actually followed them on their journey to the Promised Land, continually supplying their needs. That rock, he says, is like Christ is for us: a never-failing source of God's goodness and grace, always there to sustain us in our journey through this earthly life.

Now Paul is writing to the Corinthians, who – as I've said before – were a troublesome lot. There are problems of order in their worship, there are problems of disobedience to due authority, and there is extreme sexual immorality. In short, they are not living up to their Christian profession of faith … and Paul is writing to warn them. Referring to the events of the Exodus he writes: Now these things occurred as examples for us, so that we might not desire evil as they did … We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did, and were destroyed by serpents. And do not complain as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer.

… in short, wise up and get your house in order, before God visits you with destruction just as he did the Israelites in the wilderness.

Now preachers today do not generally threaten their hearers with death and destruction when they misbehave, although some of Paul's language makes its way into the so-called “Long Exhortations” in the Book of Common Prayer, as a warning against unworthy reception of Holy Communion. Perhaps Paul thought only the threat of death and destruction would achieve anything. But that does not in anyway lessen the strength of Paul's point, which is, simply put, Don't take God for granted. He has given you much; and he expects much of you.

Jesus' words in our Gospel today are no less unsettling. He refers to two recent disasters, unknown to us but obviously well-known in his day: one, in which the tyrant Herod has slaughtered a number of Galileans at worship; and another in which a building has collapsed and killed eighteen workers. Such events are always with us, as we are constantly reminded by events such as the recent earthquakes in Haiti and Chile.

But the question of why such things happen is not what Jesus is addressing. Rather, he says to his listeners, in effect, Just because such things have not happened to you, don't assume you are any better than others. Repentance is a duty for all of us; and each of us is called to bear fruit in our lives which befits our Christian profession. And he gives them a parable to drive his point home: A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, “See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?” He replied, “Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.”

In Jesus' words as in Paul's, there is the stark reminder that we cannot presume on God's goodness for ever. A time will come when we have to give account. And as the disasters he refers to remind us, that time could come without warning.

It's not inappropriate for us to liken the manna and water that sustained the people of Israel to the bread and wine we receive in the Eucharist. Many of our hymns do just that:

O God unseen, yet ever near, thy presence may we feel:
and thus inspired by holy fear, before thine altar kneel.

Here may thy faithful people know the blessings of thy love,
The streams that through the desert flow, the manna from above.

In this, we follow Jesus.

And we need to come to the altar in a spirit of penitence and faith: because if his gifts are to bear fruit, they must meet in us a spirit of contrition for the times we have failed him, and a willingness to examine and amend our lives in the future. We cannot come to the altar thinking, like the tax collector in the parable, Thank God I am not as others are. God won't bear with us for ever if we do.

But this is not simply about coming to Communion in the right frame of mind, although that is part of it, as it was part of what Paul was addressing in Corinth. It's a reminder that in a world that says, everything's okay as long as it feels good, Christians have to aspire to something better. A deep dissatisfaction with anything less than the best for God should be the hallmark of our way of living; and a longing for the holiness that comes from him is something we should strive for everyday.

We cannot, as Paul puts it, sit down to eat and drink and rise up to play. What we receive at the altar and celebrate in worship should make us ever more determined to turn from sin and serve God in newness of life.

Jesus and Paul also remind us that God is both patient and faithful, and will not expect more of us than we are capable of. But as Christians we should never be content with offering God a life that is any less than the best we have to offer.