Isaiah 65:
17-25; Luke 13: 1-9
Today’s
gospel records a conversation that has been repeated time and again in every
generation – bad stuff happens; does it mean I did something bad? Why does bad
stuff happen to good people? And for that matter, why does good stuff happen to
bad people.
Time and
again we witness events; situations and are drawn to ask, Why?
Hundreds of
years earlier the prophet Isaiah was blessed with a vision of the world not as
it is, but how it could be. Where all is equal; where the work of our hands is
to our benefit and not someone else’s; where life is long and trouble free;
where peace reigns and justice is given to everyone.
It is a
vision of the New Jerusalem – heaven if you like.
But. And
here’s the thing.
That vision
of hope and renewal is not merely a cloud vision of a possibility in some
distant land; nor is it to be left to heaven only, but is to be strived for
here and now in this world – it is for us to work for justice; it is for us to
strive for peace; it is for us to speak out and work for those who have no
voice helping in whichever way we can.
Throughout
scripture we are confronted by God’s repeated call to act justly. The
continuing poverty of millions in a world of plenty, the gross inequalities in
the way we conduct trade are affronts to his goodness and justice. They demand
a response from us.
Traidcraft
was founded as a Christian response to poverty. As one of the pioneers of fair
trade in the UK we rely heavily on the support of God’s people who buy our
products, who give to our charity, and who campaign with us for trade justice
and a world freed from the scandal of poverty.
Christ calls
us to fairness and justice in many, different ways. Some ways are easy and
require little effort or personal sacrifice, but others are difficult and will
mean us having to change what we buy and where we shop, and to go without
ourselves.
Some ways
will bring us praise from those around us and win us admiration, but others may
bring criticism and make us unpopular, when we raise our voice for the
voiceless, when we call for justice for the poor.
Some ways we
will find interesting and absorbing and will play to our natural strengths, but
others we will find tedious and a chore.
In some of
these ways we may please both Christ and ourselves; in other ways, we cannot
please Christ except by denying ourselves.
Yet we know
that we have the power to be able to act in all these ways because Christ
inspires and strengthens us, and because we know that he has no hands or feet
on earth but ours. If justice is to be done, it is we who are called to do it.
There is no
assurance that it will be easy; there was no promise in a vision that has come
from God of a life of ease; but it will be worth it.
Jesus had a
strong and radical message; but it was not all doom and gloom, he was full of
compassion and sought to shake those who were complacent and to encourage those
who were excluded. The parable of the fig tree reminds us that there is always
another chance; always time to change, to turn, to start over.
There is
always time to try again – be nourished, fed by the Spirit and bear fruit.
God
destroyed the world in a great flood; and afterwards promised that the rainbow
would endure to remind us that God would never do that again; that humanity was
given another chance to start over.
We live
under the promise of the rainbow; we can choose to help others, give them a
second chance, or we can choose to ignore and look out only for ourselves.
But if we
choose that way, the warning is stark – Jesus said, “if you do not turn from
your sins, you will die.”
It is not
our place to judge each other; but it is our place to do our best to help; to
work together; to bring about justice for the oppressed
We are
rainbow people
It is up to
us
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| Under the Rainbow Kite |
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