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Luke 13:1–17

4/19/2012

 
Click here to read today's passage on Bible Gateway.

Sin and Punishment?
The beginning of today's passage deals with an issue that has been around probably as long as there have been people on the earth.  As Ecclesiastes says many times, "There is nothing new under the sun."

So the question is this:  why people suffer, is it because they are being punished for sin?  Jesus deals with two different situations:

"In the discussion of the two tragedies in verses 1–5, the question emerges whether a worse level of sin causes a person to suffer a special judgment, either in being the victim in a series of events or in being the victim of a natural catastrophe. The temple massacre of the Galileans whose blood Pilate mixed with Jewish sacrifices raised the question whether God was exercising a special act of judgment against them. The collapse of a tower at Siloam that killed eighteen was a natural catastrophe—one of those things that just happens. But here the question also becomes, “Did God judge them for excessive sin?” In both cases the question is the same: Is God giving back to people what they deserved?" [1]

More personally, it's easy for us to feel this way (though we might not verbalize it) about people we know.  "It's sad that he has cancer, but he kind of deserves it for the way he lives."  Again, we'd never say it, but sometimes we might think it.  This obviously has a huge application in our family as my wife Rachel is in a wheelchair.  She's talked many times about her experiences and what God brought her through.  In one telling of her story, she put her original thoughts/feelings after the car accident this way:

"This is all my fault!  God’s punishing me because I cheated on those homework assignments at school.  God blesses those who obey and Him and punishes those who disobey Him.  This is all because I’m such a horrible person and God’s trying to wake me up!  God, please don’t punish my family for my mistakes!  If you take care of my family then I promise I’ll never cheat again!  Please just help everyone be alright and please help my legs to get over this and start working again soon!"

A lot of us have this subtle, unspoken deal with God:  "I'll be a good person and you keep things going good in my life."  If something bad happens, the whole system falls apart - either it's that God is not good and hasn't kept His end of the bargain, or that we have messed up in some way.  Rachel went through both of those feelings before realizing that the "deal" doesn't exist and that God has other purposes in suffering.  She's talked a lot about this before (even in our church), but if you have questions, please ask her!  God uses suffering, just like everything else, to work His good purposes in our lives.

We might not always think these "bargain" ideas straight out; we won't necessarily believe in a prosperity Gospel where if we are good Christians God will bless us with money.  BUT...we do it in small ways.  "I'm having a bad day today...OH! I know! I didn't read my Bible today" or "Things have been bad lately.  I need to deal with ________ sin in my life."  No! You need to deal with that sin because it is sinful and you are being sanctified by God, not so God will "make things better" in your life!  It's a subtle line of thinking that can have DISASTROUS and SOUL-KILLING consequences.  It makes fundamental false assumptions both about ourselves and about God and usually ends up with God getting the blame when the problem is our twisted thinking.  This is a HUGE topic that we don't have time to fully deal with here, but we'll be dealing with these things in-depth in the coming months.  Later in the New Testament some of the epistles deal a lot with the issue of suffering and its purposes.  Additionally, when I finish up my current sermon series on Colossians I'll be doing a series on suffering.  The point is:  I know there are a lot of questions.  Feel free to ask them.  We'll also be dealing with these issues and many more in the coming months.

This is a hugely important topic, but we've gotten a little off track.  Going back to our passage for today:  Jesus understands the purpose the people have in bringing up these tragedies.  What is His response?

"Jesus responds by changing the import of the question. The reason such events are so tragic is that they expose our mortality. Death exists in a fallen world, and nothing exposes our mortality more than when death comes suddenly and unexpectedly, cutting short a life that had the potential to be much fuller. Jesus argues that what should be contemplated is not the cutting short of these particular lives, but the fact that life terminates. This raises an even more basic question, what comes after that? How does one prevent the end from being the ultimate end? Jesus has taken a question about mortality and made it a question about the possibility of eternal punishment. So he urges the people to repent, without which all will perish—only in a death that is more than a mere loss of mortality. His point is that with death comes a decisive encounter with God, one that does deal with sin. Whether one is a little sinner or a big one, repentance now is the only way to survive that coming encounter." [2] (bolding mine)

The point:  don't worry about others.  Worry about yourself!  You don't know anything about those people and God's purposes in what happened to them.  Consider yourself and deal with your sin, not out fear of punishment, but to please and glorify God!

[1] Darrell L. Bock, The NIV Application Commentary: Luke (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996), 365.
[2] Ibid. 365-366.
Andrei
4/19/2012 07:45:37 pm

Lot to think about in response to this post... I think I'm personally still somewhat confused with this topic. Sorry ahead of time if I'm asking any dumb questions.

I was thinking about the topic of God punishing people for their sin in relation to what happens in the Old Testament. Seems like God repeatedly says: 'they turned their backs on Me, so I'm going to end their lives and/or make them miserable until they choose to acknowledge Me again.' So how do we see this in light of what you're saying? Would the answer be that this was simply how it was before Jesus?

Also, does the fact that we have salvation through Christ mean that we don't suffer any punishment at all related to the sins we've committed? From what you've said, we suffer not because we've sinned, but because we live in a broken world? I think I've heard things in sermons and situations in churches that reflect the belief that God is punishing and individual, group, or entire church for sin that is present in their lives. So there is no relation whatsoever between our sin and bad things happening?

Greg
4/20/2012 03:49:54 am

Good questions.

I think the first thing we need to do is draw a distinction between "punishment" and "consequences". Sometimes this can be hard. Two examples:

1. Yesterday my daughter Abbie was naughty and got used a stool to climb on top of a trash can to reach a big bag of Easter candy so she could eat it. In the process, she fell of of the trash can onto her but and hurt herself. The pain wasn't a punishment, but it WAS a consequence of her actions.

2. "Erwin" breaks the law and robs a bank. The police catches him and he goes to jail. Is this punishment or consequences for his actions? I think it's both.

Sometimes it's easy to separate the two, sometimes it's not. Whereas I would say that God does not usually IMMEDIATELY punish us for our sins (without Jesus there will certainly be ETERNAL punishment), God never promises to stop the consequences of our sins. If our lives fall apart as a consequence of our actions, this is not the punishment of God - it's just reality and common sense. I would say that King David is an excellent example of this in the Bible. Though there are very few times in the course of his life where it is explicitly said "Because you did X, Y will happen" (though there are a few), any reader of his story can see that his sinful actions lead to the eventual breakdown of his family and his life. Hopefully we've cleared that issue up a bit.

Therefore I think what we're dealing with here is when events are unconnected with sinful actions, such as in the quote from Rachel above: "We had this car accident because I cheated in school". The idea/passage that you are referencing above deals mostly with what we call the "Mosiac Covenant" in the OT, that is the Law given to Moses. I think particularly what you're talking about is Deuteronomy 28, where you read about "Blessings for Obedience" and "Curses for Disobedience". You'll notice if you read that chapter that the "Curses" section is much longer. Two thoughts here:

1. This is a specific covenant made to Israel about dwelling in the promised land. Forsaking God would eventually lead to them being booted out of the land. The did forsake God. They WERE booted. Again, I think this one is cross between consequences and punishment as they broke the clear command of God. I would REALLY, REALLY caution you against bringing this covenant over to us today. There is no indication that we should. God laid down the law, they broke it, they were booted. Game over. We are free from the Law as believers in Christ. I think there are important lessons to learn from Israel's disobedience, but I don’t think we can bring this over to us today.
2. There are two ways to view the fact that the “Curses” section is longer. I think our usual infantile response to it is “Wow, God must really like to punish people, because there are a lot of punishments in this passage compared to blessings.” I would encourage us all not to think that way. The final punishment in the passage is being “scattered among all peoples” (Deut. 28:64). That is the last straw: being booted from the land. Before they reach that point, however, God gives them A LOT of warning signs. A LOT of signals to turn back. A LOT of opportunity to change their ways before being kicked out. I think the fact that there are so many “curses” is not a sign of God’s joy in punishment, but a sign of His great patience and desire for repentance. He gives ample opportunity for repentance.

So – now that we’ve dealt with that idea from the Old Testament, we still have one more major issue to cover. In 1 Corinthians 11 there is a section that talks about communion and how some people in Corinth were abusing it. One part says this: “ Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died.” (1 Cor. 11:28-30). This is one of the few places in the NT that connects actions directly with a physical event. However, the passage goes on to say: “But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are DISCIPLINED so that we may not be condemned along with the world.” This again adds another element to what we’re talking about. Did these people die because of their actions? Yes. Why? The passage said that it is not necessarily punishment, but DISCIPLINE. Why? So that they won’t be condemned like the rest of the world. God enacted those physical events to wake the people up to what they were doing and the pull them back to Himself so that they wouldn’t go the way of the world. Again, there are VERY few passages that say things like that.

So, what’s the conclusion? God may choose occasionally to discipline a believer for si

Greg
4/20/2012 03:50:41 am

Continued....

So, what’s the conclusion? God may choose occasionally to discipline a believer for sin in their life. Usually the method of doing so is through the natural consequences of their sin. HOWEVER, we are not God and cannot make this connection easily. Job’s friends are a great example here: we know from the beginning of the book of Job that he is not suffering because of sin in his life – it is much bigger than that. But Job’s friends come along and basically repeatedly say “Wow – you must be a really bad sinner for all of this bad stuff to happen.” They don’t have all of the data and therefore come to the wrong conclusion. When we make quick judgments, chances are that we will make the same mistake. We’ve seen from 1 Corinthians that God DOES cause suffering as discipline sometimes, but my caution is against assuming that is ALWAYS the reason. God can cause suffering in our lives to grow us up spiritually (think Josef Tson). He can use it to glorify His name as we persevere in our suffering (think Job). We can suffer simply because we live in a world broken by sin. What we DO know is this:

“And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son…” Romans 8:28-29

God uses all things for good (even suffering) in our lives. Does that mean that we’ll always be rich and things will be good? No. That good is that we are “conformed to the image of his Son”. We are made more like Jesus.

As I wrote above, this is a HUGE topic. We’ll get to more of it later, but I hope I’ve dealt with at least a few of your questions here.


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