The Road Less Traveled: The Road of Judgment & Blame

Scripture Focus:  Luke 13:1-9

Is your first reaction in tough times
to blame?  If it is you join a whole culture looking for someone
on whom to hang all of the struggle and pain.  When you see someone
suffering, is your tendency to blame them for the suffering they face? 
Again, you will find yourself in the heart (or lack of heart) of the
culture. This is the easy road.  On this road we cut out people
from our lives who do not produce what we want.  On this road we
can also cut ourselves from life with others or life with God because
of our failures.

The road less traveled is the road of
mercy.  It seeks not to blame but to help.  It looks for forgiveness
and readily gives others mercy in time of need.  Not only can we
see Jesus do this in the Gospels but we experience it as we are joined
to his death and resurrection. What is so important to people of faith
is that we know the one who will give it when no one else can or will.

Jesus is the gardener who takes on the
fate of all humanity, our suffering and our death, head on. He not only
tends to the tree, but dies on a tree. He suggests that being cut off
from God is a terrible fate, and then he endures that fate with us and
for us. By joining us in our suffering, Jesus does not answer the questions
about why we suffer. Instead he lives it. He shows us that it does not
have the last word. Beyond our hope and comprehension is something greater
still, of which by his death we can only catch a glimpse. For this purpose
he tends the unproductive tree and dies with it, with us.  

To Know: 
Jesus will not give up on you, he doesn't want you to be cut off from
God.

To Feel: 
The love of God as Jesus meets us in our sinfulness, or in our pain
and struggle.

To Do: 
Receive mercy, give mercy, live mercifully.