Luke 13
This chapter contains five snippets disconnected in both time and content, but each of them gives us a picture of God’s nature, and the nature of the coming Kingdom.
First, Jesus handles a question on “current events” [1]. Whatever purpose the original questioner may have had, Jesus takes the opportunity to make a point. People die, not because they are better or worse, but simply because the world works that way. Lest we think that God is unjust, Jesus tells a parable explaining that God, in fact, is patient, more patient than we even deserve. We’re little more than dead scraggly trees wasting the earth we’re planted in, and yet he is willing to provide water and fertilizer for another year.
Next, Jesus is teaching in the synagogue, and notices a woman who has been “crippled by a spirit for eighteen years”. He calls her to the front, and heals her. Unlike several previous examples, such as the woman healed from bleeding (Luke 8), the woman here doesn’t perform an explicit, outgoing act of faith. Nonetheless, the Pharisees’ remark - “Come and be healed on those days [for work]” - suggests that she had in fact come to be healed. In the same way, Christ looks upon us with compassion, and calls us to the front, desiring to set us free. The entrance requirement need not be a heroic or even desperate act; yet we must come to him for healing.
“What is the kingdom of God like?” It’s like a mustard seed, Jesus says. It’s like yeast. It’s small, subtle, and unassuming. Yet it is pervasive; it grows and rises, making a large bush or causing a whole batch of dough to rise. If we’re honest, the phrase “kingdom of God” is both grand and intimidating. The prophet Daniel describes it as a rock which smashes all the kingdoms of the world and becomes a huge mountain which fills the whole earth (Daniel 2). But the kingdom is not described in those terms at all in this passage. Here, God is working his grand and bold plans in a confusingly simple and irrationally humble way.
When asked “Lord, are only a few going to be saved?”, Jesus doesn’t directly answer the question. He’s asked in the positive (How many will be saved?) and he replies in the negative (Many will be left out.) In fact, he says that “people from east and west and north and south will come”, which suggests that the crowd isn’t going to be small. Salvation isn’t graded on a curve, Jesus explains. God isn’t picking his hundred favorite people and casting all the others out; there will be both a large number of people saved and a large number who are not. Jesus urges his listeners to strive to enter rather than trying to estimate headcounts. [2]
As the chapter closes, Jesus has yet another confrontation, when some Pharisees tell him to leave because “Herod wants to kill you”. He begins to reply in a fairly rough tone, saying “Go tell that fox…”, but his manner quickly changes. “O, Jerusalem, Jerusalem,” he laments, “how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings. But you were not willing.” This is for me the most amazing part of Jesus’ love for the world. He looks the men who will kill him in his face, and cries, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem!”
Luke has given us a slideshow in fast motion. God is patient. God is compassionate. He works in humble and unassuming ways. The door of the kingdom is narrow. And above all, Christ loved us - even when we hated him.
[1] I don’t actually know if this was a “current” news event, and it appears that scholars don’t either. However it appears from the context to be a relatively recent occurrence.
[2] Sidenote: In verses 28-29, the “kingdom of God” is described in terms that sound like the post-judgment kingdom. The righteous are feasting with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and others are thrown out. But many of the other references to “kingdom of heaven”, including the mustard seed and yeast parables, sound like a description of God’s working earth through what in a few years will be the church. I’m not sure what to make of this.
