Sermon Tone Analysis
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Where is God when bad things happen?
Are people who die in calamities and atrocities just getting what they deserve?
We either have had experiences or heard about bad things that happen, all the time.
Not long ago we heard on the news that in New Zealand over forty Muslims were killed while they were worshiping.
In other countries it was Christians.
Were these victims of mass shooting being punished by God?
What about when you or someone you know contacts a serious illness and if that where not bad enough the mounting bills that go along with it put finical strain on resources.
In our reading today Jesus taught the crowds that calamity can happen to anyone because all are human.
Jesus cited two common instances about destruction.
The first concerned some Galileans who were killed by Pilate while they were offering sacrifices.
The second concerned 18 seemingly innocent bystanders in Siloam who were killed when a tower … fell on them.
Jesus’ point was that being killed or not being killed is no measure of a person’s unrighteousness or righteousness.
Anyone can be killed.
Only God’s grace causes any to live.
This point is brought out in verses 3 and 5—unless you repent, you too will all perish.
Death is the common denominator for everyone.
Only repentance can bring life.
To illustrate His point even more Jesus taught in a parable that if fruit does not show in one’s life, judgment will come.
What kind of fruit does God look for from me?
I assume He looks for the fruit of the Spirit in the life of the believer; love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control (Galatians 5:22-23).
It is both encouraging and troublesome to note that although the gardener in the story sought fruit from the tree, he did also give it, "special attention and plenty of fertilizer."
I like receiving special attention from God, don’t you.
To hear that the master Himself will give me special attention in helping me produce the fruit of the Spirit that He wants from me, is very comforting and encouraging.
The troublesome part is what else He gives the tree in order to produce fruit.
He gave it, "plenty of fertilizer."
I often feel that I have plenty of fertilizer in my life, and I don’t find that all too encouraging.
After all, what did they use as fertilizer in Jesus’ day?
The same thing they use today.
Manure.
Poop.
I guess it just goes to show that God literally uses poop to bring out the fruit.
Maybe I need to redefine those times when I feel like I am surrounded by poop.
Perhaps I need to recognize that it is specifically in those times that I am actually receiving special attention from God Himself.
Could it be that God is actually using that poop to refine me and draw out fruit from my life?
I have a tendency to reject the poop in my life.
I don’t like the smell of it.
I don’t like the situation.
I don’t like being surrounded by poop!
It doesn’t matter if it is yours, mine, or anyone else’s!
But what if the poop around me is actually God’s means of giving me special attention and producing lasting fruit from me?
Maybe God recognizes that in order to develop lasting fruit, one needs to be exposed to plenty of fertilizer.
The alternative to having manure or poop piled on to our lives is that unproductive, will be cut down and cast aside.
One day God will cut off the unrepentant.
God gives space to repent.
The parable of the fig tree shows that God’s leniency will not last forever.
There is a certain urgency to repentance.
We are, every one of us, living in the season of second chances, having been saved from the ax by Jesus’ desire to restore us to our best.
Yes, you have been saved by faith in Jesus, but God is looking for fruitfulness in you.
When we don’t bear fruit, a liberal helping of manure may be applied to your life, with the hope you will begin to bare fruit or increase the quality of your fruit.
We don’t talk about manure much these days.
Manure is a word that is no longer trendy.
We are much too sophisticated to use such down to earth language.
Today, we would much rather label it as organic fertilizer, compost material or humus.
Whatever we call it the fact remains that it stinks.
In Jesus’ day they just called it manure or dung.
And it smelled bad.
Most of their manure came from the waste material provided by their sheep, cows, chicken and horses.
And while it may stink it provides the power (the nutrients) for things to get to the next level.
It provides the means for things to experience abundant life.
So, stinky manure was applied liberally to make things grow.
Like plants and trees, we have a lot of stinky stuff in our lives too.
A lot of things that just don’t smell good.
A lot of things that just goes splat in our lives.
A lot of things that just get plopped into our little worlds.
Stinky things like cars that quit working and must be repaired.
Basements and houses that get flooded.
Children and grandchildren that get sick or get into serious trouble at school.
Doctor’s reports that come back with disturbing news.
Offices that begin to have that stinky smell of gossip and mal content.
Finances that turn upside down and family members and friends that suddenly pass away.
None of us sign up for those things.
None of us sign up for all the stinky stuff that can find its way in our lives.
However, we all know that at times stinky things happen to us and before we know it our lives smell very much like a manure pile.
At times stinky stuff happens to us like it did for Joseph, by your family turning against you.
Joseph went from smelling pretty good in that coat of many colors to smelling like a pile manure when his brothers sold him into slavery to the Midianites.
Joseph knew what it meant when your life turns into a pile of manure.
At times it happens when those over you throw you into the stinky stuff.
That is what happened to the Prophet Jeremiah.
He was doing precisely what God wanted him to do.
He was being God’s mouthpiece.
He was doing his best to preach the truth to God’s people.
But those around him, the king and the officials in control did not care for his preaching and they threw him in a pit that was full of muddy and murky water.
In a matter of hours, he found himself waist deep in filth and sludge.
Jeremiah really was in the stinky stuff; emotionally, spiritually and physically.
The Bible tells us that in the Book of Ruth, Naomi and Ruth found themselves in the stinky stuff.
There was no way that they planned on their husbands dying.
They didn’t plan on coming back to Israel only to discover that they were going to have to live hand to mouth either.
Ruth didn’t plan on having to scrap by on her hands and knees picking up the scraps left behind by the harvesters.
She didn’t plan to spend most of her time making sure her and Naomi had a roof over their heads and some food in their stomachs.
It didn’t take Ruth nor Naomi very long to understand that life can bring a lot of stinky stuff.
The same could be said for other people we meet in the Bible like Job, David, Daniel, the 3 Hebrew Children and the Apostle Paul.
None of them signed up for their “stinky mulch manure life moments”.
I have a real good feeling this morning that none of us sign up for them either.
The reality is we all go through things in life that stink.
We don’t like it and we don’t think that it is fair.
We don’t always know why family or friends can cause so much trouble and be little stinkers.
We don’t know why at times it smells like manure at the office, at work or at school.
We don’t know why we get sick, why this person died, why this had to break down or why this bad thing had to happen.
The fact is sometimes we cause the manure to fall into our lives, ourselves, and other times it is because someone else brought a ton of it to dump in our lives.
So, what do we do about it?
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