THIRD SUNDAY OF LENT HOMILY YEAR C
Ex 3:1-8, 13-15 1 Cor 10:1-6, 10-12 Lk 13:1-9
The Need to Reform
Cooperating with Grace; Vigilance; Another Chance; Conversion
1st Reading – Exodus 3:1-8A, 13-15
1 Moses was tending the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian. Leading the flock across the desert, he came to Horeb, the mountain of God.
2 There an angel of the LORD appeared to Moses in fire flaming out of a bush. As he looked on, he was surprised to see that the bush, though on fire, was not consumed.
3 So Moses decided, “I must go over to look at this remarkable sight, and see why the bush is not burned.”
4 When the LORD saw him coming over to look at it more closely, God called out to him from the bush, “Moses! Moses!” He answered, “Here I am.”
5 God said, “Come no nearer! Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.
6 I am the God of your fathers, “ he continued, “the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob.” Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.
7 But the LORD said, “I have witnessed the affliction of my people in Egypt
and have heard their cry of complaint against their slave drivers, so I know well what they are suffering.
8A Therefore I have come down to rescue them from the hands of the Egyptians and lead them out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey.”
13 Moses said to God, “But when I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ if they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what am I to tell them?”
14 God replied, “I am who am.” Then he added, “This is what you shall tell the Israelites: I AM sent me to you.”
15 God spoke further to Moses, “Thus shall you say to the Israelites: The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. “This is my name forever; thus am I to be remembered through all generations.”
Responsorial Psalm – Psalms 103: 1-2, 3-4, 6-7, 8, 11.
R. (8a) The Lord is kind and merciful.
1 Bless the LORD, O my soul;
and all my being, bless his holy name.
2 Bless the LORD, O my soul,
and forget not all his benefits.
R. The Lord is kind and merciful.
3 He pardons all your iniquities,
heals all your ills,
4 He redeems your life from destruction,
crowns you with kindness and compassion.
R. The Lord is kind and merciful.
6 The LORD secures justice
and the rights of all the oppressed.
7 He has made known his ways to Moses,
and his deeds to the children of Israel.
R. The Lord is kind and merciful.
8 Merciful and gracious is the LORD,
slow to anger and abounding in kindness.
11 For as the heavens are high above the earth,
so surpassing is his kindness toward those who fear him.
R. The Lord is kind and merciful.
2nd Reading – 1 Corinthians 10:1-6, 10-12
1 I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea,
2 and all of them were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea.
3 All ate the same spiritual food,
4 and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they drank from a spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was the Christ.
5 Yet God was not pleased with most of them, for they were struck down in the desert.
6 These things happened as examples for us, so that we might not desire evil things, as they did.
10 Do not grumble as some of them did, and suffered death by the destroyer.
11 These things happened to them as an example, and they have been written down as a warning to us, upon whom the end of the ages has come.
12 Therefore, whoever thinks he is standing secure should take care not to fall.
Verse Before The Gospel – Matthew 4:17
17 Repent, says the Lord;
the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
Gospel – Luke 13:1-9
1 Some people told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with the blood of their sacrifices.
2 Jesus said to them in reply, “Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners than all other Galileans?
3 By no means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did!
4 Or those eighteen people who were killed when the tower at Siloam fell on them – do you think they were more guilty than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem?
5 By no means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did!”
6 And he told them this parable: “There once was a person who had a fig tree planted in his orchard, and when he came in search of fruit on it but found none,
7 he said to the gardener, ‘For three years now I have come in search of fruit on this fig tree but have found none. So cut it down. Why should it exhaust the soil?’
8 He said to him in reply, ‘Sir, leave it for this year also, and I shall cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it;
9 it may bear fruit in the future. If not you can cut it down.’”
Homily
Is there a connection between how we behave toward God, on the one hand, and our earthly fortunes, on the other? Between sin and suffering? In today’s Gospel, Jesus says not in this world. He gives two examples.
When the cruel Pilate, wanting to keep the people quiet, built a much-needed aqueduct for Jerusalem, he ruthlessly usurped Temple money for the purpose. Many of the people were outraged at this profane use of sacred money, and they protested vigorously. In particular, the Galileans, an excitable people, let Pilate know how they felt. So Pilate instructed his soldiers to mingle among the gathering crowds, with clubs hidden beneath their work so enthusiastically that they beat some Galileans to death. The ones who were killed, says Jesus, weren’t necessarily more wicked than those who lived.
In his second example, Jesus tells the parable of the fir tree. The fig tree was a favourite of the Jews. Genesis, the first book of the Bible, tells that it was the leaf of the fig tree that covered the nakedness of Adam and Eve after they committed original sin. The Book of Revelation, the last book of the Bible, compares the falling of the stars from the sky at the end of the world with the falling of the figs from this tree. Between Genesis and the Book of Revelation there are about sixty other references to the fig tree, including the Jews’ model picture of the happy Jew as a man sitting under his fig tree at peace with the world.
But the fig tree takes a lot of nourishment from the soil. And there isn’t much arable soil in the Holy Land. So the fig tree had to justify its existence. In our Lord’s story, the master after three years wanted to cut down his unproductive fig tree, but was persuaded to give it a chance of one more year of care and fertilizing.
The fig tree in Jesus’ story is a reminder of the two kinds of human beings – those who give, and those who take. What the famous conductor Herbert Von Karajan said about orchestra conducing applies to life, “Technique you can learn. But what comes out of it is what you give as a human being.” Those who only take have to justify their existence. To accept Christ’s message is to be open to conversion. As the anonymous poet wrote:
If all the sleeping folks would wake up
And all the lukewarm would fire up
And all the disgruntled would sweeten up
And all the discourage would cheer up
And all the estranged would make up
And all the gossipers would shut up
Then there might come a REBIRTH IN CHRIST
Conversion means to respond to God’s care for us, to devote ourselves to a life of vigilance day in and day out, and constantly to renew our cooperation with God’s grace. In cooperating with God’s grace, we shouldn’t be under – confident of what we can do.
In today’s First Reading, Moses was very conscious of his short comings. For one thing, he was brought up by others than his parents. And he was vulnerable. When he had seen an Egyptian persecuting a Jew, Moses had killed the Egyptian. When his crime became known, he had fled to Midian (beyond the Sinai peninsula), married the daughter of the wealthy pagan priest Jethro, and would have been content to live out the rest of his days there. He had no great gifts to talk about. He ever had a speech defect.
Yet God wanted him to go back to Egypt and negotiate the freedom of his people with the great Pharaoh Rameses II. Moses mentioned many reasons not to go back – all of the above, plus that he had a good thing going in Median and the Jews wouldn’t listen to him anyhow, and so on and on. One of his major reasons for lack of confidence was the very person of the Pharaoh. We can get a picture of the power and wealth of a pharaoh from the burial treasures of King Tutankhamen, which have toured the world. Moses knew that the Pharaoh, should Moses ever get to see him, would follow other non-Jews of the time and want to know the name of his god.
They believed, you see,
