In Gospel of Luke 13, Jesus does something unsettling with tragic news.
Some in the crowd report a horrific event. Galileans have been killed by Pontius Pilate, their blood mingled with their sacrifices. It is brutal. It is disturbing. It travels quickly through the grapevine, as bad news always does. We know how that feels. A taxi accident. A tower collapse. A local tragedy in our own town. Shock. Sadness. Sympathy.
We instinctively look outward. Jesus turns the lens inward.
“Do you think they were worse sinners?” he asks. And then the repeated refrain: unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.
The point is not that tragedy strikes the worst people. The point is that death comes for us all. We live in a world fractured by sin and shadowed by judgement. Calamity is not proof of exceptional wickedness. It is proof that we are mortal.
Then Jesus tells a parable.
A man has a fig tree planted in his vineyard. For three years he comes looking for fruit and finds none. The verdict is reasonable: cut it down. It is using up the ground. But the vinedresser pleads for one more year. He will dig around it. He will fertilise it. He will give it every opportunity to bear fruit. If it remains barren, then it will be cut down.
That is borrowed time.
More time is not proof of innocence. It is mercy. The delay of judgement is not approval. It is patience.
Jesus later weeps over Jerusalem, warning that the city’s refusal to repent will end in devastation. In AD 70, under Titus, it did. The destruction of Jerusalem was not random history. It was a visible illustration of a deeper reality. The day is coming when, as Book of Revelation 20 describes, all will stand before the throne of God.
Why has final judgement not yet come? Second Epistle of Peter 3 answers: the Lord is patient, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. We are living in that patience.
And then comes the great irony. The one who warned, “unless you repent,” was himself crucified. The eternal Son bore judgement in the place of sinners. As Acts of the Apostles 4 declares, it happened according to God’s plan. He was crushed, not for his sin, but for ours. He was crucified in weakness, but lives by the power of God.
The message has not changed. “Repent and be baptised,” Peter preached in Acts of the Apostles 2. Forgiveness is offered. Life is offered. But time is not infinite.
For those who have not yet turned to Christ, the parable is a warning. The axe may not yet have fallen, but it is near the root.
For those who have repented, it is also a call. The Father delights in fruitful trees. We bear fruit by abiding in Christ, as Gospel of John 15 teaches. As we received him, so we walk in him, dependent, trusting, grateful.
Borrowed time is grace. It is also urgency.
Today is mercy. Tomorrow is not promised.
Listen to the full sermon HERE.