Throw out everything you know! Get rid of it! Dump it! Toss it!
Jesus is about to do “another reversal” on you!
He was just chock-full of surprises, this itinerant rabbi from of all places, Galilee!
This is the stuff of “shock and awe” for his poor audience…they were not expecting THIS! Nor were they ready to hear his words…
They were hard words…harsh words, strange words…unexpected words…
Their “wide spread,” “much taken for granted,” “deeply held,” “bed rock belief” was that EVERYTHING happened for a reason. Of course, it did!
God, is JUST, and if bad things happen to someone, “it has to be” – (“HAS TO BE”) because in some way, THEY DESERVED IT. They have it coming…to them. It was all THEIR FAULT!
Ouch!
Finger-pointing…
Victimizing the victim…
Or, if nothing else, in some way, something good will eventually come from it – and it ONLY SEEMS like a bad thing right now, today.
Jesus rejected that whole line of belief…and thinking…
But the people in his day and time believed it whole-heartedly with everything that was within them.
After all, the Book of Deuteronomy taught it. Moses wrote it. That settled it!
If you are good, God will bless you! If you are bad, God will get you!
Therefore, only bad people suffer…that’s what Moses said…and you – had better believe it is true.
IF, Israel did “right things” all would go well, and if Israel “did not do right,” then, tragedy would most certainly ensue. It was just that simple. Pretty much black and white. Pretty uncomplicated… You screw up and look out!!! Watch your p’s and q’s and you should be alright.
Bad things simply DO NOT HAPPEN to good people. Bad things only happen to bad people. And, shame on them!
This was true on a “national level” and also on a “personal level.”
There is actually a name for it…it is called the “Deuteronomic cycle!”
Remember in the Hebrew Bible the book called Job? He begged to differ. He maintained his complete and utter innocence, right to the very end. Job disagreed with this logic and mindset. He was righteous.
And, Jesus “very simply” agreed with Job.
Those who died were NOT “more deserving” of dying than those who lived – they were NOT “worse sinners.”
Stuff happens!
People are in the wrong place at the wrong time!
Stop judging others…
Stop pointing fingers…
Stop all the speculation…about what THEY did!
Stop blaming the victims…
NOT EVERYONE deserves what happens to them!

You see the problem of suffering is more than just being existential. It tests the very core of faith. Why does God ALLOW so much suffering in the world?

A loving, merciful God should not rule such a cold, ruthless world

Something is very wrong here, the critics of religion tell us. “Either God is not loving and merciful. OR, he does not have the power to control what he has created!”

And of course, there is a Biblical/Theological answer here, but it will never satisfy the critics…

God allows suffering to give sinners time to reflect and to change, to repent if you will, to turn their lives around. This is the self-same answer that Jesus gave…

Don’t the guilty and the innocent sometimes suffer the same fate? Do not the floods and the rains happen to the good and to the bad alike? Doesn’t sickness and illness befall all humankind?

You cannot presume to know or to read the mind of God. God is God. God is mystery. His ways are mysterious. God sees what we do not. God will do what God will do. And mankind knows neither how nor why!

The parable that Jesus shared was meant to offer “a small glimmer of hope.”

There is still time. WE can repent. WE can turn our lives around. WE can live in the moment. WE can live for today. WE can live for him! WE can live for others…WE have today. WE have this moment. WE have now! We need to make the most of the time that we do have!

SECOND CHANCES, people…

While you have life and breath, do something with it…