THE Lord pursues what occupied Him at the close of the last chapter. He is laying bare before them the crisis that was now approaching for Israel. He was the truth, manifesting the reality of things on earth—for instance, of the Jewish people in the sight of God underneath all religious forms. Nothing eluded Him and He reveals all that was needful to man. It has not the high character of the truth in John as the revelation of what was in Himself, what God was as displayed in the Word made flesh; but it is equally necessary in its place. According to the general tone of Luke, there is moral dealing with men and here with Israel.
“There were present at that season some that told him of the Galileans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.” The cruel and hardhearted governor had dealt with excessive unfeelingness and had shown his contempt of the Galileans. This furnished a subject for conversation: it was a judgment. They could more easily speak of it as it was a question of Galileans whom the men of Jerusalem were apt to despise. But the Lord answers them showing that the time for the kind of discriminative dealing which was in their minds was not really arrived. It will be so in the millennium, but it is not and could not come while the Messiah was in humiliation, a sufferer, sent to die by the same governor who so unworthily used those Galileans, yea, by those highest in Jerusalem whose sin was yet greater. Sent not to have His blood mingled with sacrifices, but to be Himself the sacrifice for sinners, in the infinite grace of God to all, beginning with Jerusalem. “And Jesus answering said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.” The Lord makes it an appeal to their own conscience, and shows that the light of Himself on earth reveals the deplorable state of all men without exception, and, if there be a difference, the exceeding guilt of the Jew in particular. They should all perish except they repented.
He does not here speak of believing, though no doubt it is implied and goes along with faith; but repenting brings in the thought of their sin and their want of all right moral judgment of it. On this He insists, but He does more; He brings forward a case calculated to arrest and search their consciences. They had spoken of Galileans; He reminds them of some nearer home in like case—men of Jerusalem, eighteen of whom had some time ago perished from a tower in Siloam that fell upon them. The Lord accordingly asks them, “Or those eighteen upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.” It is not so grave before God, nor so near to man's danger or best interests that a special disaster had occurred to Galileans, or to men of Jerusalem. What Jesus shows is the inevitable ruin of all that do not repent. This is characteristic of Christianity. It is the most separative of all things. It severs even out of Israel to God by the judgment of sin as it is and the knowledge of His grace; but at the same time it is the most comprehensive testimony possible. Not only does it go out to all nations to gather from them and put believers on equal privileges whether Jew or Gentile; but it is no less profound than universal, inasmuch as it shows both what God is towards every child of man, and what He is to none but His own children. Indeed it is a revelation of God in Christ both for the Church, and in His connection with the whole universe. He is the God and Father of all, “who is above all and through all and in you all;” though this will in no way hinder the destruction of all men who do not repent. Christ, come in humiliation to redeem from sin to God, alone reveals things as they are.
The Lord adds a parable also. “A certain man had a fig-tree planted in his vineyard; and he came and sought fruit thereon, and found none. Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree and find none: cut it down: why cumbereth it the ground? And he answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung it: and if it bear fruit, well; and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down.” This manifests, on a still larger scale, a similar truth; it adds the grounds on which they were so peculiarly responsible. The fig tree was planted in his vineyard and be came and sought fruit on it and found none, and he says “Cut it down: why cumbereth it the ground?” So far from security, nothing could be more critical than the condition of Israel now. It was not for them to be coolly speculating about Galileans and forgetting men of Jerusalem; for the thoughts of men are always partial and self-deceptive. The Lord then does not merely bring in counter-facts, but shows in a parabolic form their moral history and what was impending from God. It was only through His intervention and intercession that God was willing to bear with Israel. “Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree and find none.” There was the most ample testimony rendered—more than enough—these three years. “Cut it down: why cumbereth it the ground? And he answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung it: and if it bear fruit, well; and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down.” This was what awaited Israel. The Lord was giving them a last opportunity, as far as His ministry was concerned. We know well that, whatever His pains, whatever the means used, all was vain for the time and that generation. They did not bear fruit; they rejected Himself. “After that thou shalt cut it down.” And so it was. Israel has disappeared from its place of testimony: the fig tree, the emblem of their national existence, is cut down, and withered away. Not but that God can renew them on a different principle. Grace will interfere and bring in this Messiah for the generation to come; but their national position under the law, even in the feeble condition of a remnant from Babylon, is completely blotted out from their land. The fig tree is cut down; so the Lord told them it would be, and so it is.