Worse

"Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. Jesus answered, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish."
Luke 13:1-3

During the days of Jesus, Pilate was the most hated man in Jerusalem. He was a loose cannon, and did whatever he wanted, without any regard for the Israelites and their traditions. In this Bible passage, we find Jesus being questioned by the Pharisees during a particularly explosive political climate. Many scholars believe that the blood situation being invoked here by the pharisees had to do with his procuring money from the temple treasuries in order to build one of his grand projects. The Jews naturally protested and caused problems for him. Pilate wanted to quell the uprising, but arresting or publicly killing the rabble rousers would likely only incite them more, so here's what he did...he recruited and some greedy Galilean Jews to attend temple worship in and amongst the insurgents. Then, in the midst of the worship ceremony, these undercover Roman cops for a day pulled out their concealed daggers, killed the protest leaders. Everyone knew that Pilate was behind it, but no one could come right out and prove it. Pretty rotten of Pilate and the Galilean Jews.

The pharisees were hoping that Jesus would speak out and condemn Pilate and the Galileans for their atrocities. Jesus answers in an interesting way, though not condoning what happened, he sends a question right back at them..."Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way."

He does an interesting thing here, he doesn't dismiss the sin of the murderers, rather he points out the fact that those questioning him were also sinners, and that their sin was no better than those of the traitors. In fact, if they did not repent of their sin, their end result would be the same - they too would perish.

Jesus dismisses a common myth out there today - that some people are worse off in God's eyes because their sins are worse off in our eyes - and conversely that people who live better in our eyes are better off in God's eyes. This is not true. The reality is that all people are equally sinners and fit to perish. Still, we do this all the time don't we? I'm a much better person than such and such, because they did this or that. We tend to rank and judge others on the basis of what they did or didn't do.

Jesus challenges us to look in the mirror, rather than always looking outward. We need to deal with our own junk rather than condemning others. This is a humbling thought, but one that causes me to love others as God does, as well as praise and thank God that He chose to die for a sinner like me.

Be God's, Scott