Lent - Day 12

Posted on: March 12, 2020
by: Gerrit Dawson, Senior Pastor

Day 12 Thursday

THE TENANTS OF THE VINEYARD

That which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ (1 John 1: 3).

FOLLOWING THE SCRIPT

Matthew 21: 33-46

“Hear another parable. There was a master of a house who planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a winepress in it and built a tower and leased it to tenants, and went into another country. When the season for fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the tenants to get his fruit. And the tenants took his servants and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent other servants, more than the first. And they did the same to them. Finally, he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and have his inheritance.’ And they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. When therefore the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons.”

Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures:

“‘The stone that the builders rejected

has become the cornerstone;

this was the Lord’s doing,

and it is marvelous in our eyes’?

Therefore, I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits. And the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.”

When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he was speaking about them. And although they were seeking to arrest him, they feared the crowds, because they held him to be a prophet.

CAST NOTES

The vineyard had long been a symbol for Israel. The LORD had planted his people in the Promised Land, tending and caring for them in expectation that his vineyard would yield a harvest of righteousness to bless the world. The Jerusalem Temple even had a gilded grape vine carved above its columns.

But the vineyard was also a symbol of national failure. The people did not produce the expected fruit. Before Israel’s destruction and exile in 587 BC, Isaiah had prophesied the way the nation had failed,

For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel . . .

And he looked for justice,

but behold, bloodshed;

For righteousness, but behold, an outcry! (Isa. 5: 7).

Amidst such persistent failure, the LORD’s people yearned for a Redeemer. Psalm 80 paints this longing in terms of the vineyard,

Turn again, O God of hosts!

Look down from heaven, and see;

have regard for this vine,

the stock that your right hand planted,

and for the son whom you made strong for yourself!

But let your hand be on the man of your right hand,

the son of man whom you have made strong for yourself!

This psalm mysteriously prays not only for Israel as, collectively, the LORD’s son, but for a particular son, the redeemer of the vineyard yet to come.

As Jesus told his parable, he knew his audience would realize that he understood himself as the Redeemer of the vineyard of Israel. They understood that Jesus connected the current religious leaders to the historic, persistent rejection of the LORD’s prophets. The prophets who offered life and hope following repentance were consistently rejected, often violently.

The warning applies well to us. For the Word of God still confronts our settled lives. We still resist any call to change, to admit we are not doing just fine, to acknowledge the need to repent. The call of Jesus still provokes fierce opposition in our jaded, self-satisfied hearts.