I wonder have you ever
borrowed something and
either lost it or broken it? It
does happen, but what I am
sure that you don’t do is to
pretend it hasn’t happened by
hiding the evidence and
hoping that the owner has
forgotten about it, or worse
still beat up the owner or kill
him when he comes to
retrieve his property?
Jesus’s parable of the Tenant
farmers is a continuation of
His rebuke against the chief
priest and elders who were
questioning His authority.
It was quite common in
Palestine and indeed
elsewhere for wealthy
landowners to lease property
to tenant farmers. Quite
rightly they would expect
some return for their having
done so either in the form of
paid rent or a return of a
proportion of the produce of
the land. In the case of
Jesus’s parable the
landowner has chosen the
latter.
Jesus’s choice of property as
a vineyard is deliberate. The
chief priests and elders will
have made the connection
between the vineyard and
Israel in fact as Jesus begins
the parable, He uses much of
the imagery of the Song of
the Vineyard in Isaiah 5:1-11
which even back then was a
lament over Israel’s sin and
rebellion.
Compare the start of His
parable with that Old
Testament scripture:
“There was a landowner who
planted a vineyard. He put a
wall around it, dug a
winepress in it and built a
watchtower. Then he rented
the vineyard to some farmers
and moved to another place.
When the harvest time
approached, he sent his
servants to the tenants to
collect his fruit.” (Matt
21:33-34)
“I will sing for the one I love
a song about his vineyard:
My loved one had a vineyard
on a fertile hillside.
He dug it up and cleared it of
stones and planted it with the
choicest vines. He built a
watchtower in it and cut out a
winepress as well. Then he
looked for a crop of good
grapes, but it yielded only bad
fruit.” (Isaiah 5:1-2) Later in
verse 7, the parallel is spelled
out clearly “The vineyard of
the Lord Almighty
is the nation of Israel,
and the people of Judah
are the vines he delighted in.”
The way Jesus depicts the
Tenant farmer’s treatment of
the landowner’s servants is a
direct description of the way
those in authority had
mistreated and abused God’s
messengers throughout
history. Observe the way the
prophet Jeremiah is treated
for example in return for
faithfully speaking God’s
word:
“When the priest Pashhur son
of Immer, the official in charge
of the temple of the Lord,
heard Jeremiah prophesying
these things, he had
Jeremiah the prophet beaten
and put in the stocks at the
Upper Gate of Benjamin at
the Lord’s temple.” (Jer
20:1-2) and if that wasn’t
enough
“So they took Jeremiah and
put him into the cistern of
Malkijah, the king’s son,
which was in the courtyard of
the guard. They lowered
Jeremiah by ropes into the
cistern; it had no water in it,
only mud, and Jeremiah sank
down into the mud.” (Jer 38:6)
In Jesus’ time, the most
recent prophetic voice was of
course John the Baptist who
had been silenced by Herod
Antipas during a drunken
party.
Finally Jesus’s story reaches
its climax with the murder of
the landowner’s son and heir.
The parallel with Jesus’s fast
approaching death is
unmistakable. Jesus had
warned His disciples that He
would suffer and die at the
hands of sinful men and so in
this parable He makes it
perfectly clear that He is fully
aware of the intent of the
religious authorities to
‘silence’ Him permanently.
But, they are now warned by
Jesus in the clearest of terms
too, that there will be
consequences to their
actions.
You will recall that this
teaching follows the
disturbance caused by Jesus
in the temple the previous day
when He ejected the money
changers and traders? That
event followed Jesus’s
triumphant entry into
Jerusalem on Palm Sunday
recorded at the beginning of
Matt 21. Think back to Holy
Week when I told you all
about the Egyptian Hallel
Psalm 118? It was one of
several Psalms which the
pilgrims sang as they entered
the city at Passover. It
included the words:
“The Lord has chastened me
severely, but he has not given
me over to death.
Open for me the gates of the
righteous; I will enter and give
thanks to the Lord.
This is the gate of the Lord
through which the righteous
may enter. I will give you
thanks, for you answered me;
you have become my
salvation. The stone the
builders rejected has become
the cornerstone.” (Psalm
118:18-22)
The chief priests and elders
may have considered
themselves to be the builders
and architects of Israel’s faith,
but He the Christ is the
cornerstone whom they have
rejected.
The encyclopaedia Britannica
defines a cornerstone as
being a :
“ceremonial building block,
usually placed ritually in the
outer wall of a building to
commemorate its
dedication……Until the
development of modern
construction, the stone was
usually at a corner, possibly
as the first of the foundation
stones, and it was a real
support.”
Jesus made no apology for
the fact that His teaching was
sometimes hard to accept.
As the saying goes, ‘the truth
sometimes hurts’, but He
warns those who opposed
and rejected Him that any
bruising suffered by those
who stumbled against His
teaching had no comparison
with the crushing blow they
would experience when He
returns as judge. The chief
priests and elders may have
had the upper hand over
Jesus then, but only because
He has allowed them to do
so. The consequences of
rejecting Christ would be v
44,
“Anyone who falls on this
stone will be broken to
pieces; anyone on whom it
falls will be crushed.”
There is a consequence to
rejecting Christ as the
cornerstone of your life.
God our Father has entrusted
us with His world and His
resources and quite rightly He
expects a return for His trust.
Those who welcome His
messengers and most of all
His Son will enjoy with Him
some of the return of the joy
of the harvest, but those who
reject Him will be crushed by
the One they have rejected.
Let us close with a simple
prayer which my Godfather
sent to me at my
confirmation, the mid-13th
century prayer of St Richard
of Chichester. In some ways
it sums up today’s message:
Thanks be to you, our Lord
Jesus Christ, for all the many
blessings You have won for
us and for all the cruel pains
and insults which you have
borne for us.
Most merciful Redeemer,
Friend and Brother,
may we know you more
clearly, love you more dearly,
and follow you more nearly,
day by day.
Amen