SELF CENTERED TENANTS

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

“Listen to another parable: 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.”

“The tenants seized his servants; they beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. Then he sent other servants to them, more than the first time, and the tenants treated them the same way. Last of all, he sent his son to them. ‘They will respect my son,’ he said.”

“But when the tenants saw the son, they said to each other, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him and take his inheritance.’ So they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.”

“Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?”

“He will bring those wretches to a wretched end,” they replied, “and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.”

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

“‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?”

“Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit. Anyone who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; anyone on whom it falls will be crushed.”

When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard Jesus’ parables, they knew he was talking about them. They looked for a way to arrest Him, but they were afraid of the crowd because the people held that He was a prophet.

Matthew 21:33-46

Jesus then began to speak to them in parables:

“A man planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a pit for the winepress and built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. At harvest time he sent a servant to the tenants to collect from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. But they seized him, beat him and sent him away empty-handed. Then he sent another servant to them; they struck this man on the head and treated him shamefully. He sent still another, and that one they killed. He sent many others; some of them they beat, others they killed.”

“He had one left to send, a son, whom he loved. He sent him last of all, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’”

“But the tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ So they took him and killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard.”

“What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and kill those tenants and give the vineyard to others. Haven’t you read this passage of Scripture:”

“‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?”

Then the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders looked for a way to arrest Him because they knew He had spoken the parable against them. But they were afraid of the crowd; so they left Him and went away.

Mark 12:1-12

He went on to tell the people this parable:

“A man planted a vineyard, rented it to some farmers and went away for a long time. At harvest time he sent a servant to the tenants so they would give him some of the fruit of the vineyard. But the tenants beat him and sent him away empty-handed. He sent another servant, but that one also they beat and treated shamefully and sent away empty-handed. He sent still a third, and they wounded him and threw him out.”

“Then the owner of the vineyard said, ‘What shall I do? I will send my son, whom I love; perhaps they will respect him.’”

“But when the tenants saw him, they talked the matter over. ‘This is the heir,’ they said. ‘Let’s kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ So they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.”

“What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them? He will come and kill those tenants and give the vineyard to others.”

When the people heard this, they said, “God forbid!”

Jesus looked directly at them and asked, “Then what is the meaning of that which is written:

“‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone’?”

“Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces; anyone on whom it falls will be crushed.”

The teachers of the law and the chief priests looked for a way to arrest Him immediately, because they knew He had spoken this parable against them. But they were afraid of the people.

Luke 20:9-19

This ends today’s reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

In yesterday’s message, Jesus started telling the first of three parables as he addressed a group of Jewish religious leaders which included chief priests, elders, and teachers of the law. In that parable, Jesus told of two sons who reacted in different ways when told by their father to go and work in the field. The first refused to go but then had a change of heart and went; the second promised to go and then didn’t. When asking which son did wrong, the leaders quickly pointed out the second one, not realizing that by doing so they were actually implicating themselves as guilty. This is because on one hand they claimed they were obedient to God but in reality, they weren’t working with Him at all. If they had been, they would be following Jesus, not trying to find a way to eliminate them.

Well, Jesus used the example of the first son to frame why people despised by the religious leaders, prostitutes and tax collectors, would get into God’s kingdom before they would. Despite the sins they had committed, these transgressors who listened to Jesus, repented, and then followed Him were similar to the son who first refused to go to the field but then changed his mind.

Now this parable would have probably been enough on its own to make the point Jesus wanted to make but as we will see today, He was just getting started as He tells yet another parable, this one centered on a group of servants who turn wicked once they enter into a land that was not theirs. Look again at these words from Matthew’s account:

“Listen to another parable: 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.”

“The tenants seized his servants; they beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. Then he sent other servants to them, more than the first time, and the tenants treated them the same way. Last of all, he sent his son to them. ‘They will respect my son,’ he said.”

“But when the tenants saw the son, they said to each other, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him and take his inheritance.’ So they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.”

“Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?”

“He will bring those wretches to a wretched end,” they replied, “and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.”

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

“‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?”

“Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit. Anyone who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; anyone on whom it falls will be crushed.”

When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard Jesus’ parables, they knew he was talking about them. They looked for a way to arrest Him, but they were afraid of the crowd because the people held that He was a prophet.

As we look at this parable and its underlying meaning, it’s important to note that the landowner here is none other than God Himself. We read where there was a lot of advance preparation to make the vineyard ready to be productive for its farmer tenants with the expectation that they would be able to easily bear fruit, a portion of which was to be returned to the landowner at the time of harvest. Given that the landowner was not living on the property, He was in essence an absentee landlord.  

And so when the harvest time came, the scriptures tell us the landowner sent three servants to collect what was due him but the tenants assaulted two of the servants and killed the other. The landowner continued to send servants with the hope the tenants would make good on their side of the deal but each time the tenants repeated their attacks. Seeing that the servants were being mistreated, the landowner decides to send his son, believing that if he sent his own flesh and blood then the tenants would at least respect that.

But what happened?

When the wicked tenants saw the landowner’s son, they began scheming, saying to one another:

“This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him and take his inheritance.”

Why did the tenants call the son an heir?

Because they believed the reason the son was coming was because the landowner had died and the son was coming to claim the property he inherited. Jewish customs held that if a landowner died and there were no heirs, then the property could be claimed by first comers. The tenants thought the land would end up being theirs if they got the son out of the way and so they threw him outside the vineyard before killing him.

It was an incredibly sad ending to the story, one manifested by the evil self centeredness and greed of the tenants. Anyone truly listening to the parable would be able to feel the great injustice done to the son.

And so Jesus concluded with a simple question:

“Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?”

In other words, what judgment should fall on the sinful tenants?

The Jewish religious leaders were as quick to answer:

“He will bring those wretches to a wretched end and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.”

This would have been enough for Jesus to seal the deal on His point but He had one more things to say, asking the chief priests, elders, and teachers of the law:

“Have you never read in the Scriptures: ‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes?’”

Keep in mind now that the Jewish religious leaders were considered the authority on the scriptures or at least that’s how they promoted themselves. But Jesus wanted to expose their willingness to embrace some of God’s word while conveniently ignoring other parts. For Jesus was quoting directly from the 118th Psalm, verses 22-23 which read:

The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes.

To understand the point, one must think about house building in Jesus’ time. Stones were carefully selected so only the best were used for construction. Note how the words in the psalm were prophesying about Jesus as He would be rejected by the builders (the Jewish religious leaders and those who sided with them) but would end up being the cornerstone (or capstone), the main stone on which the integrity of the rest of the home relied on. The religious leaders would discard Jesus but He would end up being the only One through which a person could end up finding salvation and eternal life.

So what would become of the Jewish religious authorities?

Jesus tells them and us:

“Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit. Anyone who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; anyone on whom it falls will be crushed.”

Because they chose to reject Jesus, the cornerstone of God’s salvation plan, the chief priests, elders, and teachers of the law would find the kingdom of God taken from them and given to people who chose to receive Jesus and follow Him, producing the fruits that come from making such a commitment. They would lose out just as the self centered tenants did in the parable.

The Jewish religious leaders decided to reject Jesus and anyone who sided with Him. They were self centered tenants, residing in a land God had given them but unfaithful and disrespectful to the landowner, even to the point of killing the Son He sent. Through their actions, they may have felt they would once again have the luxury of leading the Jews without competition, snatching the land away from the one they thought was the heir. But what they really did was seal their own doom, turning away from the Messiah the prophets had long predicted would be sent by God to bring deliverance.

God’s word through Jesus today is asking us to evaluate who we are in the parable.

Are we like the tenants, self centered and willing to resort to sin and wickedness if it leads to our own personal gain?

Are we willing to completely reject Jesus, the Son of God, the cornerstone, at the expenses of losing salvation?

Are we living to only further ourselves or bear fruit for the One who owns all things and has allowed us to live in a portion of His creation?

Friends, the consequences mentioned here are real. Please don’t be numbered with the wretched wretches, the self centered tenants, when God’s judgment comes.

Tomorrow, we’ll look at the third and final parable.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

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