Brothers and sisters in Christ, you can find much cause for sorrow and even violence in our readings today. In Isaiah chapter 5 and in our gospel reading we have agricultural images that paint a picture of prophecy and judgement. These are negative examples of judgement from a Holy God.
And yet all things in scripture are written for our learning. It is good for all people and God’s people alike to remember the fact that the Lord will judge, that there will come a time when his mercy and patience toward us can end without repentance. Vines that bear bad fruit are cut down and plucked out.
As Jesus tells the parable of the workers in the vineyard, his audience would have Isaiah chapter 5 come to mind, where Israel is the vine that has been carefully propagated by the LORD. After all of the careful care and support and love put into the vine the tragic result is that the vine produced sour grapes. This parable in Isaiah chapter five is told as a judgement on all of Israel for it’s lack of faith.
Yet, although Jesus begins with the imagery of a vineyard, the focus changes drastically from the parable in Isaiah chapter 5. The focus of the parable is not on the produce of the vineyard or any problem with what fruits are yielded. Instead, the focus is on the care takers. The stewards and the caretakers of the vineyard represent the leaders of Israel, the pharisees and scribes and ruling class.
To describe this ruling class Jesus gives details in the parable that are exaggerated and unlike real life, already at the first attempt to harvest the fruits of the vineyard the tenants prove themselves to be exceedingly wicked, they beat one servant, kill another and stone a third.
The land owner’s response is unlike what would happen in real life. Instead of punishing the tenants and driving them out, the owner sends more servants, this time more than the first group.
Are the fruits of the vineyard really worth risking such losses? By human standards the fruits of vengeance against the wicked tenants would be sweeter than salvaging what is left of the fruits of the vineyard.
You can picture that in sending the second larger contingent of servants to collect from the tenants the master is giving the tenants an opportunity to finally be good tenants by finally surrendering the fruits of the land. With such a larger group of servants bearing down on them, surely the tenants would change their ways.
Yet, to add insult to injury, the larger contingent of servants is now met with the same fate from the wicked tenants.
It almost seems as if the patience of the master was foolish. I remember hearing this gospel reading at St. John when Isaac was a baby. As a new parent, I felt more fully the tragedy of the details of the parable that these servants should be killed, for nothing other than lust for power and control of the land. And how much more tragic that the master should send his son next. By human reckoning, no vineyard is worth salvaging to put your own son at risk.
We would argue it is not worth it even to send more servants after how the first group was treated. Look how the first group was treated, you can just anticipate more of the same.
Sending that second group of servants, it’s not going to go well for them, you might as well not send them at all. And not only for their sake, but for your own reputation, so that you are not insulted by having servants of your household shamed and even destroyed!
There is a reason Jesus gave this first detail about more servants being sent over to the vineyard. He is describing how the Father sent one Old testament prophet after another to Israel, despite their treatment of prophets of the past. The prophets spoke to Israel on behalf of the Father. They called the children of Israel to repentance. They called Israel to trust in the Lord and worship him instead of the false gods they were so enamored with.
The prophets may have been well received at first, but in the long run, the message from the Father was rejected. Many in Israel preferred the messages of the false prophets who said, it is well with you, we are on your side.
In the story of the parable it is unreasonable for the tenants to think that by overpowering and destroying all who come to collect the fruits of the land, that they will become the owners. Or that by killing the heir that they would somehow gain inheritance of the land. But this is exactly what they say to themselves when they see the son: This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and have his inheritance.’ 39 And they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him
It is just as foolish for false prophets to think that by getting rid of the Lord’s prophets and promising things that people want to hear, that God will overlook or bless that deception.
Israel rejected the prophets in failing to learn and listen to the message about the Savior who would come from the offspring of Eve, who would be a prophet like Moses yet greater, who would be a King in the line of David. The prophets told of a Savior to come who would rescue them just as God rescued through Moses in the Exodus.
Instead, Israel made its own alliances to protect them, instead of putting their trust in a Savior to come. The leaders and the Pharisees put their trust in what they can do for God with their rigorous practices, they put their focus on their self righteousness instead of their faith in the one to come who would save them.
What need do they have of a Messiah, so well tuned into following scripture and extra Rabbinical laws so that they were more holy than the common people of Israel?
But it was not just the prophets who the Father sent, though they were rejected. He sent his own son. It makes no sense for the landowner in the parable to send his own son, but that is just what our Heavenly Father did for us, he sent his son to the wicked tenants who ruled Israel with self righteousness.
The Father does not see us as lost causes. Just like the people of Israel of old rejected the prophets, our sinful nature leads us to want to reject God’s rule in our lives and establish our own rule. Yet instead of condemning us, the Father planned for our sinful nature to be condemned and defeated through the work of the Son.
There have been times when my wife and I have tried to salvage a houseplant that is not happy and is not thriving. You try to repot it and you get the same results, next a different spot in the house with more light or less light coming through. After a while I begin to think that it is just me that the plant does not like. I have given away plants that don’t work out as well as I would like. Other times I have just put them outdoors to make it as long as they can until the first frost. A lost cause is a lost cause after all.
The Lord Jesus does not know lost causes. He takes what is dead in us and brings life. He plants new life in us in the barrenness of our hearts.
The judgement to those who do not listen to the prophets or even to the Son is severe. Yet there is a bigger picture we have as God’s people. The Lord sees beyond our short sightedness, the Stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. The vineyard of the Lord may indeed produce only bloodshed. Israel may have failed the Lord, we may have failed the Lord, but the Lord still has a way to salvage what is lost and worthless.
And the Lord is patient with us until the time when we can be brought back to life! If you look at the patterns in your life you can see how many times you have born bad fruit despite all of the gifts the Lord has provided in your life.
The Lord has blessed you in planting you in the church and nurturing you with His Word, cleansing you with the forgiveness given in the Lord’s Supper. And yet we still can look at our lives and see our failures, see sins that have hindered us and become snares for us. The Lord is patient with us, leading us back to Jesus, leading us back to Him.
And the Lord has a purpose for us. Jesus is our master gardener who is designing us to become more like him. Pruning us, and propagating our fruits so that we look more and more like the Son, more like the heir- so that when we meet the Lord we will be prepared to receive the inheritance of children of God- life everlasting in the Father’s presence, life everlasting with the Son and the Holy Spirit.