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Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, the text for this morning comes from the gospel reading about the parable of the Lord’s vineyard. Be seated.
There was an old saying: fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. The intent behind that old saying is that if you can fool me once, okay, that looks on you; you got me. But if I allow you to fool me twice, then it’s really my fault, isn’t it? Shame on this vineyard owner for allowing himself to be fooled not once or even twice. But shame on this vineyard owner for allowing himself to be fooled three times. He has to be the biggest fool ever born, and he has to be a buffoon of a businessman because he doesn’t know how to ever make a profit on what is rightfully his.
I mean, is it not right that the vineyard owner should come to the vineyard and require of the tenants, who have been tending his vineyard, to give the vineyard owner the fruit that’s due unto him? Yes. And is it not right that the tenants, who are tending the vines and taking care of them, aren’t tending their vines—they’re tending the vineyard owner’s vines? That he would take those fruits and give them to the vineyard owner. I mean, it seems so obvious.
But not only did this vineyard owner fail to get his due… The tenants not only mistreated his servants; they also defied the vineyard owner’s authority. It is a reasonable expectation for the vineyard owner that he would take these tenants and either kick them out or punish them—one of the two. But this vineyard owner does neither. In fact, he reveals his insanity in that the vineyard owner, having tried once to send his servants away, tries his servants again and expects the same result, which is the definition of insanity.
To leave no doubt of the vineyard owner’s absurd behavior, after twice having the same thing happen to a small group of his servants and a larger group of his servants, he thinks in his demented mind that they actually would respect his son. Right? Can you imagine the day that the father came to the son and said, “Oh son, would you go on a mission for your old dad? Would you go to the vineyard from which my servants have been beaten and killed already? And would you go and require the fruits from the people?” You can see the utter ridiculousness of it. And yet, and yet, you know the vineyard owner did it.
Now, by now it’s very evident to you, I hope, that the vineyard owner is the Father, the creator of heaven and earth. The tenants, primarily in this text, are the Jews. But they can also apply to you, the tenants of God’s vineyard—his gifts, his resources, his precious treasure, his very own Son. And speaking of which, the Son, of course, is Jesus himself. The servants who have been sent and are beat up before the Son is killed are all the prophets who have come before, and they are all those who continue to proclaim the truth in this day and age.
Now, you and I can say, “Well, we have not killed anybody who’s come to us with the good news of Jesus Christ.” That is true. But have we utilized the gift of that forgiveness by giving it away to other people willingly and freely? Have we been withholding forgiveness from those who ask it of us? Instead, do we play with it to control them and their behavior? Have we utilized God’s gift of His resources wisely? And instead, bills aren’t paid, and the church struggles to make ends meet. No, you and I have not beat up the servants, and we’ve not killed the son.
Oh yeah, we have killed the son, haven’t we? It was our sins. Oh, we can say we did not throw the stone, but we were thrown upon him, and he bore the weight of your soul and all of the shame that goes along with your soul. We kicked the very son out of the vineyard so we could do with God’s gifts as we please. Yeah, we have a lot for which to repent, don’t we?
But lest we think that we are in an insular shell, just me and Jesus, listen. Our Lord Jesus said the father knew full well what would happen when he sent his prophets and his proclaimers of God’s good news to his people. He knew they would kill them. He knew they would turn their back on them. He knew that they would reject the message. If the vineyard owner really is the father—and he is—he knew exactly what would happen to his son when he sent his son for the tenants. You.
Our sins would kill him, and he would be damned on our account so that we would never have to be damned. The son must die. And though it was misguided and misdirected, it still was your and my sin that killed him.
Now you want to know something truly astounding and astonishing about this parable? What’s truly astounding and astonishing about this parable is not the perversity of the tenants. Rather, it is the persistence and the patience of the vineyard owner. That’s the main focus of this parable. The persistence and the patience of the vineyard owner with you and me.
It is Satan’s desire to move our attention to fixate and obsess on the evil of this world and his power and ruinous of this world and not on God’s great persistence and patience with this world—including with you and me. The father comes looking for evil in the tenants, and he finds evil in the tenants. And you know what he does when he finds evil in you? He kills it in his son for you and patiently and persistently seeks you.
Now, we would love to say, “Not me, Lord, not me.” The father is not the Lord of commerce. As you can see, he is a very dumb businessman. And we thank God he is such a dumb businessman and is not concerned with the bottom line, but is concerned with your soul and the saving thereof of that soul.
Because he does not come to those who run toward him. Jesus comes to seek the tenants that run away from him. He doesn’t come for those who show compassion. He comes for those who have none and are in need of his compassion. He does not come for the clean. He only comes for the filthy. He doesn’t come for those who stand boldly in his presence, but for those who cower in the corner, ashamed of themselves and of their lives, and are in great need of the tenant to be redeemed by the son of the vineyard owner.
It was the will of the Father to sacrifice his son for you and allow your sin to be what crushed him and killed him. He is not ashamed to call you his brother and his sister. Foolish though you and I may be, he is not ashamed to claim you as his own. Not because you got your life together or I got my life together, but because we’re unclean, compassionless, frightened, and shameful sinners.
And isn’t it interesting that the very one whom we cast out of the vineyard is the very one who grabs you and brings you back to the vineyard? That you may produce fruit. We don’t produce fruit outside of the vineyard, do we? Because we’re cut off by our own choice or by something else within us. But this is the vineyard in which you have been placed to produce fruit for him.
But my life is a failure upon a failure upon a failure and a disappointment upon the misplaced expectations that I haven’t fulfilled, Lord. Good! That’s exactly the kind of tenant owner he comes to save. He’s one whose life is a failure upon a failure, upon a missed opportunity, upon a tried again but failed again. That’s the kind of person the tenant owner is. The vineyard owner is the one who he wishes to redeem. That’s grace, brothers and sisters. That’s grace.
And he looks you square in the eye this morning and says to you, “You are my beloved son. You are my most beautiful daughter. With you I am well pleased,” because he is the son who died for you.
In the name of the Son, Jesus Christ, in his mercy alone. Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and your minds on Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.
