Summer In The Parables - [Matthew 21:33-46]

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chapter 21 Verses 33 through 46 Matthew 21. So if you turn your
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Bibles there, we'll get started in a moment But this is the parable of the wicked tenants Sometimes known as the wicked husband's men or the parable of the vineyard owner depending upon the translation that you have
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Okay. Well, let's open in a prayer and then we'll get things started Mm -hmm
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Heavenly Father, we just thank you so much for your word We thank you Lord for the power of this word and how it stirs in our hearts
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Lord Thank you for this opportunity to Spend time together and study
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To be drawn close to you to understand your will for us in this In this assembly of the
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Saints Lord, we thank you for all your awesome blessings Including this facility the elders the deacons all those who serve us in various ministries
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We just give you praise and we pray that This teaching this worship this morning all that we do brings glory to you in Christ name.
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We pray Amen Okay the parable of the wicked tenants
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Matthew 21 33 through 46 The primary focus is going to be on the book of Matthew though this tenant is also repeated in Mark and in Luke But I reserve the right to call on those other scriptures if it fills in some holes
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I'll be also asking some questions throughout the conversation to try to draw you into the discussion so that you don't have to listen to a
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Monotone speaker for the next 40 minutes or so and it'll break things up a little bit
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But this parable is about a landlord and a tenant or tenants
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So just as a point of curiosity, how many people here have ever rented? How many people here?
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Have ever been a landlord? Okay We're evil all of us landlords are evil
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I just want you to know that's going to be the premise of this entire teaching not really
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But as you know there's oftentimes a stigma associated in in some cultures regarding landlords because everybody has this thing the
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Absentee landlord and all this other stuff, but we're gonna get into the reality of landlords in this conversation.
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I Want to share with you a brief personal experience when Sue and I bought our first home back in the 80s we had a lady living upstairs from us with her daughter and We had tried to determine can we afford this property or can we not afford this property?
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So we went through all the numbers put together our budget and we said as long as we have An occupant 10 out of the 12 months of the year we can afford this place
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Well within two months of having purchased it The tenant decided they didn't want to pay rent anymore
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It took us Six or eight months to get them out of the apartment by the time we got them out of the apartment
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Not only had we had no income, but they had trashed the place We had to gut it to get it back online
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So our experience with that as being the landlord was you get to assume all the risk
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And it doesn't always work as you planned and that's part of what we're going to see here Because you have this contractual arrangement between the vineyard owner and the tenants in this story and that's what we're going to review
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So parables Jesus was the master storyteller
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Jesus this was one of his preferred methods of teaching It was a very common method for teaching and the benefit of parable was that it drew people into the story you laid out a common everyday situation and Eventually you brought them to a moral issue where they had to make a decision they had to draw a conclusion and Jesus was an artist at doing this
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He had the ability to stack parable upon parable to have a maximum impact
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And that's what we're going to see as we look at the context of this scripture in a few minutes
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The Pharisees on the other hand had a knack for taking the scriptures and making them dance on their head to serve their own
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Agenda, and this is where we're going to see the conflict Jesus often used these parables as a method to expose the hypocrisy of the
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Pharisees And that's where we're going to be going later today so Let us begin by reading the parable
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Matthew 21 verses 33 through 46. I'll be reading from the ESV Here 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
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Again he sent other servants more than the first and they did the same to them
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Finally he sent his son to them saying they will respect my son But when the tenants saw when the tenants saw the son they said to themselves
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This is the heir come let us kill him and have his inheritance
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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
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They said to him he will put those wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants
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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?
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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
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Pharisees heard this power his parables they perceived that he was speaking about them and Although they were seeking to arrest him
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They feared the crowds because they held him to be a prophet That is the
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Word of God as written in Matthew Now on the surface this storyline seems rather simple
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It's filled with several metaphors in the metaphors Even to me seemed rather obvious So I'll ask you folks who does the vineyard represent what does the vineyard represent in this parable
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Pardon me Israel exactly the vineyard is
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God's chosen people Israel and Who does the landlord represent in this parable
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I heard voice God exactly and Does anyone know what?
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Fruit is a metaphor for in this parable. We got to get some
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Starbucks delivered next next week. Come on What is what is the fruit
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Salvation okay, that's not the answer. I'm looking for but it's close Pardon me
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No, what I'm looking for bread Nope In the fruit of the fruit of righteousness, we're gonna look
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Galatians 5 22 23 we're told about the fruits of the
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Spirit as an example What we're looking for is fruits of righteousness Okay Who does the
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Sun represent in this parable Jesus So what we have here is a situation where you have a vineyard which represents
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Israel the chosen people of God That the landlord is
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God himself The fruit is fruits of righteousness as God's chosen people you are to be set apart and The Sun represents
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Christ himself and The last question who do the wicked tenants represent?
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Yeah, Casey's got it. It's the Jewish leaders of the day That's who those folks represent
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Now when we look at the last last sentence or two What shall what shall this, you know, what shall the tenant do?
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He shall throw these people out and they'll come to a wicked end. The point here is the main theme of this is judgment
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God's expectations for those whom he was chosen. They're going to see judgment judgment In fact what we're going to look at here as we go through this entire
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Sermon of this entire teaching where the scripture is We're going to see that judgment is a key theme that runs through this entire chapter okay, so We're gonna do a brief exposition of of the parable here buzz
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So the context of the parable within the scriptures. This is
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Passion Week. This is Christ's last Week of earthly ministry prior to the crucifixion and resurrection
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Sunday of this week was his triumphant march on the donkey into Jerusalem the people were crying out
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Hosanna to the Son of David He was being praised. There was another cleansing of the temple that week
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He cursed the fridge fig tree, which was another Condemnation of fruitlessness and then the
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Pharisees Again, try to challenge Christ's authority and trap him and he shares with them two parables
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The parable of the two sons and you may recall that one. That's the one where The father says to the son
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I want you to go work in the vineyard and the son says I'm not going to work in the vineyard and then he repents and goes and works in the vineyard and Meanwhile, the other son acts like a really good son.
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This is of course father. I'll go work in the vineyard, but then he never does it Again, this was an issue of judgment.
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This was an issue of condemnation. You had a contrast between the sinners of the day who were often illustrated as prostitutes and tax collectors who come to repentance and the kingdom is theirs versus those who are in leadership
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Who say all the right things? They act pious and yet their hearts are far from God and this is the contrast in the two sons and There's judgment there and then we finally get to the issue of the parable that we're reading right now but Jesus has stacked these parables one upon another for maximum impact and what he's doing is exposing the hypocrisy of the of the religious leaders
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So in this parable, we see that the vineyard will ultimately be given to others
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So imagine yourself as a Pharisee What in the world are you thinking as you listen to this a you've just been
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Condemned was always the word dist someone say dist that's that's from the Greek So you've just been dist in front of everybody publicly humiliated and you know that you are a pious theologian of the day, so How are you gonna respond to it?
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We're gonna get to that as we get into the further into the text But we're gonna do right now is we're going to go verse by verse and if and I have to I have to pace myself
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Because I want to go verse by verse and still have time to give you the application in today's world in today's
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Christian life Verse by verse verse 33 I'm gonna I'm gonna move kind of rapidly through this
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But I want you to I want you to hear what all of this means because it's kind of exciting We're gonna exposit the verse then we're gonna look at what that verse would have meant to the audience of the day
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And then we will actually discuss our modern -day application. So verse 33 here another parable
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That's his introduction Jesus introduction. I'm reminded of the term that we see frequently. He who has ears to hear let him hear
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It's an invitation from the master to learn and it's going to be foolishness to those who don't believe
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Continuing verse 33 There was a master of the house who planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a winepress
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In it and built a tower and leased it to tenants and went to another country Understand what we have here.
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We have a man here who is making an investment He has purchased this property he has improved this property and his intent is that this prop this this this
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Land will produce a profit for him and he is willing Contractually to share that with the laborers in the vineyard by offering them the opportunity to lease it
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So it's a contractual agreement, but he has assumed all the risk. He's fortified the investment with hedges fences towers
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He's put all the equipment in there for them to draw wine from the grapes and he's entrusted contractually
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With these tenants to provide the labor so that they can share in the bounty of this property verse 34
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When the season for fruit drew near he sent his servants to the tenants to get the fruit
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Now one thing we as modern people wouldn't necessarily know while people in an agrarian culture know it takes years
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For fruit to bear from vineyards orchards, etc In a wine country, it takes four to five years for a vineyard to produce a crop
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So imagine this you're the you're the tenant you're working four years.
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You're not getting paid You're dependent upon the bounty of the land to provide you what your do so you're gonna get a minimal return for your effort in the first several years and So will the landlord but the landlord in this situation has to collect
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Because what we're going to see as we get into this is by Jewish law If I as a landlord didn't collect rent
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For three years. It kind of was one of those grandfather type scenarios where the occupant is assumed to own the property
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So even if rather than taking Boxcar loads of grapes out of this property only taking bushels.
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I is the landlord in order to continue To prevail as owner.
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I need to take my agreed percentage of that So you can see that as a tenant one could grow resentful
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Making a pittance and they still have to give this guy some stuff, but that was the contractual agreement
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So that's the situation that we're dealing with here so first 36
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Again, he sent I'm sorry first 35 and the tenants took his servants and beat one and killed another and stoned another
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Again, they have perhaps grown resentful. They don't have a lot to pay. They don't want to pay
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But It's kind of outrageous to Actually kill the people sent to collect the rent
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But what they're actually actually exercising here is in effect a coup d 'etat to steal the property
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First 36 again, he sent other servants more than the first and they did the same to them now
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What's wrong with this picture? You get you get a situation here where a landlord sends somebody to collect the rent
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They kill his collection guy And What does he do? He sends another one?
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exactly, and that's Pat said it testifies to the incredible patience of the landlord in fact from an earthly perspective a ridiculous amount of patience
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Because I think from an earthly perspective if I sent someone to collect the rent and they kill them the next person that shows up At the door would be the police the constable the
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National Guard my enforcers It would be somebody but it wouldn't be the next collection agent and that part of part of the silliness of this is
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What Christ was trying to impress upon these people is this landlord has an incredible amount of patience much more patience than seems reasonable and Then we take it to the next step.
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The next step is He sends his son first 37 finally sent his son saying they will respect my son now this
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Process may have happened all at once over the course of several weeks Or it may have actually been over the course of those three years
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We do not know we do know that the landlord was far away for a long time
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So he was not in the immediate vicinity So how frequently was he sending somebody how long did it take for him to get word that his?
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His emissaries were being killed. I do not know but Even if you looked at this as an annual event for those three years
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The third year comes perhaps and now the son shows up. They will respect my son
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Well, they don't respect his son In fact, if you look at verse 38 when the tenants saw the
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Sun they said to themselves, this is the air Let us kill him and have his inheritance. This is a premeditated murder
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It wasn't an act of passion. It wasn't an act of rage. It was premeditated They hadn't paid the rent and if they hadn't paid the rent for three years
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They would have the property one has to wonder whether this was the scheme all along We don't know for certain but we know at this point it certainly is is the old man dead and has he passed it on?
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to his son or Is he coming on behalf of the dad? either way
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They premeditated to kill this man and have the property as their own So that's a pretty sad state of affairs.
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So we're really dealing with some vile people here. So You don't have any comments or questions so far.
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I don't see any hands Okay, I'll continue So verse 39 they took him threw him out of the vineyard and killed him now
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I Take a sip of water. Pardon me. This is curious.
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The reason they had to throw him out before they killed him was because By shedding his blood in the vineyard
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The ground would be corrupt and their produce would be corrupt and they would have in effect ruined their own crops
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Because it would have been unclean so Here we have a bizarre situation where there's an incredible hypocrisy
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I have no issue with conspiring to kill somebody but I don't want to violate the sanctity of the earth and you know respect the laws in regards to the the
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The uncleanness of the land. It's it's kind of a bizarre Hypocrisy that you can you can have that level of abuse on a person, but you're worried about the property
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So a question to you is how can one resort to something as desperate at murder and Yet still pay attention to such minutia is tainted grapes
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Charlie yeah, it does
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It does that's that is that is something that we will see as we get into the revelation of this
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But how how can how can a person? Think this way
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How can how can someone be conspiring murder and yet still be concerned about such minutia as tainted grapes
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Bruce Yeah, basically what we're dealing with is the depravity of man sin
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Does distort man's ability to reason and we are sinful by nature and you're absolutely right
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Bruce. That's that's the whole crux of it. Oh Yes Right correct, okay verse 40
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When therefore the owner of the vineyard comes what will he do to those tenants? This question was posed to the audience which comprised of Pharisees scribes teachers of the law
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So Jesus has set the bait debate. He's drawn them into this
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Scenario where he he painted this picture of the tenant and the landlord and at this point
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One has to seriously consider that jeez that the tenants are definitely in the wrong here and the landlord is in the right here and What you find now is the audience is clearly recognizing that the
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Landlord has been truly Offended here by what's taken place. So he's drawn them into the drama.
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He's kind of baited them and They're going to condemn the perpetrators
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So here's what happens the you know that they respond in verse 41
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He will put those wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give
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Him in the fruits of their seasons. This is kind of analogous to the situation in The book of Samuel where David has taken
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Bathsheba as his wife and sent Uriah to die and he's confronted by the prophet
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Nathan and Nathan lays out his own parable the parable of of the man who had this little sheep and this is all he had and some rich man comes and takes his sheep and What's David's reaction that man should die and in the same fashion
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Nathan confronts him and says you're the man and that's what we have here We have a situation where these people have just said the perpetrators of this wickedness
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Should be put to death and driven out and this is basically They've basically condemned themselves as they heard this parable
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But Jesus doesn't end there He goes to verse 42 Jesus said to them have you never read the scriptures the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone
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This was the Lord's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes now this verse is from Psalm 118 and this verse
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Is one they were very familiar with because they used to sing this outside the gates of the city every
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Passover and here they are It's coming up to Passover The next weekend is
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Passover. They're very familiar with this, but the Israelites often thought that they were the cornerstone
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Christ is the cornerstone And this is what's happening. Now. I have to admit if I were a
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Pharisee after having been you know Humiliated in these forums with Christ time after time.
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I think I would Dread every time I heard the words from him. Have you never read the scriptures?
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I mean, what do you mean? Have I never read the scriptures? I am the theologian de jour here Everybody here knows
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I'm the expert in the law Everybody looks up to me because I am so pious
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What do you mean? Have I never read the scriptures? So here we are
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All of the experts in the law and the scriptures right in front of them and it's right over their head
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It's continues to go over their head. They don't see what's right in front of them So the Pharisees must have been ripped they must have been humiliated angry embarrassed and Continues this was the
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Lord's doing God is sovereign over the affairs of men so Verse 43 therefore
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I tell you the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits
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Basically what we see here is the Jewish leaders have just been fired They haven't figured it out yet, but they've been fired in the same way
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Saul was fired by Samuel After he had disobeyed
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God and it took a while for him to actually figure it out Though he had been told there was another that would be chosen as king
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It took a while to actually flush him out so to speak and reclaim that throne as David did
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But the Jewish leaders been fired the venue was being open to others. It was being opened to the
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Gentiles and We're really what we're beginning to realize in this.
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That's just see your hand go up Steve Okay, what what we're beginning to realize here is that?
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What is revealed in Romans? 9 8 that Abraham seed is not a genetic seed
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Romans 9 8 says this means that is not the children of the flesh Who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring?
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So we have new inhabitants of the vineyard, it's no longer the Israelites as in the seed of Abraham Genetically, it's the seed of Abraham in regards to the promise
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So we see new occupants of this vineyard Continuing for in verse 44 and the one who falls on the stone will be broken to pieces and when it falls on anyone it
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Will crush him now. This is not included in all manuscripts, but it retains the imagery of stone stone being hard impervious everlasting heavy and in a battle between pottery and stone
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The pottery always loses in the battle between human flesh and stone Flesh always loses the rock will prevail and we know as we read more in the scriptures that Christ is the stone of stumbling and the rock of offense
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Now verse 45 when the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables they perceived that he was speaking about them the
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Religious leaders had traded their God -given roles for wealth and political leadership
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They kind of wrapped themselves in the flag of Jewish righteousness their own self -righteousness
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Now my question to you folks is Have you ever seen this in modern times?
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Have you ever seen this in? Modern church or modern culture. Can you think of an example where you may have seen this?
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Well, you may have seen the vineyard that God Has being used for someone's own purposes
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Well, we're gonna see as we get into the application. There are many Situations there where people have exploited the dice your hand go up or you're stretching
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Forgive me. I'm not put I can't see past this podium without my glasses
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But when I wear the glasses, I can't see the podium. So I have a choice And bifocals isn't one of them
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So what we have here is Christ exposed the hypocrisy of the
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Pharisees They claimed to be the servants of the Lord, but they didn't even recognize him when he was in their midst though They knew the prophecies as written in the
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Scriptures. They didn't even see them when they were revealed before their own eyes guns got
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John's Gospel Says he was in the world and the world was made through him yet.
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The world did not know him He came to his own and his own people did not receive him then the last verse and Although they were seeking to arrest him.
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They feared the crowds because they held him to be a prophet Though the Pharisees listened to this parable and they recognized themselves being portrayed as the villains in this parable
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It didn't cost them to repent It cost them to seek vengeance. I mean what an incredible irony
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You know God puts this example up and rather than respond with their hearts softened their hearts are hardened strengthens their resolve to eliminate
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Jesus I started this with the beginning of the parable where Jesus says listen to another parable and I end up with the same thing he who has ears to hear let him hear and Apparently they didn't hear because God's truth is spiritually discerned
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Now we're gonna go over the original audience the meaning of this parable to the original audience
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The original audience consisted of scribes Pharisees Sadducees the religious leaders the elite as we mentioned earlier
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They were educated They were politically theologically Socially connected in the society and how did they react to this parable?
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They reacted negatively They reacted violently and it's fascinating because as I started preparing for this this teaching
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I Kind of looked at this parable and said how in the world you're gonna talk for 40 45 minutes on this parable
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You know, it's so obvious you read it It takes two minutes to read it and it kind of reveals itself because all these metaphors are so obvious What's the big deal?
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Well when I read it in its context within the scriptures I saw more when I looked at it within its context of history and culture
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I saw more and when I found out that this parable that Jesus gave wasn't even original
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I saw more and Those who were well -versed in the scriptures knew this wasn't original this story
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Though Christ embellished it and repackaged it is actually from Isaiah 5 verses 1 through 7
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You don't have to turn there though. You may if you want and I'll just share this with you
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Isaiah 5 Let me sing for my beloved my love song concerning his vineyard
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My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill He dug it and cleared it of stones and planted with choice vines
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He built a watchtower in the midst of it and hewed out a vine a wine vat in it
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And he looked for it to yield grapes But it yielded wild grapes and now
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Oh inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah judge between me and my vineyard
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What more was there to do for my vineyard that I have not done in it when I looked for it to yield grapes
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Why did it yield wild grapes and now I will tell you what I'll do for my vineyard
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I will remove its hedge and it shall be devoured. I will break down its wall and it shall be trampled down I will make it a waste it shall not be pruned or hoed and briars and thorns shall grow up I will also come in the clouds that they rain no rain upon it for the vineyard of the
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Lord of hosts is the house of Israel And the men of Judah are his pleasant planting and he looked for justice
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But behold bloodshed for righteousness, but behold an outcry So this was a verse these men were very very familiar with in fact
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Verse 7 for the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting
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They used to sing this in the synagogue they used to revel in who they were in their identity as God's chosen people and Yet they didn't realize that they were the ones who were bearing the bad fruit and when
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Christ Gave this parable He basically repackaged
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Isaiah chapter 5 verses 1 through 7 and made it quite clear That it was the religious leaders who were not bearing fruit in the vineyard of Israel that God had entrusted them with and That they killed the prophets and that they would kill the
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Son This is all laid out. So here it is laid out in the book of Isaiah and Christ simply says remember that book
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I'm holding it up for you. And There they are. They are they are condemned. They are undone by their own their own sin.
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So that's kind of a Situation there Um Stanley Ellison is one of the authors that I read he had a commentary on the parables and he wrote the following in this parable of the wicked tenants
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Jesus used many metaphors to bluntly portray for the leaders the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophetic parable being enacted before their eyes
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The vineyard was completely destroyed in 70
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AD When Titus's troops surrounded the city and he built a berm around the city in Section by section he starved them all out
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He systematically destroyed them. He conquered the whole city and In in doing it the way he did
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They were decimated over time So that's the parable in itself.
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The question is what does that mean to us? You know, I'm not
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I'm not a Pharisee I'm not a Jewish leader Maybe I'm a Pharisee.
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Maybe it's going to be part of the discussion. Maybe you're a Pharisee so We did a we reviewed what this parable meant to to the leaders
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We went through it and exposited it but now we're going to review how it affects us
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So I Think as Christians reading the scriptures we find it.
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It's extremely easy to criticize the Pharisees You know, we look at them and we say what a bunch of bug bungling idiots
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This is so obvious, but you know, we we've already read the entire New Testament to Revelation We know who
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Christ is and we mirror it and we see how how things had been predicted in the
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Old Testament They didn't they had the Old Testament They had their
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Skewed or distorted view of how they had evolved with their laws and with their customs and how those had superseded
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God's Word to the point where it became works oriented again and I guess the question that I would have to ask would be
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I Asked myself If I were in Christ's day if I was standing in this room when
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Jesus was having this conversation Would I have acted any differently? And we might want to say of course
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I would have but I honestly don't know if I would have And I want you to think about that Jesus said these men honor me with their lips
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But their hearts are far from me and I would challenge you that many churches many Churches that profess to be
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Christian churches and many people who profess to be Christians May find themselves in the situation where they honor
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God with their lips, but their hearts are far from them. I want you to think of some modern examples of Christ's Church being abused and This is where we need to look at our application look at modern churches today
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How many churches have become? platforms for political action
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This is God's vineyard It's not a political action committee now,
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I I'm a junkie for politics, but I don't want to make BBC the vehicle by which
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I express my issues politically and When you see a church go that route that vineyard is being corrupted
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How many churches are being used to meet people's personal and social needs?
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Now we have wonderful fellowship and that's great But is that the purpose of the church?
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How many churches do you see being advertised on? Television and flyers on the
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Internet a friend of mine a lemon stood got a door hanger last week That's it. Come to our church.
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We have great music. It's not like your father's church. We have great music
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We have fun. We have fellowship. There wasn't a mention of Christ. There wasn't a mention of the gospel
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It wasn't a mention of the scriptures, but it's a great place to have fun another corrupted vineyard
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How many people find that church provides an opportunity to enhance their status? recognition power prestige in the community
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How many churches provide a bully pulpit for leveraging conservative political agendas whether it be fighting
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AIDS? fighting for the poor fighting for the unborn None of these things are evil.
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It's great to want to feed people It's great to want to help the poor. It's great to want to help the infirmed whether it be
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AIDS cancer or whatever But don't confuse that with the gospel
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There's a difference between us as Christians reaching out into these venues and Making that the church's mission the church's mission is to save souls
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Is not to become politically active if you look back at Wilberforce as an example
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I'm checking the time here. I got to wrap it up in a couple minutes Wilberforce When he challenged the
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British Parliament on the issue of slavery He was a Christian man bringing a moral cause through the political process
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What you didn't see was his mentor John Newton the pastor Making the church run down to the
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Parliament to raise Cain it was the difference between the church's mission and A Christian man's mission and I think that's an important thing for us to distinguish as a
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Christian It's one thing to live a fruitful life and it's another for the church to be
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Messed up into the affairs of this world and that's another example So what we find is churches become the pink church the rainbow church the green church whether they're talking about women's rights homosexuality or environment
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And that is not what the church is for So those are some examples in modern -day Pharisees using
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God's vineyard for the purpose of producing rotten fruit so I've got a wrap -up real quick because I'm gonna get in trouble
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I don't want that So what do I have till 950 or 9 or am
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I done you're the boss Okay, oh that's good it works, okay
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So what we see here is that the vineyard of Israel was handed over to the Gentiles and the
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Christian Church began The Christian Church has not been exempt from bound from going from being bountiful to Fruitless and I want you to think of some examples look the church history where places that were so rich with incredible theology and Doctrine and wonderful teaching and if you looked at the church in North Africa Centuries ago where Augusta and st.
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Ambrose were what's happened to those churches there? Think of Western Europe where we had
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John Calvin and Martin Luther And what's happened there in Getting close to home in New England where we had
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Jonathan Edwards and George Whitfield What's happened? What has happened to the wonderful fruit of that vineyard?
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You get to constantly be vigilant Terry Johnson in his book in the parables says that this parable
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Illustrates the perfect is prophetic of the fate of self -serving fruitless people of every age
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Self -serving soon as you go to self -serving you become fruitless Whose ministry is it whose church is it it is not?
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Self is not the pastor's church is not the eldest church is not the deacons church. It's not our church
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It's Christ Church And if we serve in a ministry as if that mystery belongs to us whether it be a simple humble ministry of straightening chairs out or Preaching up here in the pulpit every day.
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It is not our ministry It is God's Church and we have to remember that I want to wrap up with a scripture verse
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Because it's easy for us to look at the Pharisees and how they In their
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Arrogance had corrupted the vineyard and We having been grafted in It's easier for us to think well, you know, we've arrived.
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I want to remind you Romans 11 17 but if some of the branches were broken off and you
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Although a wild olive shoot were grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing root of the olive tree
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Do not be arrogant toward the branches Do not be arrogant towards those who have come before us as Pharisees If you are remember it is not you who support the root, but the root that supports you
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Then you will say branches are broken off that I might be grafted in that is true They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith
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So do not become proud but fear for if God did not spare the natural branches neither will he spare you?
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So we have to remember that What does God demand of Those to whom he has entrusted his vineyard
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He demands fruitfulness now put the question to you is
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What does the Bible describe as fruitfulness and I gave a clue earlier in the conversation if we will look in the
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Bible? What what would what's where is the scripture verse that describes the fruitfulness
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Pardon me Galatians exactly Galatians 5 22 and 23 but the fruit of the
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Spirit is love joy peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness self -control
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Against such things there is no law So we mustn't seek to redefine fruitfulness according to social political or personal passions
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But we must bear good fruit as defined by God and we just have the illustration from Galatians So it's defined by God for God.
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It is not about self His people provide fruit or they will face judgment
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Though you know it you're unable to do it apart from him and I'll wrap up with this verse from Jesus I am the vine you are the branches
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Whoever abides in me and I in him he it is that bears much fruit for apart from me.
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You can do nothing I'll repeat that for apart from me. You can do nothing
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If anyone does not abide in me He is thrown away like a branch and withers and the branches are gathered go into the fire and burned
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Are there any questions or comments regarding this teaching Charlie No, and the stuff that I studied
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I didn't come across that I know what you're talking about, but that wasn't part of any of the reference material that I was using
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Any other questions before I close in a prayer? Yes, Casey Okay Okay Casey added that Martin Lloyd -Jones has an excellent
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Exposition on Isaiah 5 if people want to look into that further and Martin Lloyd -Jones his readings are absolutely awesome
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Okay Let's go. I'm sorry Carol No, what
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I'm what I'm what John Newton as you may know, he's the guy that wrote amazing grace. He was a pastor and Will the force was part of his church will the force came to a point in his life where he had to make a choice
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Whether he wanted to choose ministry or choose politics. He was gifted in politics
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He was encouraged by Newton to pursue politics and in pursuing the pursuit of politics
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He wrestled with the morality or more specifically the immorality of the slave trade and what he wanted to do was confront that He gets a
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Christian worldview, but he didn't go as Newton would have been the pastor
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Doing it you had the politician doing it through the political process. So be a
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Christian where you are But don't taint the vineyard in in doing that Okay Anyone else?
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Okay. Well, let's wrap up Heavenly Father we thank you so very much for your word
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We thank you for the wonder of it how it all ties together
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How it amazes us that is so tightly woven and integrated and thank you Lord for opening our hearts and Reminding us
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Lord that we all have a proclivity in our fallenness to become Pharisees if we are not vigilant So I pray
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Lord as we looked at this last verse Where you were reminded that you are the vine away the branches that we must
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Submit to you that we must draw from you that we can do none of this on our own Of course by your grace and by your mercy.