Author: Gary Witcher

Parables Nine

"Listen to another parable," Jesus says in Matthew 21:33-39."  There was a landowner who planted a vineyard and put a wall around it and dug a wine press in it, and built a tower, and rented it out to vine-growers, and went on a journey.
"And when the harvest time approached, he sent his slaves to the vine-growers to receive his produce.  And the vine-growers took his slaves and beat one, and killed another, and stoned a third.
"Again he sent another group of slaves larger than the first; and they did the same thing to them.
"But afterward he sent his son to them, saying, 'They will respect my son.'
"But when the vine-growers saw the son, they said among themselves, 'This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and seize his inheritance.'
"And they took him, and cast him out of the vineyard, and killed him."
"Therefore when the owner of the vineyard comes," Jesus asks in verse 40, "what will he do to those vine-growers?"
"He will bring those wretches to a wretched end," the people reply, "and will rent out the vineyard to other vine-growers, who will pay him the proceeds at the proper seasons."
As is the case with all the parables, the conclusion is inevitable. Anyone could give the correct answer to the Master's question.   The interesting thing is that Jesus is talking to the chief priests and elders of the people, as we note in verse 23.  They give the right answer, even though Jesus is not really talking about a landowner and some renters.
What the Lord is actually talking about is God and His relationship with the Jewish people.  God selected the Israelites as His chosen people. In return, they mistreated and even killed God's prophets, and were getting ready to murder His Son.
Jesus makes this application in verse 43 when He warns that God is going to take the kingdom away from them and give it to someone else.
One of the amazing things about the vine-growers in the parable is their total lack of intelligence in dealing with the landowner.  Here is a man who is rich enough and powerful enough to own this property.  Yet they think that by killing those who are sent to collect the rent, they can do whatever they want to.  What do they think he is going to do after they kill his servants and eventually his son?  Is he just going to shrug his shoulders and say, "I guess they don't want to pay the rent so they don't have to?"
This becomes even more amazing when we see the reaction of the Jewish leaders after the parable.
"And when the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables," verses 45,46 point out, "they understood that He was talking about them. And when they sought to seize Him, they became afraid of the multitudes, because they held Him to be a prophet."
The application is so obvious that even these men cannot help but see it.  Remember that Jesus is telling this story while it is actually still in progress.  The vine-growers, the Jews, have not yet killed the Son of the Landowner.  So what do the Jewish leaders do when they hear the parable?  They want to kill Jesus and thus complete the story just as the Lord has told it.
It's a good thing, isn't it, that we are a lot smarter than those Jewish leaders?  Or are we?
Who really killed Jesus?
"But God demonstrates His own love toward us," Romans 5:8 informs us, "in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."
Jesus did not die on the cross because the Jewish leaders decided that was what should happen.  He died on the cross because we put Him there.  Nails could never hold the Son of God to a Roman cross.  Only our sins could do that.
If we take advantage of the salvation offered through the sacrifice of Christ, then that death is not in vain and we can benefit from it.  But if we reject Jesus or refuse to do what the Father tells us, then we are just as guilty as the Jews of nailing Jesus to the cross.
"They again crucify to themselves the Son of God, and put Him to open shame" the latter part of Hebrews 6:6 says of those who fall away from the truth.
If we reject the truth found in the Bible, can we really point an accusing finger at the Jews or at the vine-growers in the parable?
"For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth," Hebrews 10:26-31 warns, "there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a certain terrifying expectation of judgment, and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.
"Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.  How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?
"For we know Him who said, 'Vengeance is Mine, I will repay.'   And again, 'The Lord will judge His people.'
"It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God."
What punishment did the vine-growers in the parable receive?  What can we expect if we deal with God the way they dealt with the landowner?
"How shall we escape," Hebrews 2:3 asks, "if we neglect so great a salvation?"

"The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king,” Jesus begins in Matthew 22:2-6, "who gave a wedding feast for his son.
"And he sent out his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding feast, and they were unwilling to come.
"Again he sent out other slaves saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited, "Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fattened livestock are all butchered and everything is ready; come to the wedding feast."'
"But they paid no attention and went their way, one to his own farm, another to his business, and the rest seized his slaves and mistreated them and killed them."
As Jesus relates in the rest of the story, the king was enraged and sent his armies to destroy those who had treated him this way.   Since those who had been invited were not worthy, he sent his servants to the streets and highways to gather all those they could find.
Once more, it is not difficult to grasp the meaning of this parable. The first ones to be invited to the feast are the Jews.   But they turn their backs on God when it is time to establish His kingdom through His Son, so the invitation passes to the Gentiles.
We have to wonder why anyone would refuse this invitation to the wedding feast.  We have to wonder why the Jews would reject God's invitation.  We would never do anything like this, would we?
We would never be guilty of the words in verse 5: "But they paid no attention and went their way, one to his own farm, another to his business."
Just how much time and energy do we devote to knowing, understanding and obeying what the New Testament teaches about the kingdom?  Are we really accepting the invitation?
Something happens during the wedding feast that Jesus feels is important enough to include in the story, so we are not quite through with the parable.
"But when the king came in to look over the dinner guests,” verses 11-13	note, "he saw there a man not dressed in wedding clothes, and he said to him, 'Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?' And he was speechless.
"Then the king said to the servants, 'Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into the outer darkness; in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'"
"For many are called," Jesus concludes in verse 14,  "but few are chosen.
In those days wedding guests were provided with proper clothing when they arrived at the door.  So there was no excuse for what this man did, other than the fact that he wanted to enter the feast on his own terms and not those of the master.
The King is God.  The Son is Jesus and the feast is the kingdom, the church.  What kind of clothing is required to enter the feast?
"For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ," Paul replies in Galatians 3:27.
There are those who tell us that we can enter the feast any way we want to.  All that matters is that we hear the invitation and respond to it.  These are the same as the man who tried to attend without the proper clothing.
"And the Spirit and the bride say, 'Come."' Revelation 22:17 offers. We all have the invitation.  But it is up to us to respond to it in the right way.
False teaching will cause us to wind up in outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.
But the truth will set us free and allow us to take part in the great feast of God.

Unless otherwise noted, "Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE(R), (C) Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977. Used by permission."