Pentecost 19: Wicked Tenants, Wicked God

“Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given
to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom.”

We haven’t had sweet Gospel stories lately, have we?
This parable that Jesus tells today is a hard one to wrap our heads around--
Its hard to understand what Jesus is getting at.

But I think what Jesus is getting at, is the larger story of salvation history,
all the way up until Jesus’ time,
and the confrontation between himself, and the religious leadership of his day.

As it says at the end of the passage,
“When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they realized that
he was speaking about them.”

Using another parable about God’s vineyard,
Jesus likens the religious leaders of his time to the wicked tenants, who beat,
stone, and kill the land owners slaves.

And ultimately, Jesus foretells of his own death,
As the wicked tenants in the parable also kill the landowners son.

No doubt those leaders felt threatened and angry:
And decided to arrest Jesus.
But they had to wait for the time to be right, because they were afraid of
resistance from Jesus’ followers.

And we know what happens next:
Jesus’ betrayal and arrest,
His trial and crucifixion,
All followed by the resurrection that began a whole new relationship between
God and humanity.

It’s a story that we already know,
Even if it’s hard for us to initially figure out what’s going on and who’s who in the
parable.
So let’s sum it up:
God the landowner has a vineyard: And the vineyard represents the people of
Israel.

God leases the vineyard to tenant farmers, who are the Jewish religious leaders.
When the time is right, the landowner sends his slaves, who are the old testament
prophets to collect the produce of the vineyard.
The religious leader tenants beat, stone and kill the prophets,
And eventually even kill the landowners only Son, Jesus.

In the end, the landowner takes the vineyard away from the tenant farmers,
He puts them to a miserable death, and leases the vineyard to a new people,
People who are not just the Israelites,
but all those who follow Jesus, and produce the fruit of God’s kingdom.

Once we understand who is who in the story,
It’s a nice enough story, as long as we are the ones who are producing fruit.

It’s not so nice if we’re the tenants:
The tenants who failed to give God his due,
And suffered a miserable death,
Losing all they had hoped to gain for refusing to pay their fair rent,

Not giving God the landowner what he deserved.

The hard reality is that sometimes we ARE like the tenants.
Sometimes we shy away from what Jesus would have us do.
Sometimes we are selfish.
Sometimes we participate in violence.
Sometimes we refuse to share the fruits of the vineyard.
Sometimes we fail to respond lovingly to the gifts of God’s creation that envelop
our lives.

How can we face the seeming inconsistency of knowing God as loving, gracious,
and all giving on the one hand,
And on the other--
Seeing God as judging and punishing?
Do wicked tenants make for a wicked god?

In order to answer that question,
We have to start with the fact that God initiates the relationship with US.
Not the other way around.
(Remember God’s invitation to the vineyard in last week’s parable?)

God calls us to be in unity with God and all people.
God’s reaching out to us is best understood as his giving us everything we have--
With no strings attached:
And without our deserving it.
Without our having done anything to gain it.

Our collect for today puts it well,
That God always wants to give more than we either DESIRE or DESERVE.

Despite this,
Jesus made it clear that we are the most precious beings in all creation:
So valuable,
That we are worth dying for.

We don’t have to earn God’s love:
It’s given freely.
So why would a loving God put us to a miserable death?

Maybe it’s not God:
But we who might choose that for ourselves.

The wicked tenants received all they needed from the landowner,
But they refused to accept his graciousness.
They turned their backs on him, his servants, and even his son.
And they were given multiple opportunities to try again.
They weren’t even cast out the first time that they participated in violence,
But instead, it wasn’t until the THIRD time.

By their actions and inactions,
They cast themselves out of the vineyard.
One could even say its similar to the way that Adam and Eve’s disobedience
resulted in their loss of the benefits of the Garden of Eden.

The miserable death we might experience can only result from our failure to
accept the gifts of God,
And respond to them in thanksgiving,
Again and again and again.

The miserable death can only result from our selfishly acting as if the vineyard is
all ours--
Or should be all ours and no one else’s, let alone God’s,
And doing so again, and again, and again.

We have the capability to cast ourselves out of God’s vineyard:
Producing a self-inflicted kind of misery,
That we alone can create.

Today’s Gospel is not a story about a vengeful wicked God.
It’s a warning for us about what we can miss out on if we act like the wicked
tenants.
It reminds us that God gives us more than we either deserve or DESIRE.
It’s like the words to the famous doxology:
“Praise God from whom all blessings flow.”
Praise God who freely gives us more than we deserve or desire.

And what we have is not ours to own,
But is on loan from God.

We need to remember that God’s way of grace and love is wooing us to respond
to our good fortune,
Of living in his vineyard,
By reflecting that love in our actions toward others.
And remembering that we have been blessed, in order to be a blessing.

God has already set up the vineyard for us.
And it’s more than we deserve,
More than we can even desire.

But it remains God’s vineyard.
We can share it,
Or we can try to hoard it for ourselves.
We can stay,
Or we can go.

God has already acted.
The next choice is ours.
Amen.