“A double warning”

By Rev. Michael Stonhouse

Meditation – Monday, June 19, 2023

Luke 20:9-19 (Forward, p. 52) CEV p. 1089

Of course, we must not try to find or assign a meaning to each and every detail of a parable—at least, that it is what Biblical scholars tell us—but it is tempting to do so, especially with today’s parable. We know for certain that the chief priests and teachers of the Law of Moses saw this parable as directed at them, as applying to them. However, it is quite natural for us to try to assign names to the various servants whom the renters, the tenants, rejected and mistreats. Here we could suggest Elijah (Kings 19:10), Zechariah (2 Chronicles 24:21) and Jeremiah (Jeremiah 21:19, 21) for starters, but undoubtedly there are more. And, I guess that such an exercise is not altogether useless or fruitless, for it certainly does give tangible evidence of Israel’s consistent refusal to listen to God’s word, and especially gives evidence of how its leadership was in the habit of doing this as well, and worse, actually persecuting the prophets and putting them to death. And so, the example of the son, who is undoubtedly Jesus, fits right into the pattern.

And so, what is the offence of those renters, other than, of course, their treatment of the servants initially and their penultimate murder of the son? There are two matters of offence. Firstly, they somehow thought that the vineyard was theirs, to do with as they wanted. In fact, they harboured the mistaken thought that should the son and heir be eliminated from the picture, that they would come into the inheritance. So, basically, when it came to the vineyard, God’s kingdom and people no less, they thought they were in charge.

And secondly, and stemming from this first error, they neglected to pay God His due, to give to God what was justly and rightfully His. Now what exactly that was is not spelled out in this passage, so we will have to guess as to what this amounts to, but surely this must include matters like obeying Him, accepting God’s word from the mouth of the prophets, and listening to His Son.

It is of interest, and rather instructive, to take note of the owner’s response through all of this. First, we have to note His great patience. He does not come down ‘like a pile of bricks’ upon their first disobedience and rebellion but gives them another chance—three chances, in fact. But, even so,

these tenants cannot evade the fact that renting the vineyard is their privilege rather than their right, and that, accordingly, they bear some responsibility, not only for their care, and stewardship, in the treatment of the vineyard but also for giving the landlord his due, in this case, his rent. With responsibility, there inevitably comes accountability of some sort.

There is one other thing: the owner does not want his vineyard to be left unattended, fallow, as it were, so he immediately finds some replacement and appoints that person (or persons) to that responsibility. And, in the case of God’s kingdom and people, it is clear from this parable that God is taking this task and responsibility away from its present leaders, the chief priests and teachers of the Law of Moses and giving it to someone else.

Now, here is the sticking point: Christians have historically seen this action from the Father as handing on the authority & responsibility to themselves, to the Church as it were. Undoubtedly, this is true in one way or another, but then we must step back a bit—and be doubly careful in this supposition. For, if God put aside His own people, His chosen people, for their refusal to give Him His due and honour and serve and obey Him, how much more is He liable to do that with us, if we are likewise negligent. I am not suggesting that this would ever happen, but to see this just as a warning, a warning not to ‘sit back on our laurels’ and count everything as just fine anyway. We too must be careful and wise in our stewardship and make sure that God gets His due. Amen.

Forward notes: “When they heard this, they said, ‘Heaven forbid!’” (verse 16b)

“Last week, we looked at the parable of the ten pounds and considered how to glean a main point from the story without needing to make God one of the characters in it.

“With the parable of the wicked tenants, we’re faced with a similar challenge. Is the point of the story that bad stewards cling to power and wealth instead of discharging their duties humbly, recognizing they are not owners but merely stewards? If so, can we fully digest this teaching without associating the proprietor with God? On one hand, the proprietor comes and judges the poor stewards, which would seem right to many hearers. On the other hand, he’s someone who buys a property/business and then takes no active role in it. He steps back and lets his money work for him. He enslaves people and sends them to certain death.

“Herein lies the challenge of Jesus’s use of everyday earthly realities to portray the kingdom of God. The gap between the advent of the kingdom and its full realization is proportional to the gap between the one small aspect of the kingdom that each parable points to and the overall reality that they portray.”

MOVING FORWARD: “What is your takeaway from today’s parable?”

A concluding note or two: contrary to our author’s supposition, there is nothing in the parable to suggest that the landowner is in anyway negligent or cruel or anything like that; nothing to suggest that he ‘enslaves people and sends them to certain death.’ There is nothing to suggest that he is not a normal, law-abiding owner who is well within his rights to expect respect from his tenants and rent when it comes due. And, as for our author’s idea that we interpret the landowner as other than God, the shape of the parable clearly suggests such an interpretation. And indeed, from the reaction of the authorities, it is clear that they see it this way--and themselves as the unfaithful tenants whom God rejects.