The Parabole of the Tenant Farmers
Notes
Transcript
CIT: Subject - Who are the rightful members of God’s kingdom? Complement - Not the squatters, but the one’s who recognize the son.
CIS: It’s not about who get’s there first. It’s who about who recognizes Jesus Christ as the Son of God.
SO: Apply - You don’t have to be the first to catch the message (there’s a journey to true faith). You win when you acknowledge the Son.
Intro:
AJ - “Daddy let’s race down the stairs.”/Teaching Tony/ and his reaction
Transistion: Usually those who get there first are the winners and get to make the rules. But Jesus’ message to his advesaries challenged thier perspective.
The Passage of Study
Prayer
Context:
Author: Traditionally written by John Mark (associated with Paul in Acts (13:13) and Peter (1 5:13)
Genre: Gospel
Part of the Synoptics
Very similiar description of the life and message of Jesus.
Parallels Mt. 21:33-46 & Lk. 20:9-19
Purpose: Mark wants to give his readers an accurate account of Jesus and present him as both the messiah of the Jews and the savior of gentiles.
Context: Just entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday/Triumphal Entry
He has preformed a prophetic demonstration by throwing out the money changers in the temple
Curses the fig tree
And his authority has been challenged by the chief priest, scribes, and elders, the cultural and religious leaders of Jerusalem.
; poses a question and recieves a response; explicit ‘will be taken away from you.”
Lk. does not include a detail about the tower; a reaction of surprise by the crowds;
The Story
The Story
1 And he began to speak to them in parables. “A man planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a pit for the winepress and built a tower, and leased it to tenants and went into another country. 2 When the season came, he sent a servant to the tenants to get from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. 3 And they took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. 4 Again he sent to them another servant, and they struck him on the head and treated him shamefully. 5 And he sent another, and him they killed. And so with many others: some they beat, and some they killed. 6 He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ 7 But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ 8 And they took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard.
Exp:
Jesus used paraboles to teach his audience (v.1)
They were a common form of teaching method that First Century Jews would have been accustomed to
They normally used the regular settings and scenarios to teach there lessons.
The point of the lessen would come from an unanticpated/extreme element in the story.
The setting of this parable is a vineyard. It is strikingly similar to an ealier prophecy of Isaiah.
The prophecy has a vineyard with a tower, around the tower has been ‘dug,’ and it would yeild grapes.
Isaiah 5 - The vinyeard is “house of Israel and the men of Judah (7).”
Lk doesn’t include the detail about the tower, while mk and mt do
Jesus’ audience would have known this parable was about the judgement of ancient Judah and drawn the conclusion Jesus was about to say something similar to his opponents.
The people would have recognized the vineyard as a symbold for God’s people and the owner as God.
Jesus accusers will recognize themselves as the evil tenants and will get angry for it.
These tenants were supposed to steward the land for him.
The people also would recognize that servants were God’s messengers, the Old Testament prophets all the way up to John the Baptist, many who were killed and persecuted by the leaders of Israel (v. 2-5)
A difference: God doesn’t leave in Isaiah
The rediculous: he sends his son (v.6)
Here is where Jesus wants his audeinces wheels to start turning. Why would the owner send his son after all this time and his servants had already been treated poorly?
Mt. two groups of servants/Lk. 3 individual servants
Jesus had come to rescue the lost sheep of Israel (Mt. 15:23).
But he was being rejected by them and would be killed (v.7-8).
Ill:
A military man had an aquataince who promised to take care of his house when the military family PCS’ed to the next duty station. The military family agreed and moved. They were shocked to find out that the acquataince had decided to to stay in the home without much for the house. To make matter worse, the state the old house was in had laws that provided squatters rights to tenant because the military family no longer lived in the home. It took the military family several months and lots of court time and money to final get a trashed house back in there possession.
App:
God will reach out to his people even when they are evil and will not listen.
Those people who live in, and even manage, the vineyard are not necessarily God’s people.
Its not about where they live or there ethnicity.
They think they have a right to the people and the land and will even plot to kill the rightful owners.
Is there anything in our hearts that is God’s but we beleive is our own? We we will even kill that which would threaten it?
Life/Family/Goals/Careers/Dreams? - Let’s make sure we are recognizing God’s plan for our lives instead of our own.
9 What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others. 10 Have you not read this Scripture:
“ ‘The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
11 this was the Lord’s doing,
and it is marvelous in our eyes’?”
12 And they were seeking to arrest him but feared the people, for they perceived that he had told the parable against them. So they left him and went away.
Exp:
The owner comes and destroys the vineyard and tenants? - No, just the tenants (v.9).
He will give the leadership of God’s people to others.
Vs. 10-11 referecences another scripture Ps. 118
A portion of this psalm (v.26) is what the people said ealeir when Jesus entered Jerusalem (11:9).
This PS is attributted to King David, he was understood have been rejected but later vindicated by the establishment.
Jesus is now taking over the methaphor of the stone/cornerstone.
The powers will reject/kill Jesus, but that will become the key to God’s rescue operation of his people.
There wasn’t any doubt in the chief priest, scribes, and elder’s minds, Jesus was calling them out as the evil tenant farmers.
App:
Dover Chapel, are you a part of God’s vineyard?
Jesus Christ is the foundation of our faith. You are a part God’s vineyard.
He judges those who mistreat his people
He reaches out to his people
He was rejected and killed on his people’s behalf.
He became our marvelous foundation as a result.
So you don’t have to be the first to understand the Gospel to get in. But you do have to acknowledge.
Do you know Jesus Christ?
Response:
Seeker: You don’t have to be first, take the journey to faith that God has you on.
Beleiver: You do have to acknowledge the Son/ Remember that we are tenants not squatters: we must submit our will to his, lest we fall. The Spirit who resurected Jesus can help us. Let’s ask for his help in worship to acknowledge God and submit to his will.