The Parable of the Tenants

0:00 · [music] Sorry, that's my fault. I turned that microphone on too early.

0:14 · Yeah, got to be waking woken up.

0:20 · That's true. Well, good morning. My name is Ken Strowmire. I'm sure you woke up with that squaltch in your ears.

0:27 · Um, it's an honor and a privilege to be here with you guys this morning. Pastor GJ DJ and his family are on vacation and he asked me to to share the word with you this morning. So, let's open up in a word of prayer. Father, we praise you for this morning, a chance to gather for worship and fellowship. We ask that you be with Pastor DJ and his family as they are traveling home today and be with others who could not join us this morning.

0:56 · Amen. Amen.

0:59 · Well, we're continuing our study in the parables. This morning, we move on to a a different area of Jesus's life. Um, we're going to be in Matthew chap 21. The parable is in in verse 33. That's where it starts. But, um, chapter 21 kind of sets the stage for us. So, as we're going through it, I'll share a few other verses from Matthew 21.

1:31 · But this, like I said, starts a different era in or the last week of Jesus's ministry. It's the triumphal triumphant in entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem where he's on the donkey where they're singing hosana, hosana. That's covered in chapter 21:es 1- 11. And the rest of Matthew, the rest of the book takes place in this last week of Jesus's life here on earth. So from his triumphal entry to his death and resurrection covered in Matthew 21.

2:14 · So if you haven't already, turn your Bibles to Matthew 21 and we'll set the scene before we get there. And if you don't have a Bible, there's one in the seat in front of you. And as Pastor DJ likes to say, take it, mark it, and make it yours.

2:34 · All right. So, while you're looking for that, let me set the stage of what's going on. Like I said, verses 1- 11 talk about Jesus's triumphal entry into Jerusalem. He rode in on a donkey to fulfill prophecy. They're shouting hosana to fulfill prophecy. And then he moves into the temple.

3:00 · What's the first thing he does in the temple?

3:04 · Verse 12 and 13, he turns over the money changers tables and he says, "My house will be a house of prayer." And then once he's done that, he's turned over the tables and he's kicked out the those selling the doves. The blind and the lame are coming to him and he's healing them.

3:29 · And then let me read verses 15 and 16 to you. When the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonders that he did and the children shouting in the temple complex, "Hosana to the son of David," they became indignant and said to him, "Do you hear what these children are saying?" Jesus responded, "Yes, have you never read? Out of the mouth of infants and nursing babies, you have prepared praise for yourself."

4:02 · Now, indignant, I love words. So, indignant means that you become angry for a perceived wrong. And that's kind of what the the religious leaders did, right? It's a perceived wrong that these children are praising Jesus. What? Why did they become, if you notice, they didn't become indignant until the children started praising Jesus.

4:35 · So, here's the city. They they saw the money changers turned over and they said, "Well, that's all right. We'll just set them up and maybe we can make another profit, more profit." And they they saw the people, the lame, the blind and the lame coming to him to get healed. And they said, "That's great. Look, he's doing that in the temple. That makes us look good.

4:57 · But then the children started saying, "Hosana, hosana to the son of David, giving Jesus praise." They said, "Wait a minute. That shouldn't be happening. We should get the glory. We should get the praise from this." So that's why they came. And and and so they became indignant. And Jesus said, you know, of course they're singing my praises. And verse 17 says, then he left.

5:31 · That's like the ultimate mic drop. He says, "Yes, I am God." And drops the mic and walks out. He claimed to be God. When he says, "My house," he took God's house as his own. "My house will be a house of prayer." And then he said um when they became indignant about the kids he said haven't you read they will sing my praises.

5:56 · I have made it so they can sing my praises. So he claims to be God and then he just drops the mic and walks out. He says he left. Well he came back the next day and he was teaching in the temple. This is verse 23.

6:15 · The religious leaders came to confront him again and they said, "By what authority do you do these things and who gave you that authority?"

6:28 · Well, Jesus says, "I'll answer your question if you answer my question." And he says, "Um, John's baptism, is it from heaven or from man?"

6:42 · Well, if you read the story, the the religious leaders, they get together and start talking about that and they say, "If we say that it's from heaven, he'll ask,"Well, why didn't you believe me?

6:54 · And if we say it's from man, then all the people will be after us because they think he's a prophet." So, they went to Jesus and said, "We don't know." And Jesus said, 'Well, if you won't answer my question, I'm not going to answer yours. And that brings us to verse 28.

7:15 · Jesus said to him, to them, the religious leaders, he said, "What do you think?" And he launches into this little parable. He says, "A father had two sons. The first one, he goes and says, go work in my vineyard." And the son says, "No, I won't do it." But later changes his mind and goes and works in the vineyard. The second son, he goes and says the same thing, "Go work in my vineyard."

7:46 · And that son says, "Oh yes, yes, I will."

7:49 · But never does.

7:52 · So then Jesus asks the religious leaders, "Which one did the will of the father?

8:02 · And the religious leaders said, "Well, the first, the one that actually did the work." And so Jesus responds and says, "Truly I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes will get into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him. But the tax collectors and prostitutes did believe them. and you seeing that they believed would not change your mind.

8:35 · And that's where we get to today's passage. So stand with me if you will and we will read Matthew 21 33- 46. And I had it marked first service and took the marker out forgetting that I had to have it for this service. All right. Matthew 21 verse 33. Listen to another parable. There was a man, a landowner, who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a watchtowwer.

9:28 · He leased it to the to tenant farmers, and went away. When the grape harvest drew near, he sent his slaves to the farmers to collect his fruit. But the farmers took the slaves, beat one, killed another, and stoned a third.

9:44 · Again he sent other slaves more than the first group and they did the same thing to them. Finally he sent his son to them. They will respect my son. He said but when the tenant farmers saw the son they said among themselves this is the heir. Come let's kill him and take his inheritance. So they seized him threw him out of the vineyard and [music] killed him. Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those farmers?

10:18 · Verse 41, he will completely destroy those terrible men, they told him, and lease his vineyard to other farmers who will give him his produce at the harvest. Jesus said to them, "Have you never read in the scriptures? The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This came from the Lord and is wonderful in our eyes.

10:41 · Therefore, I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing its fruit.

10:49 · Whoever falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, but on whomever it falls, it will be it will grind him to powder. When the chief priests heard this and the Pharisees heard these parables, they knew he was speaking about them. Although they were looking for a way to arrest him, they feared the crowds because they regarded him as a prophet.

11:17 · Father, thank you for your word. Help me to communicate the message you would have this morning. Help us apply it to our lives in Jesus' name. Amen. So, first of all, I want to take a moment to discuss what those tenant farmers are.

11:35 · Someone came up to me this last week and said, "Well, what's a tenant farmer?"

11:41 · And I was shocked. So, you don't know what a tenant farmer is? And then I realized, well, that's not really a normal thing for us in today's society. So, I'm kind of in a position where I can talk to it. My parents grew up in eastern Colorado. They were um my dad was a um daylight. Sorry, I just lost the word. Hold on.

12:15 · My dad was a hired hand. He worked for different people on a regular basis. He would go work for someone for the planting of the seeds and then he'd be work for somebody else for the planting or for the harvesting. He was a hired hand. Uh my mom was what was called a sharecropper's daughter, which means that they did not own the land that they were on. Somebody else's property. Somebody else gave them a house on the the property to live in while my mom's dad worked the farm.

12:48 · They gave him everything he needed, the tractors, the seed, everything he needed to make the pro the the farm successful.

13:00 · And that's what Jesus is talking about when he talks about the tenant farmer is somebody who lived on the land, worked the land. At the end of harvest season, they sold the crop, the farmer kept what he needed to live on, and the rest went back to the owner. So when Jesus was writing most of his parables, he uses examples from from farm life because that's what people would know at this point at at this time.

13:34 · So let's look at how the religious leaders would interpret this parable.

13:41 · So let's um let's read verses 33 to 36 again. says, "There was a man, a landowner, who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a watchtowwer. He leased it to the tenant farmers, and went away. When the grape harvest grew near, he sent his slaves to the farmers to collect his fruit. But the farmers took his slaves, beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. Again, he sent other slaves, more than the first group, and they did the same."

14:13 · So as we look at how these religious leaders would have viewed this parable, they would have correctly determined that the the landowner is God. They had heard enough about um a vineyard.

14:32 · In the Old Testament, Isaiah 5 talks about the vineyard being built and they would relate that to Israel. So the landowner is God. They would have related the vineyard to Israel. And they would have rightly said, "Oh, those guys, those messengers, the ones that came to get the the fruit, those are the prophets from the Old Testament, the messengers that God sent to his people to say, "Hey, you know, you're doing it wrong."

15:03 · But then who would they have thought the tenant farmers were?

15:12 · They would have thought it was the Romans because the Romans had come in and taken over Israel and were doing whatever they wanted with God's property. So they thought they would have put um the Romans as the 10-in farmers. Verse 37 and 39 says, "Finally, he sent his son to them. They will respect my son," he said. But the tenant farmers said, "Let us take him outside the gates and kill him."

15:48 · So maybe they saw themselves as the son, God's children, his son to to say, "We are the last chance for the Romans. We are the last chance for the us to take back the kingdom of God. And that didn't happen, right? They killed him.

16:08 · So what was their pronouncement?

16:12 · He said said we should he will completely destroy those terrible men and give the vineyard to another people who will provide him his produce at the harvest. So they thought in their minds that God would send the Messiah to kick out the Romans and reestablish the religious leaders as those above are in control of of Israel. That's what they thought. Jesus tells them he has correctly pronounced judgment on the tenant farmers.

16:54 · And then he tells them, "But you incorrectly identified the tenant farmers." He says in verse 42, "Have you never read in the scriptures, the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone? This is a what the Lord has done, and it is marvelous in our eyes." Well, we just sang a song, Christ alone, cornerstone.

17:26 · How many just sang the words not knowing what cornerstone meant?

17:32 · You know, sometimes we do that. Well, let's talk about that cornerstone for a second. The cornerstone comes from the world of masonry where they set the cornerstone and built everything else around it.

17:49 · That cornerstone was the most important piece of the building. It's what everything else was lined up with and it supported the structure. Well, if if we look at that and we think, well, how does that apply to us today?

18:04 · In everyday language, a cornerstone represents the fundamental basis or core principle of a concept, strategy or system. So Jesus is telling him, I'm the cornerstone. You don't know what you're doing. You rejected that and so you will lose the kingdom.

18:28 · Verse 43, Jesus expands on the meaning of the vineyard. It's no longer refused to Israel, but to God's kingdom. Jesus took away from a small group of people, the religious leaders, and will give it to a new group, new people. So in in the version that we read the the word used for nation is ethos which means people a better translation is people. So it's not another nation it's a people.

19:01 · And that brings us to what DJ likes to call the parabolic principle. We are the new people that are entrusted with the kingdom. 1 Peter 2:9 says, "But you are a chosen family, a royal priesthood, a holy people, a people for God's own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous life. You have been chosen by God to be his family with direct access to him."

19:37 · That's what it means to be a priest. you have direct access to him and have been given freedom to live apart from the world.

19:50 · Well, let's take a little closer look at that vineyard for a second and that will give us our first application point, which is God has given us everything we need to be righteous and holy. Are we squandering it?

20:05 · If you look at the the vineyard, the owner planted it, put protection around it with the the fence and the wall, the and the tower.

20:16 · It gave them everything they needed to produce the fruit, the wine press, the vines, everything they needed. They just had to take care of it and produce the fruit. Second Peter 1 2 and 3 says, "Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the full knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, seeing that his divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness through the full knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and excellence."

20:49 · So there's two parts to that. The first part is what has he given us and the second part is to what end?

20:59 · Well, let's look at the word that he uses. He says, "Has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness." So, let's look at that everything first.

21:13 · So, let's say I I tell you I want you to bake me a cake and I say, "Here's everything that you need to bake that cake." Everything you need. They say, "Well, I need a little more flour." I said, "Everything." Well, I need some some vanilla. Everything. Everything is there. That's what it means. Everything. You don't need anything else to bake this cake. Everything.

21:40 · Um, and then we look at that word. He says, "It has been granted to us. I have granted you everything you need to do that cake.

21:51 · What do you have to do?"

21:54 · You have to bake the cake, right? Just because you have the ingredients doesn't mean you have a cake. You have to make the cake. Well, if we look at that and he says he has granted us everything to p pertaining to life and godliness. Well, what is that everything? What has he given us? He's given us the Bible.

22:16 · Everything.

22:18 · The Holy Spirit, the church, the family of God. Look around you. We are all on the same path growing in godliness. We need each other to do that. So that's the first part. What has he given us? Everything. We are lacking in nothing. We just have to do it. Build build it. Make that cake.

22:47 · The second half of that is to what end?

22:54 · And the second, the Westminster catechism answers that in its first question. And that first question is, what is the sole purpose of man? Why are we here?

23:08 · 1 Corinthians 10:31-33.

23:10 · So whatever, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do everything to the glory of God. Give no offense to anyone inside or outside the church of God.

23:23 · Just as I also, and this is Paul speaking, try to please everyone and everything, not seeking my own benefit, but the benefit of many, so that they may be saved. So, it's kind of a dual purpose, right? It's to give glory to God and then share his his love with others. There's dual purpose there. Give glory to God, share his love with others. So, it's kind of like we answer we ask the question, well, I'm saved.

23:56 · Why am I still here?

23:58 · Well, now you know, if it was just to be saved, I could go to heaven today. But there's another purpose. To bring glory to him and to share his love with others. Romans 11:36 says, "For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. To him be the glory forever. Um which leads us to our next application which is Jesus expects that we know the scriptures.

24:36 · Verse 13, chapter 21:3 it is written.

24:41 · Verse 16, have you never read?

24:44 · Verse 33 quotes Isaiah chapter 5 about the vineyard being built. The religious leaders would have known that. Verse 42 said, "Did you never read?" He expects them to know the scriptures. He expects us to know the scriptures. But it's not enough just to know them. It's not enough to repeat, to memorize. The religious leaders knew the scriptures, right? The problem was they used them for their purposes, their power, their control, their prestige.

25:22 · And as we've already read, Romans 11:36 says, "For from him and through him and to him are all things to him be the glory forever." So we go back um 1 Peter 2:1 and 2 says, "Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, all hypocrisy and envy, and all slander, like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation."

25:56 · New baby wants milk. It's all they care about. And what happens? They get that and they just start growing, right? It's the same for us. We take in that milk like a baby, just feeding off of it and feeding off of it and it'll help us grow in respect to salvation. Ephesians 4 tells us that we should be not tossed around by every wind of doctrine that comes along. That we can avoid those bad doctrines in every scheme of mankind.

26:30 · What's it talking about there? It's talking about those false believer, false teachers that come in and say, "Oh, here's this scripture. I'm going to sp build a whole theology off of that one scripture, and you should believe me."

26:46 · Well, Jesus is saying here, I expect you to know my scriptures. Does that match?

26:52 · All scripture interprets itself. Does that match what we're talking about?

27:00 · Now, all of this is good. We're talking about Jesus and everything, but what really come comes down to is point number three.

27:12 · What is your response to the cornerstone?

27:18 · There's a decision to make. That decision is what will your response be to the cornerstone?

27:25 · That is Jesus. He's offered his life as a payment for our sins. We have committed. He has offered eternal life to those who trust and follow him. He is the core principle, the foundation, fundamental basis for all of life.

27:51 · What is your choice? Romans 11:36, for from him and through him, and to him are all things. To him be the glory. Will you meet Jesus and fall on the cornerstone, the rock of ages? Will you meet with Jesus and repent and follow him? Or will you be like the religious leaders in the parable and completely reject him?

28:18 · 1 Peter 2 6-9. Behold, I lay in Zion a choice stone, a precious cornerstone, and he who believes upon him will not be put to shame. This precious value then is for you who believe. But for those who disbelieve, the stone which the builders rejected, this has become the chief cornerstone and the stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. They stumble because they are disobedient to the word.

28:49 · If you've not made a decision to follow Jesus, please talk to me afterwards or some of those around you. We would love to share Jesus's love with you. Um, now for those of us who claim to follow Jesus, let's look at that parabolic truth again.

29:13 · We are the new people that are entrusted with the kingdom of God. He has taken it away from the Jewish leaders who were not producing the fruit that he wanted the the people to follow him and he's given it to us. We are the new people.

29:35 · 1 Peter 2:9 and 10. But you are a chosen family, a royal priesthood, a holy people, a people for God's own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God. You had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

30:05 · My question to you is, do you live like that?

30:09 · Do you live like that?

30:14 · If not, what's the first step you need to take?

30:21 · If we look at second Peter 1 2 and 3 again, it says, "Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the full knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. seeing that his divine power has granted us everything pertaining to life and godliness through the full knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and excellence. Where do we find that? Does the word of God permeate your life?

30:52 · Where do we find everything that God wants us to know is in here? How well do we know this? How much time do we spend in the thing that can give us oh I don't know everything pertaining to life and godliness. Crossurch has several Bible studies that go on throughout the week and we'll start more as school starts soon.

31:26 · Are you taking part of that? Come join us. Join us in growing in grace and godliness. That's what we're all about in our Bible studies. Growing in grace and godliness. He has given everything we need. Come study it with us and grow with us. At this point, I want to invite the worship team back up.

31:53 · If you don't know the Bible studies that are happening, we have them posted out back. You can talk to some of us. We can we can guide you in the right place.

32:03 · Let's pray.

32:06 · Father, thank you. Thank you that you have chosen us to be a part of your kingdom plan. You have given us everything we need for life and godliness. You have sent us the helper, the Holy Spirit, to guide and grow us. Help us live to our potential for your glory and not ours in Jesus name. Amen.

32:37 · [music]