July 28, 2013
Scripture:
Hymn 335 - I’m so glad that our father Prayer,
We’ve been looking at the stories which Jesus told, which are called parables. The last two parables have had vineyards in them and today’s parable will also have a vineyard. It is a lot of work to keep up a vineyard. You need to build trellises for the vines and then train them to grow up it. Farmers would do all this work, because of the fruit and profit that come for it. Jesus told so many vineyard stories because, it was a picture of Israel, God’s chosen people, and also it’s a picture of his church today.
Matthew 21:33-41
A householder is a man that owns many houses. This householder built a vineyard. He planted the grapes and then he also planted a hedge around it so that no animals could get to them. Finally he rented it out to farmers. The rent he got paid was some of the fruit from the vineyard. God had left the Levites and the elders in charge of the Israelites. They were to take care of the people’s problems.
Our householder lived in another country, so he sent some servant’s to collect the rent. The farmers beat some and others they killed. The servant’s that God sent to his people were the prophets and they were not treated nicely. Finally the householder sent his son. He thought that they would respect him, but it was no different, they killed him too.
This parable was very telling to those who were like the farmer. Like the farmer in our story Israel had the vineyard taken away. Today the famers are Christian’s and sad to say it is not much better. The thing that the Lord wants to see is fruit, like love, joy and peace.