Then he leased it to tenant farmers and left on a journey.
At the proper time he sent a servant to the tenants
to obtain from them some of the produce of the vineyard.
How quickly we forget that everything we have and even everything that we are is only leased to us! We begin the treat our talents as though they were earned, our possessions as though they were our own creations, and even ourselves as though we were the ones holding ourselves in existence from moment to moment. No doubt the tenant farmers had been doing what they considered to be actual work on the property for so long that it didn't seem fair to them that another would, from so great a distance, demand the fruit of those efforts. Because they had been exerting themselves they came to gradually regard themselves more as in charge, more and more as owners rather than tenants. But God would have us know that even our efforts are not truly something for which we alone can take credit. All is predicated on the gift of grace. And we must therefore not hold back the fruit of his gift when he comes to ask it of us.
At the proper time he sent a servant to the tenants
to obtain from them some of the produce of the vineyard.
But they seized him, beat him,
and sent him away empty-handed.
The vineyard owner could have immediate resulted to violence from the moment his servants were beaten and sent away empty-handed. But he did not. He tried again and again to persuade rather than coerce. But this seemed rather to have the opposite effect, eliciting, not the fruit, but hardness of heart and an ever escalating response of violence from the tenants. How can it be that God's demonstrations of patience and mercy can meet with such a response? This can only be because of the mystery of sin which causes us to wildly and desperately try to protect what we imagine to be our own sphere of autonomy and independence. Our egos tend to fight desperately for dear life, to keep their walls strong and imporous against any intrusion. Questions like what we owe to God or what would be the best use of the fruit of our vineyard must not even be considered if we are to remain safely ensconced within, seated on the throne of our lives.
He had one other to send, a beloved son.
He sent him to them last of all, thinking, 'They will respect my son.'
The depths of love demonstrated by the owner sending his son to such a hive of violent miscreants is difficult to fathom. It wasn't as though he had been coming closer and closer to success in his diplomatic efforts and thought one final push of sincerity would do the trick. He must in fact have known that his son would be at risk. But he spoke, not of what was likely, but what he desired in the depths of his heart: "They will respect my son". Yet that they did not do so was not the end of the story. The landowner was wiser than to place all his hope on the success of that plan. In fact, even the violence which it was said the landowner would visit on the tenants was not necessarily the last word on their fate. For the tenants were in fact those who heard this parable of Jesus. And they were still standing there free and capable of repentance. Even the fact that the parable itself seemed only to confirm them in their role as tenants attempting to seize the son was not necessarily the end of the story. It may eventually have been the case that they were able to recognize not only that the parable was addressed to them but that it really did reflect on something evil within their hearts. Perhaps they might have been among those to look upon him whom they had pierced and repented.
they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn (see Zechariah 12:10).
If we look around us at our homes and possessions, or consider our schedules, or ponder the different abilities we have have been given, do we remember that these are all elements of the vineyard gifted to us by the landowner in order to produce his fruit? Why is it that we so often try to hoard that which only has value when it is shared?
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law (see Galatians 5:22-23).
God has given us "everything that makes for life and devotion" by "his own glory and power" so that we possess the "precious and very great promises" designed to bring us to share even in the divine nature itself. This divine nature, the essence of God himself, is a good that is always diffusive of itself, and a love which always seeks to share itself with others. For this reason we must make every effort to avoid the path of the hostile tenants and instead seek to follow the guidance of Peter.
For this very reason,
make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue,
virtue with knowledge, knowledge with self-control,
self-control with endurance, endurance with devotion,
devotion with mutual affection, mutual affection with love.
No comments:
Post a Comment