Listen to the sermon with the player below, or, download the audio.
+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
The State of California reportedly has experienced more than eight-thousand wildfires this season, and some four-million acres are said to have burned. Perhaps notable for us is the fire near Glass Mountain Road that started last Sunday, was fed by gusty winds Monday, and has seriously affected Napa and Sonoma counties and their valuable vineyards (Wikipedia). The cause of the so‑called “Glass Fire” is under investigation, but its threat and damage are self‑evident in photos and video filled with flames and smoke instead of “picturesque wineries and rolling hills” (NPR). Today’s Old Testament Reading (Isaiah 5:1-7), Psalm (Psalm 80:7-19; antiphon: v.7), and Gospel Reading all have their own idyllic depictions of vineyards turned destructive and violent, including enemies burning one by fire. In each case, the vineyard represents God’s people as objects of His love and care, and the damage is caused, in the case of the Old Testament Reading and Psalm, by the people’s unfaithfulness, and, in the case of the Gospel Reading, by the spiritual leaders’ unfaithfulness, which results in their being replaced. This morning we reflect on today’s Gospel Reading, directing our thoughts to the theme “Under New Management”.
You may recall the context for today’s Gospel Reading from last Sunday’s Gospel Reading, in which Jesus answered some Jewish leaders’ question about His authority with a question of His own about John the Baptizer’s authority and Jesus then illustrated their failure to listen to John with a parable about two sons, one of whom did his father’s will by repenting and believing (Matthew 21:23-32). Then, as perhaps the Jewish leaders were trying to get away from Jesus (Lenski, ad loc Matthew 21:33, p.835), He called them to hear another parable, one that both was more devastating than the one before it and moved from their personal failure to repent and believe to their professional failure to fulfill their commitment to God by caring for His people. In both Gospel Readings, the Jewish leaders effectively pronounced their own sentence, and, in the case of today’s Gospel Reading, the Jewish leaders even announced the consequence of that sentence, that is, the change in vineyard “management”. And so, my meditation on the Gospel Reading in preparing for this morning certainly had me considering how I fail to fulfill my professional commitment to God by caring for His people in this place.
But, in today’s Gospel Reading, Jesus did not stop with the impact that the Jewish leaders malfeasance had on them, but Jesus spoke a warning to all of those listening, including each one of you. Jesus brought up two verses from Psalm 118 (Psalm 118:22-23) that seem to identify the Jewish leaders as the builders who reject Jesus as the stone that becomes the cornerstone, and then Jesus’s applied those two verses, warning that one who falls on Him will be broken to pieces and the one on whom He might fall will be crushed. In short, your and my relationship to Jesus, the stone that the builders rejected, matters for eternity.
All of the servants God as the Lord of the Vineyard has sent, sends now, and will ever send, including His Son, have been sent in order to call and so enable both the leaders of His people and the people themselves to repent (for example, 2 Chronicles 24:19). Apart from repentance, on account of our sinful nature and all of our sin, we deserve both death here in time and torment in hell for eternity. But, when we repent, then God forgives us our sinful nature and all of our sin, whatever our sin might be. God forgives us by grace through faith in His Son, Jesus Christ.
One of the ways that Jesus in today’s Gospel Reading moves beyond the Old Testament songs of the vineyard is in depicting the rejection of the Lord of the Vineyard’s Son as the climax of the people and their leaders’ rebellion against their God (Davies and Allison, ad loc Matthew 21:33-40, III:176-177). As the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther suggested in a 15‑38 sermon on today’s Gospel Reading, Jesus not only attacked the Jewish leaders, who He knew wanted to arrest and kill Him, but Jesus arguably also provoked them so that they would not “hold back from their plans” (Luther, AE 68:113). Indeed, Jesus told the parable of today’s Gospel Reading, and a few days later He was crucified. But, the God-man Jesus Christ died on the cross for the sins of the whole world, including your sins and my sins. Jesus died the death we deserved, so that we would not have to die eternally. Out of His great love, the Father sent the Son to be taken, thrown out of the vineyard, and killed, for us. What more was there to do that He has not done? As we heard St. Paul say by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in today’s Epistle Reading (Philippians 3:4b-14), we have the righteousness of God that depends on faith—that is, the righteousness of the now-resurrected Christ’s perfect life and death for us, for the forgiveness of our sins.
The Jewish leaders truly lost their positions caring for God’s people: the care of the Kingdom of God was taken away from them and was not leased but was given to others—others like Jesus’s apostles, and their successors, pastors today. These, as it were, produce the Kingdom’s or Vineyard’s fruits both by reading and preaching God’s Word to groups such as this and by applying the Gospel to individuals with water in Holy Baptism, with the pastor’s touch in Holy Absolution, and with bread and wine in the Sacrament of the Altar that are Christ’s Body and Blood, given and shed for you and for me, for the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. God works through His Word purely preached and His Sacraments rightly administered by that “new management”, not only to forgive our sin and to give us the blessings that go with that forgiveness in a right relationship to Jesus Christ, but also to transform us so that we each produce fruit according to our respective vocations.
Fruit is first mentioned in St. Matthew’s Divinely‑inspired Gospel account by John the Baptizer, calling his hearers to bear fruit in keeping with repentance and warning them that every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 3:8, 10). Similarly, Jesus in His so‑called “Sermon on the Mount” speaks of healthy trees’ bearing good fruit and diseased trees’ bearing bad fruit and being cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 7:17-19). Whether likened to grapes from a vine or to figs or other fruit from a tree, the fruit that God brings forth from Christians is sorrow over sin, trust in God to forgive that sin for Jesus’s sake, and at least the desire to do better, if not also actually beginning to keep God’s Commandments according to our various vocations (confer Galatians 5:22). And yet, even with God’s help, in this world we as Christians still fail to keep those Commandments perfectly, so, with daily sorrow and trust, we live in the forgiveness of sins that we receive from God. And, in turn, we extend our forgiveness to our brothers and sisters in Christ for their sins against us, even as they extend their forgiveness to us for our sins against them.
Despite the photos and videos of the fire-plagued Northern California vineyards that evoke the songs of the seeming past failures of God’s vineyard, as we heard in today’s Gospel Reading, that vineyard is “Under New Management”, and we benefit from that new management. By our Lord of the Vineyard’s Word and Sacraments we abide in Him and He abides in us, and we bear much fruit, prove to be His disciples, and glorify His Father in heaven (John 15:5, 8). In the words of today’s Psalm, He gives us life, and we call upon His Name, now and forever.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +