THE PARABLE OF THE TENANTS

Matthew 21:33-46
Key Verse: 21:33

    "Listen to another parable: There was a landowner who planted
     a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a winepress in it and
     built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some
     farmers and went away on a journey."

     In the last passage we studied the parable of the two sons. The
second son was compared to the chosen people who said "yes" but did not
carry out their mission. As a result, they could not enter the kingdom
of God. Verse 31b says, "Jesus said to them, I tell you the truth, the
tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God
ahead of you.'" The first son was compared to the tax collectors and
the prostitutes. They were sinners.  But after hearing the good news of
great joy from Jesus, they repented, beating their chests, and they
were, only by the grace of God, accepted into the kingdom of God. We
learned that when we repent all our sins, our Lord Jesus Christ
forgives our sins and gives us the privilege of inheriting the kingdom
of God. Today's passage, with the title, "The Parable of the Tenants,"
is precisely the extension of the parable of the two sons. Here we
learn who God is and who man is. In short, we learn man's relationship
with God.

First, a landowner (33). Look at verse 33. "Listen to another parable:
There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it,
dug a winepress in it and built a watchtower. Then he rented the
vineyard to some farmers and went away on a journey." The phrase at the
beginning of this verse, "Listen to another parable," delineates this
parable as a succession of the parable of the two sons. Jesus was eager
to teach man's relationship with God once more. When we ponder verse 33
carefully we learn that the landowner who planted the vineyard was God.
Here the phrase, "who planted a vineyard," has a deep meaning. Genesis
1:1 says, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."
Again, John 1:1-4 says, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.
Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has
been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men." Isaiah
40:11 says, "He tends his flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs
in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently leads those
that have young." This verse describes God's character. He is like a
shepherd. We have seen many pictures of Jesus who takes young sheep in
his arms and carries them close to his heart. I believe everybody has
seen this kind of picture. Maybe many of you have hung this picture of
Jesus on your wall. Isaiah 40:12-13 says, "Who has measured the waters
in the hollow of his hand, or with the breadth of his hand marked off
the heavens? Who has held the dust of the earth in a basket, or weighed
the mountains on the scales and the hills in a balance? Who has
understood the mind of the Lord, or instructed him as his counselor?"
In these verses we learn that our God is the Almighty Creator God who
can measure the waters in the hollow of his hand, and who has held the
dust of the earth in a bucket and weighed the mountains on his scales.
Therefore, to acknowledge God's existence is most important for all
humankind. Otherwise, we are nothing but the dust of the ground. We
want to maintain this dust of the ground forever.  But it crumbles, and
the wind blows it away. If we do not believe that God is the Creator of
the heavens and the earth, we become worshipers of a monkey. By
worshiping a monkey, we get nothing except several pieces of bananas.
As long as we believe that God is the Creator of man and the world, we
thank God that he has provided all the necessary things for us and even
gave us a glorious mission to join in his world salvation plan.

Second, man is the steward of God's world (33b-34). Verse 33b says,
"Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and went away on a
journey." Here, "the vineyard" refers to the world, and "some farmers"
refers to all mankind.  God created the heavens and the earth and all
the good environmentseven paradiseand rented them to mankind so they
might take care of God's world.  Here we learn that God made us for the
purpose of using us as his tenants. The word "tenants" has a bad
connotation these days. But in the Bible, "tenants" is synonymous with
"stewards." God made the world for his own glory and for the utmost
happiness of man when he stewards God's world. The first man, Adam,
gave names to all the fish in the sea and all the trees on the Rocky
Mountains in Colorado. When we review the story of Abraham, the
ancestor of faith, we learn that God made man to be great and to be a
blessing to himself and to others and finally to all peoples of all
nations. If we refuse to be God's stewards, we become godless people
who can do all kinds of evils and become inventors of evils. Praise God
that he made us the stewards of God's world! The phrase, "and went away
on a journey," tells us that God completely entrusted us with the care
of God's world. Actually, men are nothing but clumps of the dust of the
ground and, in them is the life of God. Without stewardship from God we
are indeed miserable. So Psalm 19:1-4a describes the glory of man's
stewardship. It says, "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies
proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or
language where their voice is not heard. Their voice goes out into all
the earth, their words to the ends of the world." When we meditate on
this psalm, we learn that God is God, and that we are stewards of God's
marvelous world. Ephesians 2:10 says, "For we are God's workmanship,
created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance
for us to do." Paul is more philosophical. So he clearly told us that
we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works,
which God prepared in advance for us to do.

     There are many people who want to do God's work. But they are
badly injured and broken by the evil of the world. So whenever they
want to do God's work and whenever they want to carry out God's
mission, their injuries and scars make them feel unbearably painful, so
painful that they forget about doing the work of God. They become
useless. But at the end of Ephesians 2:10 there is the phrase,
"prepared in advance." For example, Moses received palace training and
next, painful wilderness seminary training for 80 years all together.
Finally, he lost the vocabulary to express himself. His mind was
occupied with the words "a political criminal." But God called him to
liberate his 600,000 slave people in Egypt from the hand of Pharaoh.
Moses suffered much through training. But the training itself became
the strength to deliver his people to the promised land. There was a
girl whose mother divorced her father. So in her young age, her heart
was broken. She became sorrowful, so she cried with her older sister
when the day was sunny. She cried with her older sister when the day
was rainy. She cried when she saw a man who looked like her father. But
through one-to-one Bible study her heart was healed. Soon after, she
married a gentle and generous young man. Now she does not cry. Instead,
she is a mother-like shepherd to many children from broken families.
When we accept the Creator God, our misfortune changes into God's
compassion in our hearts.  When we help the same kind of people who
have had the same kind of misfortune, our souls rejoice in the Lord.
Here we learn that God disciplines us in order to use us to bear much
fruit, and that through much training he heals our wounded souls. When
our wounded souls are healed, there is happiness for each of us.

     Look at verse 34. "When the harvest time approached, he sent his
     servants to the tenants to collect his fruit." This verse doesn't
mean that God wants to collect rent from his tenants like apartment
owners do. Rather, God wants to see if we are stewarding God's world
and living in a way that can bear fruit. Then, what is fruit? "Fruit"
has deep spiritual meaning. Again, we think about Abraham. When God
came to him and gave him promises, God first said, "You will be great
and you will be a blessing." Through this, we learn that fruit is to
become great in the sight of God and to be a blessing.  To be great in
the sight of God means to mature in God. To be a blessing means we are
great and wealthy enough, both materially and spiritually, to be a
blessing to others. If we do not bear fruit we are totally useless to
Godlike firewood.

Third, the illusion of the tenants (34-40). Look at verse 34 again.
"When the harvest time approached, he sent his servants to the tenants
to collect his fruit." Spiritually speaking, "to collect his fruit"
means God wanted to see that they were doing well. Look at verse 35.
"The tenants seized his servants; they beat one, killed another, and
stoned a third." It is totally unbelievable that the tenants treated
God's servants in this way. At first, the tenants recognized that they
were God's tenants. But the vineyard grew larger and larger, and the
fruits were more than abundant. Then they forgot the owner, God. They
had the illusion that the vineyard was their own. Their illusion made
them beat one of God's servants and stone another and kill a third.
They made terrible mistakes. This hallucinative illusion can happen to
anybody or any nation. Many Korean missionaries came to America. They
worked hard for God's vineyard. Soon they were blessed. They became
rich and honorable. Then several of them ran away from God's vineyard
to use their wealth all by themselves. When they ran away from God's
mission, God did not bless them. He loved them and wanted them to
repent. One of the medical doctor missionaries was an
anaesthesiologist. He gave too much anaesthesia to a patient. As a
result, the patient died. So he lost his physician's license. Now he is
running a small grocery store. He has to wake up at 4:30 a.m. and
gather merchandise to sell during the daytime. His work finishes at
10:00 p.m. Another was a very proud medical doctor. When he was blessed
by God, he ran away. Then God gave him two retarded sons.  Later he had
a severe car accident and is now totally crippled. He lives on
government aid. A third one was blessed by God while carrying out God's
mission. But he ran away. Now he has insomnia and a stomach ulcer. He
is existing. But his daily work is not medical work but a boxing match
with his wife. Another of them finished his architecture study with
much subsidy from God's institution. As soon as he graduated he ran
away. Then he got kidney cancer and died after two months. Two medical
missionaries are as proud as Herod the Great. They were dismissed from
their hospitals and are intensively looking for jobs. But they have had
no success. One lady was greatly blessed by God when she was doing
God's work. But when she ran away with hallelujah Christians she had a
car accident, and only her head has been alive for the last seven
years.

     The illusion of the tenants was indeed stupid and suicidal.
     Nevertheless God sent his own Son, believing that they would
respect his Son.  When the tenants saw the son, they said to each
other, "Aha! He is coming!  This is the heir. Come, let's kill him and
take his inheritance" (38). So they took him and threw him out of the
vineyard and killed him. This is an allegorical illustration of Jesus'
crucifixion on the cross. We must be alert not to fall into the
illusion that we made ourselves or that we made the vineyard with our
own ability, and that the vineyard is our own. This is the generation
in which many people say: "This is my life. My children are mine." But
that's sheer illusion. No one is his own self. He is made by God to
work for the glory of God and to be happy in the course of fulfilling
God's mission. His children are not his own. His children are God's
children, entrusted to him for an appointed time. We must tremble
before our children, realizing that they are God's children entrusted
to us, and so we must be a good example to them and a good influence on
them. Anybody who is recognized as a servant of God by his family
members is a great man in the world. Abraham Lincoln was recognized by
his wife as a man of God, so he became a great man in the United States
of America. There are many irresponsible people who do not care for the
children entrusted to them by God. Newsweek magazine concluded about
the Colorado gun-shooting event, "That happened because their parents
did not care for them." These days many parents enjoy worldly pleasure
after work. They are too tired after enjoying worldly pleasure. So they
cannot take care of their children, even though they really want to. It
is tragic. How can we ignore God's children entrusted to us? How can we
break up our families, abandoning our children like oinking piglets?
We should not repeat this kind of sin anymore in this country.

     God's fruits are holiness and gentleness. But during the last
several years, we have had enough headaches because of young kids'
unholiness.  These days we are terrified because of young kids'
violence. Our kids are not studying hard because they are crazy for
dating and gang activities. According to the chemistry of the Bible,
immorality and violence are the beginning point of destruction. We must
pray for our kids to be holy and to be gentle.

Fourth, the rejected stone (41-46). Look at verse 41. "He will bring
those wretches to a wretched end,' they replied, and he will rent the
vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at
harvest time.'" His disciples understood humanly and said, "If he rents
the vineyard to other tenants they will give him his share of the crops
at harvest time. Then it will be okay; it will be no problem." Look at
verse 42. "Jesus said to them, Have you never read in the Scriptures:
"The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone; the Lord has
done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes"?'" This verse describes how
Jesus lamented over those who abandoned God and became godless and
self-centered. Not only so, they made Jesus the rejected stone. They
thought Jesus was not fitting in their blueprint. So they rejected him.
In other words, they crucified Jesus on the cross. But God made the
rejected stone become the capstone; the Lord has done this, and it is
marvelous in our eyes. Those who live in illusion may reject Jesus and
put him far away. But it doesn't work that way. Look at verse 43.
"Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from
you and given to a people who will produce its fruit." Those who
abandon God cannot inherit the kingdom of God. This is really a crucial
matter to anyone who abandons God. In addition, those who fall on the
rejected stone will be broken to pieces. But he on whom it falls will
be crushed. These days relativistic humanists do not honor God as God.
They will not inherit the kingdom of God. It is not a light matter. If
they are not accepted into the kingdom of God, they go to another
place, where Satan lives.

     The chief priests and the Pharisees heard Jesus' parables and they
ground their teeth until they had to go to the dentist. But they were
afraid of the crowd, so they could not arrest Jesus (45-46).

     In today's passage we learn that God created us. God also gave us
the mission to bear much fruit. God also expects us to be great and to
be a blessing.