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작성일 : 13-05-29 09:05
  [문서자료]  Parable of the tenants (Luke 20:9-19)
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   Parable_of_the_tenants__17.3.2013_.docx (15.7K) [28] DATE : 2013-05-29 09:05:25




Parable of the tenants (Luke 20:9-19)

Introduction
Today’s passage is very often misunderstood to be simply – “if you don’t produce fruits that God is pleased about then we will be perished by God, so God’s people must produce good fruits”. But we know by now that the bible doesn’t teach such simplistic, moral and ethical lessons. There are greater truths focused on the sovereignty of God, His work and His saving grace.
We see today there is a vineyard, and the owner of the vineyard. Then there are farmers looking after the vineyard and servants of the owner who are sent to the vineyard. Then in the end there is the son of the owner who dies at the hands of the tenants.
This parable refers to similar story in Isaiah:
<READ Isaiah 5:1-7>
As you can see the vineyard and the vine trees symbolise the Israel nation. The Israelites in the Old Testament refers to God’s chosen people, the church. So it’ll help to understand the parable today if you think that the vineyard is the church that is chosen before creation and the farmers are the individual believers.
Who owns the vineyard?
As you can see from the passage today, the vineyard is “leased”, and the ownership of the vineyard is not the farmers themselves. That means, the owner of the church is God, and the church derives its value only through its owner, God. Therefore, believers do not own the church. The church is something God has made, and is a dependent being that can be crushed by the owner at any time.
If that is the true identity of the church, then what is the fruit that the church must bear?
The self-denial to confess that “the owner of the church is God, and therefore the church only exists for God’s benefit (that is, God’s glory)” and the fruit of praise in relation to His glory  that’s the fruit the church must produce.
But our desires for taking everything for ourselves does not stop even within the church. So even in the church, we constantly seek our advancement, our profit, our glory. We keep forgetting that the church is something that is leased, something that belongs to God  just like the farmers forget that the vineyard is not theirs and belongs to the owner.

How did this play out in the Old Testament?
In the pretence of worshipping God, they put forward their law keeping, their offerings, that come from their righteousness and their strength. In return they demanded that God gives them salvation of the soul as well as worldly blessings, in terms of restoring their nation Israel and blessing them. All their works was to prove that they deserve to be the chosen nation, they deserve to be special people of God. They deserved to be Israel, meaning they deserved to be the owner and Lord of Israel because they could determine their own destiny/fate…. They deserved to be the owner of the vineyard.
At this time servants of the owner come to them and demand a different kind of fruits than what they are producing. They demanded “repentance”.
But they absolutely cannot repent.
“We are doing so well, why do I need to repent?” In that way, the requests from the prophets demanding the fruit of self-denial, the fruit of recognising the owner’s sovereignty only offended those who were diligently building up their value, so they killed the prophets. So the reason the farmers of the vineyard did not give up their fruits and kill the servants was not because the fruits were so precious to them, but because they didn’t have any fruits to hand over.
The owner
Now the owner is well aware of the antics of the farmers, but he still sends his son anyway. That was bringing about the death of his son himself, but he sends his son anyway.
Isn’t that strange?? The owner is rich and the farmers are not. Shouldn’t the owner have sent some bodyguards at least? It’s clear that it is the owner’s plan to have this happen.

Understanding the parable
There is something interesting about this parable. Normally, all other parables that Jesus spoke could not be understood by those listening to them. But in this particular parable, people understood it:
<READ Luke 20:16, 19>
The mysteries of God can only be understood by His chosen nation.
<READ Matthew 13:10-11>
Then how is it that the teachers of the law and the high priests were able to understand his parable? It’s because this message is aimed at the chosen believers in the church right now, who are still living their walk of faiths for self-glorification, for self-worth and claim, just like the teachers of the law and the Pharisees.
The Pharisees and the teachers of the law who this parable is aimed at, is ME!
Isn’t that true? How about you and me?
The fruits that God wants the church, and wants us to produce is to acknowledge our true first states of being nothing but dust in front of the grace of the cross of Jesus Christ, and produce true fruits of surrender and obedience. But the churches do not exist for the glory of God and for His name. This sort of a vineyard is useless to God  a vineyard that doesn’t even produce the fruits for the owner, what good is that? It is rightful to be thrown away.
<READ Luke 20:15-16>
The vineyard that the farmers who not only produce no fruits that the owner wants, but kills the son who the owner sent to get them - what kind of result should the vineyard face? Isaiah says such vineyard should be crushed, and in Luke it says that such farmers should be killed.

God’s solution
But God comes up with a different outcome for the vineyard and the farmers. That is to build a new vineyard through the stone that the builders rejected:
<READ Luke 20:16-18>
To those people who listen to the parable of the farmers and are saying “no, please don’t allow that to happen”, Jesus is responding with “That’s right, if the destiny of all those unrighteous farmers like you are just to perish, then why would it be recorded that the stone that the builders rejected has become the capstone?”.

Stone the builders rejected
The fallen man who rejected God and wanted to be God by themselves, all build houses, like the tower of Babel in order to increase their worth and value in the world. These houses all represent the “self”. These architects that we are, we all reject the request from the Lord who says “deny your abilities, deny your strength and only depend on the grace of Jesus”, because it hurts our pride. That is why we throw away the stone that the Lord has given to us to build our houses on.
Then we continue to build our houses on sand. Remember last week? What did we say the houses on sand represent? House on myself. House on rock was house on Jesus. We build these houses on sand, houses on ourselves…
What would God do to hose types of houses?
<READ 1 Corinthians 3:10-15>
The house that Jesus himself builds, built on the foundation rock Jesus  that is a true house. This is the true house of grace, a true temple, the true church. God accepts only Jesus.
But see in verse 12, it says if anyone who builds on this foundation adds unnecessary “Gold, silver costly stones, wood, hay or straw” then all these things will be burned up and the believer will suffer loss as a result.
Jesus is the only thing God accepts, because that is the only pure thing. Anything that we add, that comes from our selves, can only harm it.

That is why today’s parable ends with this amazing gospel message:
<READ Luke 20:18>
The very stone of grace that we rejected because we were too busy building our vineyard, building our houses, is going to break the houses in to pieces. Jesus is going to break us, to expose all that unnecessary Gold, Silvefr, wood, hay or straw that we bring. Jesus is going to expose all the stuff that our “selves” bring to the table, and make us see our sin, and break us. So that we’ll be humble, and we’ll cling to the cross of Jesus saying “Lord, we need you, we have no hope without you!”.
And this process of being broken is termed “suffering”, but true believers will be able to give thanks for this suffering because they know it’s grace and a blessing.





 
   
 

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