The Parable of the Evil Vinedressers

And the Bible is filled with mysteries and parts that many times we overlook. We don't give it sufficient attention, as is the case of the message for today. Because Jesus Christ once gave a remarkable parable, one that not only describes what He was going through, but also about His death, about what was going to happen as far as a judgment over that nation. But amazingly, that parable actually extends out to our days and even beyond. How do you like that? For just one short story to describe what was happening in His day, what was going to happen to Him and the Jewish nation. And then He goes and explains what would happen after that, all the way to His second return upon the earth. Now I'd like to start with an imaginary story. Suppose everyone here was a wealthy king or queen upon this earth, and you had extensive territories that you governed, and basically you ruled and decided upon what to do. And so, as a token of appreciation, you wanted to do something for your people. And tucked away beyond the mountain ranges, there was this beautiful valley, a large, beautiful valley that had not really been developed at all. And so, this king or the queen, because we've had kings or queens, like right now, we have in England Elizabeth II, and certainly Elizabeth I, who was the one that was involved in basically defeating the Spanish armada back in the 1580s. And so, we've had competent queens as well as kings, and so, whether you're a man or a woman, you could be in this place, where you have people that you are governing over. And so, you wanted to make this special gesture, and so you said, well, now that we have all of this prosperity and we've been able to develop things, I want to take that valley that's hidden away, and I want to create this beautiful environment. And so, the king ordered, or the queen, to go ahead and build on one extreme, one end of this valley, this large dam. So then, the water would fill up, and you could provide the necessary water, but protect it from any difficulties of overflowing too much into the valley. Also, you developed the hydroelectric power to give them electricity, and this valley had forests and fertile grounds, and so you built nice roads through it. He built up all the infrastructure for people to really enjoy, and then he invited the people who wanted to live there that they could come and settle and develop that land. And so, they did, and since it was a very fertile area, pretty soon they started producing more food and exporting it out of the valley, and became a very prosperous place. And then, their children grew up. Well, they had known this place from birth, and so they took it for granted, and they thought, well, everybody lives like we do. And they became spoiled because of the easy wealth that they acquired. And so, the youth growing up felt, well, it's kind of boring here. We got all this money. We don't really have too many places to invest it. And so, pretty soon, they started having gambling saloons, houses of prostitution, started buying illegal drugs, and sure enough, venereal disease started becoming a big problem. There was corruption in the government. Sexual perversion was being permitted everywhere, and crime. And you, as a king or queen, are quite concerned because this is not what you wanted this valley to become. It was supposed to be a model for the rest of the nation, whereas now it had become perverted, filled with evil, and so he sent his representatives into the valley, saying, the king or the queen were not happy that they better get their act together and quit corrupting themselves. Well, these representatives were not respected. They were booted out. And so, the king said to his son, the prince, go there and warn the people. There are going to be consequences to you perverting and destroying this beautiful valley that we have given to you.

Sadly, when the prince tried to get them to change their ways, he was killed. And then, as the children grew up even more, they became more defiant. They began to arm themselves and kill any representatives who were sent. Eventually, the perversion started spreading outside the region and contaminating the whole country. And so, finally, you decide the only way to end the rot is to destroy the place. And so, first, you round up. The few righteous people and families left. They left the valley. And then, you had the dam blown up. The valley was flooded, and all the inhabitants drowned. And the country returned back to its normal self. Now, this reminds us of what happened to Sodom. What were the underlying causes of the perversions in Sodom? Let's go to Ezekiel 16. Ezekiel 16, verse 49, tells us what happened.

God describes in verse 49, He says, Look, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom. She and her daughter, talking about Gomorrah, had pride. So when things are easy for you, things are prospering, things are all going well. The perversion usually has a high opinion of himself. Fullness of food, there was abundance there in Sodom. And abundance of idleness, so much food was being produced that people didn't have to work in the fields the whole day. So they had free time, especially the weekends. Idleness. Neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and the needy. They were about themselves. Give me the money, let me spend it on my own things. I don't care about the poor. Let them worry about themselves. Let the government take care of them, in a sense they were sane, and did not strengthen the hand of the poor and the needy. And they were a hottie, again, that's a characteristic of pride. They committed abomination before me. They perverted their sexuality, which is one of the final manifestations of that pride and independence and rebellious spirit. I'm going to do things my own way. I'm going to look how I like to look. I'm going to do the things I want to do, even if they go against God's laws. Therefore, I took them away as I saw fit. God intervened. Of course, this story also reminds us of the flood in Noah's day. Let's go to Genesis 6, verse 11. Genesis 6, verse 11. Same pattern as Sodom and Gomorrah. This was even before that. In Genesis 6, verse 11, it says, The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. This is not what God created this beautiful earth to become, but it did. People took this earth and started doing things their way, abusing, taking advantage, doing violence. Of course, most violence has to do with breaking the eighth commandment, about lying and then stealing, because when you want something that somebody else has, and they don't want to give it to you, people resort to violence. Verse 12. So God looked upon the earth, and indeed it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. Other translations have His way. It's actually God's way that they corrupted in this way. And so it also adds in verse 13, And God said to Noah, The end of all flesh has come before me. God knew there was no way to recover what used to be a peaceful existence upon the earth, a way of following His principles and laws. He says, No, for the earth is filled with violence through them, and behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make yourself an ark of gopher wood. And so He took Noah and his family out of the way to protect them. In verse 17 it says, So it goes on, and He's going to have a representative type so that the animals could reproduce after the flood.

And so we see here God repeating the same principle. Universal corruption brings through a righteous God judgment, and He will save the righteous, and there will be then total destruction of the evil and disobedient before Him. This principle is brought out in 2 Peter 2. 2 Peter 2 verse 4.

2 Peter 2 verse 4 it says, And did not spare the ancient world but save Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly, and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly, and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked. For that righteous man dwelling among them tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds. Then, this is a conclusion, the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations or trials, and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment. So we're coming closer to that day of judgment upon this earth.

For example, how much of the corruption is spreading around the world? Well, one indication has to do with the statistics of how venereal diseases have increased. I was really shocked last week when the World Health Organization published its latest conclusions. And I first, this morning, I was thinking, well, from what I read, it said that there are a million cases per year that people get infected with venereal diseases. And I'm thinking, just one million per year. So next year will be another million. And then I realized, no, I was wrong.

It's one million per day that is happening. It's over, it's like 375 million people per year are infected with these sexually transmitted diseases. And that doesn't even include HIV, AIDS, and other virus-caused infections. This is just talking about bacterial infection. It says here that more than 3.7 billion people under the age of 50 or 60 percent of the world population are infected with herpes simplex virus type, which are highly infectious and incurable. So besides having a million per day, you have to add all of these people because that's only bacterial, the things you get infected through venereal diseases that are bacterial.

This is a way of getting infected through viruses. And so here it says that 3.7 billion people, so a little over half of mankind now is carrying some type of herpes infection. These are highly infectious and incurable. As far as genital herpes, the second type of herpes, in the U.S., one out of every six people have this from ages 14 to 49. The HSV-1 is primarily transmitted by mouth-to-mouth contact. HSV-2 is sexually transmitted almost entirely through skin-to-skin contact. So there are more people on Earth with herpes than there aren't that are not.

Thankfully, these type of herpes infections are not produced by sitting on toilet, public toilet seats, or using bedding of someone else, or sharing objects as silverware soap or towels. It's usually mouth-to-mouth. So what is a person doing kissing someone that's not his wife? Well, that's a way you can infect them. The other one is having sex with someone that's not your wife. And so you see just an example of how things are being corrupted on Earth.

And now we come to this remarkable parable in Matthew 21, verses 33 through 46. I think this will open your understanding to this parable, which is not mentioned very often. Matthew 21, verse 33, it says, Now when the vintage time drew near, he sent his servants to the vine dressers. After all, they were the ones that were renting his property. And the way they paid it was once the vine had yielded the grapes and everything, well, the owner got part of the results of that.

And so he sent his servants that they might receive its fruit. And the vine dressers took his servants, beat one, killed one, and stoned another. Again, he sent other servants more than the first, and they did likewise to them. Then, last of all, he sent his son to them, saying, they will respect my son. After all, he's doing them good. But these vine dressers basically took over. Didn't want to respect the man. But when the vine dressers saw the son, and by the way, in Mark 12 verse 6, it mentions that this was the only son he had, his beloved son.

They said among themselves, This is the heir. It's the only heir. Come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance. So they took him and cast him out of the vineyard and killed him. Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vine dressers? They said to him, He will destroy those wicked men miserably and lease his vineyard to other vine dressers who will render to him the fruits in their seasons.

Jesus said to them, Have you never read in the Scriptures the stone which the builders rejected has become the chief's cornerstone? This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes. Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it. And whoever falls on this stone will be broken, but on whoever it falls, it will grind him to powder. Now when the chief priests and Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he was speaking of them. But when they sought to lay hands on him, they feared a multitude because they took him for a prophet. And so let's look at the parallels that Jesus Christ gives about his circumstances at the time, and how it is a parable about him and his father and what they have given, in this case, to the Jewish nation.

The Believer's Bible commentary has some good highlights on this. If you want to do a little more research, I'm going to be using some of their material here. So from this parable, we gather that God is the landowner, and Israel is the vineyard. Keep your finger here while we can go to Psalm 80, verse 8, to see how God called Israel his vine.

Psalm 80, verse 8, it says, You have brought a vine out of Egypt, talking about Israel. You have cast out the nation and planted it, and you prepared room for it, and caused it to take deep root, and it filled the land. The hills were covered with its shadow and the mighty cedars with its boughs. She sent out her boughs to the sea and her branches to the river. And so God planted this vine. He expected to have fruit from it. Another scripture along this line, Isaiah chapter 5, verse 1. It says, Now let me sing to my well beloved, a song of my beloved, regarding his vineyard. My well beloved has a vineyard on a very fruitful hill. He dug it up and cleared out its stones and planted it with the choicest vine. He built a tower in its midst and also made a winepress in it. So he expected it to bring forth good grapes, but it brought forth wild grapes, which were little and unusable. And now, oh, inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge, please, between me and my vineyard. What more could have been done to my vineyard that I have not done in it? Why, then, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes, in other words, good fruit? Did it bring forth wild grapes? And now, please, let me tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will take away its hedge, and it shall be burned and break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. I will lay it waste. It shall not be pruned or dug, but there shall come upon briars and thorns. I will also command the clouds, that they rain no rain on it. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant plant. He looked for justice, but behold oppression, for righteousness, but behold a cry for help. So God uses this analogy in Jeremiah chapter 2, another time, to notice how Israel knew about this analogy long ago. Jeremiah 2 verse 21. It says, Yet I have planted you a noble vine, a seed of highest quality. How then have you turned before me into the degenerate plant of an alien vine? For though you wash yourself with lye and use much soap, yet your iniquity is marked before me, says the Lord God. So we understand the parallel here. Also, he says he built a hedge around it, which separated it from the other areas. Of course, in Deuteronomy chapter 4 and verses 5 through 8, it helps us to understand. Of course, it was about the people of Israel. It wasn't just having their territorial borders, but it was also his laws that formed a protection with all of the aberrations going on in the rest of the nations. Notice in Deuteronomy chapter 4 verses 5 through 8, it says, Surely I have taught you statutes and judgments, just as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should act according to them in the land which you go to possess. That would be Israel. Therefore be careful to observe them. For this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes and say, Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people. For what great nation is there that has God so near to it, as the Lord our God is to us, for whatever reason we may call upon him? And what great nation is there that has such statutes and righteous judgments as are in all this law, which I set before you this day? So yes, this was a wonderful hedge to protect Israel from being contaminated by false idols and false laws.

The winepress here signifies the fruit which Israel should have produced for God. In other words, there was a work to be done. All of this fruit was to be harvested. And then with this winepress, you could get all that juice and produce the basis for good wine in the future, which is very saleable. It's very profitable. Also, the tower that he built there represents God's watchful care for his people. Many times God is called my high tower, my protector. So he did everything he could to produce good fruit. The winedressers are the chief priests and scribes, as it mentioned at the end, that they realized Christ was talking about them and their responsibilities over Israel, that they had not fulfilled it, that they had become corrupted, that they were not producing good fruit. And God repeatedly sent his servants, the prophets, to the people of Israel, seeking from the vineyard the fruits of fellowship, holiness, and love, also admonishing the people, warning them what would happen, because God is not some absentee landlord. He is very active in everything going on, and he's not going to tolerate corruption and perversion in the long term. He sent his prophets to warn them. And what did the people do? Instead of heeding them, respecting them, they persecuted the prophets and killed many of them. And finally, God sent his only Son, saying, They will respect my Son. The chief priests and scribes had said, This is the heir, a fatal admission. They privately agreed that Jesus was the Son of God, though publicly denying it, and thus answered their own question concerning his authority. His authority came from the fact that he was the Son of God and the parable they are quoted as saying, This is the heir, come, let us kill him, and seize his inheritance. In real life, they were saying, If we let him alone like this, everyone will believe him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation. Let's go to John 11. Verse 48. John 11. Verse 48. This is what the Pharisees and the chief priests, in verse 47, it sets up the scene. Then the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered a council and said, What shall we do for this man works many signs? Lazarus had just been raised from the dead after being in a tomb for four days. Instead of glorifying that, they were worried about their own political positions and riches. Then the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered, and they said, If we let him alone like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and nation. And one of them, Caiaphas, being the high priest that year, said to them, You know nothing at all, nor do you consider that it is expedient for us that one man should die for the people, and not that the whole nation should perish. So here he says, Well, it doesn't matter. Let's kill him. Because that way we can continue doing our thing. And that this way we're going to get rid of him, and at the same time we're going to show people they better not follow him. Because we have the authority and the power.

Then from that day on, they plotted to put him to death. And so they rejected him, threw him out, and crucified him outside the city. Just like they said with the son, they threw him out of the city. And that's exactly what they did with Jesus Christ.

So when the Savior asked what the owner of the vineyard would do, their answer condemned them. As he shows in verses 42 and 43, he quoted the words from Psalm 118, verse 22. The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes. When Christ, personified as the stone, presented himself to the builders, the leaders of Israel, they had no place for him in their building plans. They threw him aside as useless. But following his death, he was raised from the dead and given the place of preeminence by God. He has been made the topmost stone in God's building. Or the cornerstone, if you want to look at an analogy. Usually we talk about a cornerstone, and the commentary mentioned this, but it should be the cornerstone. God also has highly exalted him. Look at Philippians 2, verse 9. Philippians 2, verse 9. It says, So Jesus bluntly announced that the kingdom of God was be to be, and at the name of Jesus every knee should bow of those in heaven and those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. So Jesus bluntly announced that the kingdom of God would be taken from the leaders of Israel and given to a nation bearing fruits. And so it happened. Israel, as a nation, has basically been set aside as God's chosen people for the time being. And they have been blinded to where they don't see the truth. A hardening has come upon them that rejects the Messiah up to this day. And the prophecy of the kingdom of God would be given to a nation bearing the fruits of it. Now we can read in Romans 11 about those people that have been given the vineyard. Romans 11, verse 17.

It says, And if some of the branches were broken off, talking about the leadership of Israel and basically many of the Israelites who did not believe, and you, being a wild olive tree, being from the Gentile nations, were grafted in among them, and with them became a partaker of the root and fatness of the olive trees. Remember, Israel is represented as an olive tree. But now some of these branches, because of unbelief, have been cut out. And then God has called the nations for people to come and become part of spiritual Israel. And so they are grafted in in this way. And it says, Do not boast against the branches, but if you do boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you. That's why we respect Israel as a people who have been persecuted so much. Going on, we look at 1 Peter 2, talking about a holy nation that Christ has established as His Church. It is no longer about being of Israelite ancestry, but of having the faith in Jesus Christ, His sacrifice, His way of life. In 1 Peter 2, verse 9, It says, So God's people have been called now from different nations. And so you see this parable of the wicked vine keepers actually extends beyond Jesus Christ's day, because it continues with the Church as those that now are given the responsibility to take care of that vineyard. And the ministry are now some of these vine dressers that help and serve God's people as they are involved in this vineyard. And that we have to produce spiritual fruit. We cannot emulate or imitate the past failure of Israel, who did not accept Jesus Christ and His ways and His teachings. Christ says, Whoever falls on this stone will be broken, but on whoever it falls, it will grind him to powder. Notice here, and we actually have two parts in this verse. The first part, the stone is on the ground. And somebody who tries to kick it or to get rid of it, it says, Whoever falls on this stone will be broken. Christ, as a foundation, is not going to be moved. It's not going to be destroyed. Whoever comes against Him, He's going to bear the blunt of God's wrath. But notice the second part. It talks about, but whomever it falls upon, it will grind Him to powder. So this time, the stone is descending from above. And we see this in Daniel chapter 2. Let's go to Daniel chapter 2. It talks about this stone.

Daniel chapter 2.

It says in verse 43, of course, this is the prophecy of all of the world's kingdoms until Christ's coming. So he says here, in verse 43, it says, This is talking about the ten toes, the final manifestation of man's governments before Christ comes back. And basically it's describing here the king of the north that is going to be composed of many nations. Some are strong, some are weak, and they will mingle with the seed of men. It's interesting that sometimes in the translations, it doesn't bring out the whole meaning here. And I really enjoy in the Spanish, it actually says that they will align themselves with the others through contracts, through these alliances, written constitutions, to set them up as a people, as one type of group, a European union, is such an alliance of many different people, and they have come together, bound themselves through human alliances. It says, But they will not adhere to one another, just as iron does not mix with clay. Because you have different languages, different cultures, different mindsets, different historical backgrounds. And so you see even today what's going on. And now you're up with the Brexit, where basically England, Great Britain is breaking off because they don't go along with everything else. And so this is all in a flux. But then it says, And in the days of these kings, in other words, when we see this happening on the world scene, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, and the kingdom shall not be left to other people. It shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. And as much as you saw that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, in other words, that stone didn't come from human means, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold, all the previous of man's governments and kingdoms, the great God has made known to the king what will come to pass after this.

And so this parable extends to the time when that stone will come, and it will smash to pieces this world's human government. Won't that be nice? We won't have to turn on the news and just hearing all the bickering and all the threatenings and all the messes that human governments are making around the earth. We won't have any of that anymore. It'll be a kingdom of peace, a kingdom of joy, a kingdom of unity, as we don't see today.

So the chief priests and the prairies realized these parables were aimed directly at them, not just this one, but in particular, in answer to their question concerning Christ's authority. That's how it got started, and he answered them with this parable, among others. They would like to have seized him then and there, but they feared the multitudes who still took Jesus for a prophet. So you see, brethren, this parable actually extends to our days. That stone will arrive for the second time. Cain, and basically, he set up the church with him as that cornerstone, but the world has rejected that. In the church, we have them as a cornerstone. It's a beautiful analogy because a cornerstone is the one that builders will set up. According to that dimension, according to everything of that cornerstone, it goes out this way. So that's the way the building has to be set up. It goes out toward the right, also the bottom. You have to have it level. So all the other stones follow it and also vertically up. So that's what Jesus Christ is doing. Notice in again 1 Peter 2, where Peter takes the ideas from this parable and others, and he goes on to say, In 1 Peter 2, verse 4, it says, So in a sense, we are being shaped according to those dimensions that Jesus Christ has. Now, of course, we're still a work in progress. It's a lot of polishing, a lot of fitting, but there's that perfect model and standard set for us. So living stones, in the sense that we have not set our own patterns forever, we're learning. We're supposed to be growing. We're supposed to be becoming more like Christ. We are being built up a spiritual house, not a physical temple, a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices accepted to God through Jesus Christ, which are good works. And spiritual sacrifices are something that we do for God, serving others, obeying Him, keeping the feasts. That's a spiritual sacrifice we're offering to God.

Which is part of that parable that Christ quoted the scripture. And a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. They stumble, being disobedient to the word to which they also were appointed. But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. And so, again, we see the perfect parallels between what Christ gave and what we're living today. We are part of that spiritual building that Christ established. That in the book of Acts, we see in the day of Pentecost, the spiritual building with God's Holy Spirit softening us, guiding us against our own carnal desires and becoming more like Jesus Christ. It's a work in progress, but it has started already.

And so, the church is a work. We're not producing wine. We're not crushing grape. We are producing God's truths and sending them out to the world. We're taking the truths from the Bible. We're printing them. We are sending them through all the electronic means. Imagine radio, TV, Internet. We are sending that fruit out to the world. Those who taste it and want a part of it can become part of those that are the wine or the vine dressers. We are all working in God's vineyard, and it is a great privilege learning the ways of the kingdom of God, applying them in our own lives and our families. As we see with Pentecost, it's when God's people get together and produce the spiritual fruit from God's Holy Spirit given to us. We produce a humble and obedient attitude, and that's part of our job. God is not producing physical fruit. He's producing spiritual fruit. And through it, He's doing a great work that is being sent out. Even if it's a small group, the production, because He has opened up these great doors, we can reach the entire world without being physically present over there. That is a miracle in itself that has just happened in this past century. So, brethren, let's be good vine dressers in God's vineyard. Remember, one day you will receive the greatest reward ever.