The Parable of the Vineyard Owner
Matthew 21:33-46
- Landowner = God
- Vineyard = locus of God’s kingdom
- Wicked tenants = unbelieving religious leaders
- Servants and Son = prophets and Christ
The Parable of the Vineyard Owner
Matthew 21:33-46
- God offers us an opportunity to join Him in building His kingdom.
- God sets us up with everything we need to join Him in His kingdom work.
- God is patient with us even when we reject His plans or become hostile toward Him.
- God’s patience is not infinite and we can all be replaced.
- God’s plans and purposes for His kingdom will be accomplished.
The Parable of the Wedding Feast
Matthew 22:1-14
- The king = God the Father
- The feast = a celebration of God’s kingdom
- The son = Jesus, God’s Son
- Servants = those proclaiming the Gospel invitation
- Invitees who reject the invite = indifferent or even belligerent unbelievers
- People on highways = the broader invitation list
- Man with no wedding clothes = insincere, religious posers
- Called and Chosen = Gospel is a universal invitation which some receive, others reject
The Parable of the Wedding Feast
Matthew 22:1-14
- The Gospel is an invitation.
- Some reject the invitation.
- Some accept the invitation.
- Some of those who appear to accept are merely posers/pretenders.
“When Jesus burst on the scene preaching the gospel, He did not come with positive self-talk or an invitation to admit our brokenness. He called the world to repent and believe.”
– Kevin DeYoung
“It is not the case that God simply ‘accepts us as we are.’ He invites us as we are; but responding to that invitation always involves the complete transformation which is acted out in repentance, forgiveness, baptism, and receiving the Spirit.”
– N.T. Wright
“The church — the body of Christ — is the place where God invites us to renew our loves, reorient our desires, and retrain our appetites. Indeed, isn’t the church where we are nourished by the Word, where we ‘eat the Word’ and receive the bread of life? The church is that household where the Spirit feeds us what we need and where, by His grace, we become a people who desire him above all else. Christian worship is the feast where we acquire new hungers — for God and for what God desires — and are then sent into His creation to act accordingly.”
– James K.A. Smith, You Are What You Love
“Our lifelong nostalgia, our longing to be reunited with something in the universe from which we now feel cut off, to be on the inside of some door which we have always seen from the outside, is no mere neurotic fancy, but the truest index of our real situation.”
– C.S. Lewis