In the Gospel, we have another parable involving a vineyard. In it, Jesus is alluding to Isaiah’s parable of the vineyard of the First Reading from this past Sunday, something the listeners of the time would have instantly recognised. Jesus is not slow to confront the truth, and the parable he shares is in response to the Pharisees. It holds up a
mirror to them.
In the time of Jesus, it was common practice to lease land to tenant farmers, who would then hand over a portion of the produce to the absentee landowner. The tenants were to oversee the productivity of the vineyard in return for a share of what it produced. If they did not pay the landowner, the landowner would find new tenants. We might read the parable with God as the landowner, Jesus
as the son of the landowner and the Pharisees and Chief Priests as the tenants.
Perhaps in the five years that they had been working the land, the tenants had begun to think and hope that the landowners’ servants would not arrive to collect the produce. Perhaps they had begun to think of the land as their own.
But
the landowner has not forgotten about his vineyard. He sends servants to collect the produce, and they are killed. He sends more servants, and they also lose their lives. The vineyard and its fruit mean so much to him that he sends his son, believing that his son will be respected. But they have no respect for the heir of the landowner and kill him.
The owner of the vineyard, God, will do anything
and everything to protect his vineyard out of his great love for it. In his graciousness, he has extraordinary patience in the situation. He continues to offer the tenants a chance to make things right, but time after time, they kill the messengers of the landowner until he sends his son to represent him, and he, too, is killed. The landowner will never give up on his vineyard. He will remove it from those who have abused the sacred trust to care for it. He will take it away from those who have
forgotten that it does not belong to them (the religious authorities in the parable). He will always protect what belongs to him.
Where have I experienced God’s fiercely protective care of me?
Reflections by Annemarie Paulin-Campbell
