Meditation on Luke 20:9-19; Pastor Edgar Mayer; Wilsonton/Glencoe Parish; 29.3.98; 5th Lent
"Heavenly Father, in this time of Lent help us to confront our shortcomings before you. Amen."
Surely Not!
We know that Australia has its share of corrupt politicians. That's not especially new and we won't adopt a holier-than-thou attitude but what I always find astonishing is that once they're caught, they hardly ever face up to their corruption. Remember the politician who used party donations to buy himself a nice stamp collection? Challenged in court: "Wouldn't you say that you're actions were wrong?" He simply replied: "Surely not. Surely my actions weren't wrong. I just invested the money for the party."
It's an incredible answer. It ignores all the evidence. He was caught in the act but refused to acknowledge any personal guilt. How can he think to get away with it? That puzzles me and may be it puzzles all of us but we'll see that such excuses and denial of guilt are not that uncommon. Jesus had to deal with an incredible response to the parable he just told. Let's hear the parable again and then the people's response.
Jesus said: "A man once planted a vineyard and rented it out. Then he left the country for a long time. When it was time to harvest the crop, he sent a servant to ask the tenants for his share of the grapes. But they beat up the servant and sent him away without anything. So the owner sent another servant. The tenants also beat him up. They insulted him terribly and sent him away without a thing. The owner sent a third servant. He was also beaten terribly and thrown out of the vineyard.
The owner then said to himself: 'What am I going to do? I know what. I'll send my son, the one I love so much. They will surely respect him!'
When the tenants saw the owner's son, they said to one another: 'Some day he will own the vineyard. Let's kill him! Then we can have it all for ourselves.' So they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him."
That's the parable and in conclusion Jesus asked: "What do you think the owner of the vineyard will do? I'll tell you what. He will come and kill those tenants and let someone else have his vineyard." We no longer have the death penalty but what Jesus said, still sounds logical. Tenants who beat and batter others and finally kill a man deserve death themselves.
That was certainly logical 2000 years ago, but listen to the people who responded to Jesus. They must have had a twisted sense of justice. They cried: "Surely not. Surely the tenants are not going to get killed. That sentence is too harsh. They were not that bad."
An incredible response by the people. What happened here? Were they so slow on the uptake or were there deeper reasons for their bias? How could they reject a just verdict when the evidence was so compelling?
They could because they sensed something terrifying. The parable which Jesus had told was not just a dramatic story. It touched on real life. The one who told the parable and his audience were both involved in the parable itself.
Jesus is the Son of the vineyard owner. The Son who is going to get killed. And Jesus' audience are the tenants who will kill him. God the Father who is the owner of the vineyard gave his tenants everything – everything to make a living. All he expected was his share of the good things that came from his gifts. He wanted that people give something back to him – something from their prosperity, their time, their love, but instead they didn't want to give anything back and in their drive to keep everything for themselves they were going to kill God's Son.
That's what people sense the parable is on about. They already felt a growing resentment toward Jesus and maybe they were not sure how far this resentment would go. As Jesus tells it, it will go as far as murder. That's the real life situation behind the parable.
Now it's very easy for us to say, we wouldn't be like the unjust and cruel tenants. We would give the owner of the vineyard his share of the crop and not kill his Son. But is that really so? Are we doing that in our every day lives? Isn't it rather true that we likewise severe the bond between us and God? When we have great success at work, when our business survives despite the drought, when our children turn out great, do we give God his due or do we hold on to all the goods ourselves? We are great in enjoying the fruits of success ourselves. We pat ourselves on the back and let others know how smart we are, what great foresight we had. There is just no glamour in saying: "I don't know how this all happened. God must have had a hand in it."
In extreme cases such behaviour wants to take over what is God's. It wants to take possession of the vineyard. It strives for recognition that all we make of our lives is our own doing. God is in the way of our freedom. We don't like the tenant-mentality where we are dependent on God, on his goodness and generosity. It's much better to be the landlords of our lives ourselves.
At one time or another we all think this way. I find that I hardly ever pray earnestly for God's guidance in specific things. I think that God has given me a brain and that when I use it as a Christian, he will direct my thoughts so that I make the right decisions. But am I completely honest? Do I really think this way or do I just like making my own decisions without God's input through prayer? I like to be the landlord of my life myself and keep God at a distance. We all like to keep God at a distance and sometimes it's not as subtle as not praying for guidance.
Those are the facts and they throw a bad light on us. Jesus knows these facts. He knew about our behaviour when he told the parable of the tenants but the surprising thing is this. Our behaviour is mentioned in the parable but is not the point of the parable.
The point is this: "What then shall God do with you – you who want to keep him at a distance?" The point is this crucial question where everything comes to a climax. Asking the question God confronts us with what we have done. He signals that he knows about us and with this question he ultimately challenges us. It's like a wake-up call: "What shall I do with you? Can't you see that you bring judgment on yourselves? Return to me! Stop doing what you are doing and return to me! Listen! What shall I do with you?"
When this question comes to us, it's time to come back to God. And we can do it by giving the answer Jesus already spelled out for us: "What then shall God do with you? What then shall the owner of the vineyard do to the tenants? He will come and kill you."
Our answer: "God kill us. God, do with me what you want." That's how we come back to God. That's the way. Only, I don't want to give this answer. I feel my heart beating faster. I'm in shock. I want to live and not die. If this is repentance, repentance is hard and I feel the urge to join the ones who deny their guilt and cry: "Surely not. Surely, I'm not going to get killed. I wasn't that bad."
But that's not the solution. We all need to fight this urge and first think more deeply about what God wants us to say – what he wants us to say in this season before Easter as we reflect on the sufferings of his Son. If we think about that, perhaps we eventually find the courage to say the words: "God, kill us."
When God prescribes the death sentence for us, he wants us to see that we are guilty. He's not an old, silly man with a beard who is too frail to enforce his discipline. He is not to be manipulated or tempted. He is to be taken seriously and he takes us and our sin seriously. When we find the courage to say the words: "God, kill us" we confess our guilt and show respect to him.
But there is more. We all constantly strive for power and influence. Some achieve it through their superior will power and don't have to hide their ambition. Others are less direct in their wish to dominate people. They may consciously be the weakest member of the group so that everybody has to look after them. And isn't it power to boss people around this way: "Oh, I've got a headache again, could you please bring me a Panadol and tell everybody to be quiet around the house"? We all love power, the strong and the weak, but when we say: "God, kill us" we give up all power and give it all to God. Whatever happens to us now is up to God. That's repentance.
It's not comfortable to give up all control and we may wonder: "What will happen to us? Will God really kill us?" Those fears make us try to figure out how God will act. Now it's very hard to predict what God will do, but maybe we get a few clues from listening to Jesus' parable again. How did God, the owner of the vineyard, act, when the tenants didn't give him a share of the crop?
First, he sent a servant. Remember? This one we beat and sent away without anything. We expected a law-suit then but nothing happened. Instead, God sent a second servant and we thought: "Let's see how far we can go with this one." And we beat him and insulted him terribly. Surprisingly, no punishment came to us. Instead, God sent a third servant. By now we thought he didn't have the resolve to go against us and we wounded his third servant. When his Son came, we thought: "Now he's really lost it, sending us the heir of the vineyard." And we killed his Son.
God sent three servants and his Son but what if he didn't do this out of weakness and an inability to get his way, as we first thought, but did it out of love for the tenants of his vineyard? What if God's pleading by sending one messenger after another wasn't the action of a weakling but the action of an extremely forgiving landlord?
Likewise, what if God's refusal to send fire from heaven on our world, is not a sign of his weakness but a sign of his patient love? If that were true, perhaps he won't kill us for what we have done.
With that thought we say it now. We repent: "God, kill us." The moment has come. We surrender completely: "God, kill us." Now we will see what God will do. We are not certain what will happen because death is the logical punishment for our crime.
There is no doubt about that. It is the logical punishment but here God surprises us. God does not bind himself to what we call logic. His love is free to be irrational. And in his love God says: "I won't kill you." It's hard to explain that he says it: "You will live despite everything."
But what's even harder to explain and what's even more irrational, is how he gives us life. Who does he send now to plead with us the tenants of the vineyard? His servants are gone. His Son is gone. We took care of them. Who does he send now? There seems to be no one left.
Listen to Jesus. He tells us whom God will send to make a new start with us. Jesus' words: "I will go and I will be mocked, insulted, spat on, flogged and killed outside of the vineyard but on the third day I will rise. Then I come to you again" (cf. Luke 18:31-33). There is no dead end for God's love. The death of Jesus wasn't the end. The heir of the vineyard lying in his own blood wasn't the final picture but through God's incomprehensible love it gave way to a new beginning: a new lease on life. The risen Jesus comes to the tenants of the vineyard again and proclaims: "God heard your cry of repentance and he wants you to live. Remain the tenants of my vineyard."
Do we take this in? God says: "Surely, I won't kill you. Surely not." In his own way God gives the same incredible response to Jesus' question as the people who deny their guilt. "What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will kill the tenants." "Surely not." – The answer of the people who want to talk their way out of it. "Surely not." – The answer of God who finds love where others only find punishment. It's the same answer: "Surely not." But it is for God to give it. Amen.
