The Owner Of The Vineyard

The Owner of the Vineyard

Mark 12:1-12

Good morning.

Imagine owning a business for a long time and all of sudden, you have to leave town for an extended period, for some reason.

You have poured your heart, soul, and all of your energy into this business, so it means everything to you.

Since you have to leave, someone needs to run your business while you are gone, but you want the people you ask to run it, to do a good job and operate it like it was their own business.

So, you decide to make the people who will run the business a great offer; they can run the business as if they owned it, and then they will simply share some of the profit with you.

After a couple of years, you send some people to collect you share of the profits from the company, but the people running the business treat your messengers poorly and even kill them.

How would you handle this situation?

Please open your Bibles to the Gospel of Mark 12 as we continue in a verse-by-verse study of that Gospel.

Last week in Mark, we learned about forgiveness and Jesus’ authority, as the King of the kingdom.

Mark 11 does not say our eternal destiny is contingent on forgiving others.

Mark 11 teaches that our relationship and prayer life with God, can be hindered if we refuse to forgive others.

Withholding forgiveness from others will cause a person to miss the joy of grace, as they refuse to extend grace to others, because unforgiveness causes bitterness and it can bind a person up.

The day after Jesus cleansed the Temple, the King arrived at the Temple, His own royal house again, and the religious leaders questioned Jesus’ authority, so, Jesus answers with a question.

If what John the Baptist said was true, then Jesus had all authority over the Temple, the Word of God, and over them.

If the religious leaders would not accept the words from John the Baptist, why would Jesus give them any further revelation.

The religious leaders said, "If we say, 'From heaven,' He will say, 'Why then did you not believe him?' But if we say, 'From men'" — they feared the people, for all counted John to have been a prophet indeed.”

We do not know was their response to Jesus’ question and this showed that these men were not sincere seekers of truth.

We ended saying, “Just as a lack of faith is an obstacle to effective prayer; refusing to forgive or holding on to bitterness can also hinder our prayers.”

Today, Jesus uses a parable to describe Israel’s rebellion against the Lord and then the religious leaders try to set another trap.

I. How Israel treated the O.T. Prophets.

Read Mark 12:1-5

Crop sharing was used in ancient Israel, and it is still used in some farming communities today.

A crop share lease is an agreement between the landowner and a farmer who is willing to farm the land while splitting the expenses as well as the crop harvested, with the landowner.

The Lord was specific with Israel about the produce produced from their land. Listen to what was written in the Law to Jewish people, about the produce harvested from the land.

Leviticus 19:23 'When you come into the land, and have planted all kinds of trees for food, then you shall count their fruit as uncircumcised. Three years it shall be as uncircumcised to you. It shall not be eaten.

Leviticus 19:24 But in the fourth year all its fruit shall be holy, a praise to the LORD.

Leviticus 19:25 And in the fifth year you may eat its fruit, that it may yield to you its increase: I am the LORD your God.

Warren Wiersbe said, “In order to retain his legal rights to the property, the owner had to receive produce from the tenants, even if it was only some of the vegetables that grew between the rows of trees or vines.”

This explains why the tenants refused to give him anything: They wanted to claim the vineyard for themselves.”

Question: Why did Jesus use a vineyard for this parable?

Psalm 80:8 and Isaiah 5 call Israel the Lord’s vineyard.

Isaiah 5:4 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, did it bring forth wild grapes?

Isaiah 5:5 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.

Isaiah 5:6 I will lay it waste; it shall not be pruned or dug, but there shall come up briers and thorns. I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain on it."