Behold, the Lord, the Almighty, the Maker of the heavens and the earth, He is doing something new, which the nations have not known, nor could they ever have performed it. The Lord who opens a way through the sea and brings His people through the mighty waters on dry ground — who causes rivers to spring forth in the desert wilderness and gives drink to His people — He forms a people for Himself and gives them Life in body and soul, to the glory of His Holy Name.
He plants them as a Vine and cultivates them as a Vineyard in a good land, that they might thrive and bear good fruits of faith and love. Not because He is hungry or in need of produce and profit, but for the sake of His divine and holy Love; that is what moves Him to bestow Life and Salvation.
That grace of God, His own divine Love, is the reason and the purpose for which He plants His Vineyard, His people, His Church, and for which He daily and richly provides for His own and cares for them. He does it all out of His fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, that they might live — that you might live — that you might grow and flourish and bear good fruits after His own kind, in faith toward Him and in love for your neighbors round about you in the world.
In Love, therefore, He entrusts the care of His Church on earth to His people in various ways, to each person according to his or her particular calling and station in life. As each of you are called to be His own and are planted in His Vineyard by His grace, so are you also given a stewardship of His Vineyard in your own place or portion. Which is to say that you are given to care for others around you. And by the same token, you are likewise cared for by your neighbors and by those who are in authority over you, for this life on earth and for the Life everlasting in body and soul.
The stewards of the Lord’s Vineyard certainly include the pastors and professors of the Church, who are charged with the preaching and teaching of His Word for the benefit of His people. But so, too, fathers and mothers are entrusted with the care and catechesis of their children. Brothers and sisters are given to care for each other; and teachers for their students, and students for their studies and their classmates; and doctors and nurses, engineers, accountants, cooks, and computer programers, each and all for their respective neighbors. So, then, wherever the Lord has planted you, wherever He has given you work to do, that is where you care for His Vineyard in love; and that is where and how, by faith in His Word, you also bear good fruits to the glory of His Name.
But then, because He works in this way through various masks and means, through neighbors and governing authorities — because He chooses to care for His Church and His Creation through His creatures — it may often seem that He has gone away “on a journey for a long time,” that He is far removed from the cares and concerns of His Vineyard; that He is uninvolved and unobservant. That is not the case, but that is the temptation — and so also, to despair of His providential care, or to seize control of the Vineyard to the extent that you can, in the hopes of fending for yourself.
Nevertheless, the Lord has not forgotten His Vineyard and its needs; nor has He relinquished His care and cultivation of the Vineyard. His “journey” is not a turning away or departure from His people; it is rather His slowness to anger and His withholding of the punishment that sin deserves. He deals with His people, not directly but through means, in order to be gentle with His Vineyard.
Thus, already from the Fall into sin, and even to the close of the age, the Lord governs His people, His Church, by His Word of promise and by the Word of His Prophets and Apostles — written by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in the Holy Scriptures and continued in the Office of the Holy Ministry, in the preaching of the Law and the Gospel unto repentance and faith in His forgiveness.
The Lord is patient and long-suffering in sending His servants to preach to His people, and thus by His Word to bring forth the fruits of His Vineyard. So have you heard in the Parable — and how He continues to do so even in the face of rejection and refusal. The treatment of His slaves whom He has sent is an attack upon His honor and authority, and yet He has persisted in peace.
Let this be a caution and encouragement to you; for as the Lord Jesus spoke this Parable against the scribes and the chief priests then, so has it been written in the Holy Gospel for your instruction.
Consider the stewards of the Lord’s Vineyard, and how, instead of bringing forth the fruits of the Vineyard for His praise and glory, they seek to keep it all for themselves, for their own benefit — not only the fruits it has already produced, but the entire Vineyard.
From the very first Garden until now, it has always been this way, that Man attempts to take the fruit that God has not given — the fruit that belongs to God, the Lord — and that Man thereby tries to seize and hang onto life for himself in that forbidden fruit, because it looks so good; and that he thus rejects and refuses to receive the true divine Life that God is freely giving by His grace.
The gardeners and vine-growers do not comprehend that the real treasure and true glory of the Vineyard is not to be found in itself, but in its Lord — in His gracious providence and good gifts; and that Paradise is not found in the pretense of self-righteousness, but in the presence of the Lord.
Even so, that true divine grace and glory of the Lord has ever and always been the case, and so does it ever remain, even after Man has fallen into sin, into unbelief and disobedience.
Therefore, by His divine grace, in great love for His Vineyard, the Lord God sends His beloved Son, in whom His Church is gathered into being. And to be sure, His people do have Life through faith in Him; for it is in the Son that the Vineyard is fruitful and productive to the glory of God.
To that end, God the Father sends His own dear Son in grace, mercy, and peace.
But then what happens? It sure doesn’t sound like any kind of happy ending, does it?
As the Parable is drawing to a close, it rather seems that everything has gone from very bad to much, much worse. The Lord of the Vineyard has lost it all. His Vineyard has been taken over and His beloved Son has been thrown out like rubbish and killed. That is what sin, at its heart, is always aiming at and leading to: To usurp the glory of God by the rejection and murder of His Son.
Only then, when it already seems too late to do any good or to make any difference, the Lord of the Vineyard comes and destroys those vine-growers — and He gives the Vineyard to others.
Here is the new thing that God does! Here is the Mystery of His Vineyard, which all the nations of the earth could never have imagined or pulled off. It is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous.
The rejection and death of the beloved Son is not only the height and culmination of sin; it is also the precious Cornerstone that God has set and established for His one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. Christ Jesus goes voluntarily to His death, knowing what He will suffer. Is He not the One who tells this Parable ahead of time, before it all unfolds? And yet, He proceeds in Love.
He goes willingly to His death upon the Cross, handed over by His own people to the gentiles, in order to atone for the sins of all the people by the giving of His own Body and Life as a Sacrifice, and by the shedding of His own holy and precious Blood. He lays down His Life in Love, and He will take it up again in faith, so that by His innocent suffering and death He might destroy death and remove its terrifying power from all the children of men. He comes in peace and submits Himself to the abuse, to the beatings, and to His death by crucifixion, in order to reconcile this whole hostile world to His God and Father by the Ministry of the Gospel of His Cross.
Thus, the judgment of unrighteousness and the destruction of sin are borne for all by the beloved Son, in order that the Vineyard might be spared, and restored to its own Lord, and given Life in His Resurrection from the dead. So has He done, and so it is. The Vineyard lives, and it is given — not rented or sold, not relinquished, not bartered or abandoned — but it is given to others, to all who believe and are baptized into Christ Jesus, who share by faith His Cross and Resurrection.
Make no mistake, whoever does not believe will be condemned. There is the coming Judgment of unrighteousness. There will be that Final Day of reckoning, when those vine-growers who reject the beloved Son and refuse to repent will be subject to eternal damnation of body and soul.
But now is the Day of Grace, in which the servants of the Lord continue to be sent in patience and in peace. And now is the Day of Salvation, in which the crucified and risen Son of God comes to cultivate His Vineyard, His people, His Church, by the preaching of repentance and forgiveness.
It is by His Cross that the whole Vineyard is forgiven. And it is in His Resurrection from the dead that His Vineyard is justified, enlivened, and abundantly fruitful. And that is true for you, as well.
So, then, what is your faithfulness and fruitfulness in Christ Jesus like?
By the measure of the world, and by the conceits of your own sinful heart, “fruitfulness” is found in whatever you manage to accomplish, to achieve, and to accumulate for yourself.
But in truth, everything is determined by the Cross of Christ, either unto repentance, faith, and life, or unto the judgment and condemnation of unbelief. He is the Stone of stumbling and the Rock of offense. He breaks into pieces those who fall on Him, and He smashes into dust and scatters those on whom He falls. And yet, He is also the Chief Cornerstone upon whom you are built.
Fear God, therefore, and repent of your sins. And put your trust in Christ Jesus. Remember the grace, mercy, and long-suffering patience of the Lord your God, who loves you, and that He did not spare His beloved Son but handed Him over to His death upon the Cross in order to save you.
By the grace and Spirit of God you know that your righteousness, your resurrection, and your life are not found in yourself, nor in your own works, but in this dear Lord Jesus, crucified and risen.
So it is that your good fruits of faith and love are found in the fellowship of His suffering, as you are conformed more and more to the Image of His crucifixion. That is to say, not only that your old sinful self is put to death, but that you also carry the Cross and lay down your life in love for your neighbor, for Jesus’ sake. And by the power of His Resurrection He raises you up in faith each day through the forgiveness of all your sins, as He shall also raise you up in glory at the last.
Indeed, you are among the good fruits that Christ Jesus bears to the Glory of His God and Father!
Here in the Gospel of His Cross and Resurrection is a pathway through the sea and living water in the desert. Here the Heir bequeaths to you the Inheritance of His Father. And the Fruits of this true Vine are given and poured out for you to eat and to drink. Here then, in this Sacrament, lay hold of Him who lays hold of you for the Resurrection of your body and the Life everlasting.
In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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