2026-10-04 Pentecost 19
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen!
My very first congregation was in the south end of the Okanagan Valley, right in the heart of wine country. There are over 40 wineries in the surrounding area. The hills all thrive with beautiful estates and vineyards as far the eye can see, earning the region the well deserved title of the “Wine Capital of Canada!” It was truly a gorgeous spot. It was hot and sunny, and of course, the fruit and wine were abundant. We always had loads of people wanting to come and visit us there. But when we moved back to Saskatchewan, hardly anybody still wanted to come and visit us … It remains an unsolved mystery to this very day!
You may have caught that little detail in today’s Scripture readings that the lectionary lays out for us. Vineyards. Vineyards in Isaiah. Vineyards in Matthew. More precisely, it’s one vineyard. And the vineyard has issues. Isaiah says his vineyard, despite being built on a very fertile hill and having all the evidence of hard work and care like removing rocks and having the very best vines planted, it wouldn’t yield any fruit. The Hebrew has ‘wild grapes’ and the Greek has ‘thorns’ - either way, it’s not what you want or expect from the vineyard.
Matthew records Jesus’ parable of the vineyard. Likewise, this vineyard has issues. This time it’s not the lack of fruit but rather the renters. There’s nothing worse than bad renters. The master of the vineyard sends his servants to reap the dividend. It’s harvest time, time to pick some fruit and make some award winning wine! The servants go but the renters beat them, kill them and stone them with rocks. Finally, the Master’s Son is sent, hoping for a different outcome. But they kill Him too to steal the inheritance!
So there you go. Everyone thinks that BC wine country is the best but, it’s the land of fruit and nuts! The fruits get stuck in the valley while the nuts roll all the way to coast! And neither of them cheer for the Roughriders, so that’s a double whammy!
So what do we do with these texts? They both have the vineyard in common, but they are actually addressing a couple different things. Let’s start with Isaiah and the fruit. God plants the vineyard. He does everything right. He makes it so that it can easily produce the fruit that He is looking for in abundance. But the issue is, it’s not producing good fruit. Verse 7 tells us what is going on: “For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting; and he looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold, an outcry!”
The good fruit of justice and righteousness have been swapped for the wild thorns of bloodshed and outcry over iniquity. The people have sinned against God and against His word. They have transgressed His commandments. And not only here or there, but everywhere. The whole society has become a tangled mess of bramble and iniquity. And maybe we can relate to this as we see our world ever descending into this similar rot and decay. I just saw a headline from the National Post that corrections Canada is going to be distributing paper straws for safer drug snorting in Federal prisons. I had to double check that it wasn’t some kind of fake news satire! Safer and environmentally friendly illegal drug use whilst in jail! This tells you all you need to know about what an utter clown show our country and society has become.
So as God’s Baptized people, we need to be concerned about the fruit that God is looking for. Embracing lives of goodness and faithfulness in Christ will produce the good fruit. Justice and righteousness. Walking the way of His commandments. How you treat the person who irritates you at work. How you show compassion to the lonely, the poor, the down and out. Whether your speech, spending, and time match what you sing on Sunday. Do you actually repent when the Scripture or another Christian confronts you - or do you instead “beat the servants” by dismissing them. Has your faith become a consumeristic faith, asking “what do I get” or treating Jesus like a mascot rather than a Messiah?
I heard an amazing quote from a Sermon by another pastor from a few years ago, around 1500 years or so:
“If someone has some land, but neglects it and leaves it untilled, he finds it produces thorns and thistles in proportion to his neglect. When he does come to clean it, the more it is infested with these weeds, the more his hands will bleed when he wants to pull up what he allowed to grow in the time of his neglect. It is impossible for a man not to reap what he sows. A man who wants to sow his field must first thoroughly uproot all the weeds, for if one does not pull out the roots properly, but cuts off the tops only, they spring up again. If a man wants to be sure that he has pulled up the roots, after ridding the field of briars and all kinds of weeds, he must plow it and break it up and till it and finally sow it with good seed. For if, after giving it all this careful attention, he allows it to lie fallow, fresh weeds will arrive, and finding the soil soft and well tilled, they will push their roots down deep and grow stronger and more numerous.” - St. Dorotheos of Gaza.
So that’s the fruit issue. Now for the servants issue. This is another one of those parables directed against the Pharisees. They were the teachers of Israel. They should have perked up their ears when God sent them messengers. But instead, they rejected them and treated them shamefully. And when God sends His Son with high hopes, how did they respond? Schemes of crucifixion and death. The Jews and the Romans killed the Lord of life outside the vineyard of Jerusalem. We want to make sure we don’t do likewise to the Master’s Son. So the message is the same for us too. Repent. Do it often. Do it sincerely.
The Good News of this parable though is that the Master is shockingly patient. He is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He wants His people to turn from their fruitless ways. He wants them to embrace His servants. So He keeps sending them. Prophet after prophet and ultimately His very own Son, our Saviour, Redeemer and Lord. The one is ultimately rejected by man has become the cornerstone. The vineyard is not abandoned. It is given to those who perk up their ears and produce fruit.
The amazing grace of God is here, even for those who have been unfaithful tenants. The Son has been thrown out and killed for tenants like us. Therefore, live as a people who belong to Him. We gaze into the mirror of the law and realize that in our sins, we have been much like the fruitless vineyard and perhaps also like the scandalous servants. But God doesn’t give up on us. He gives us His Son to assure us our sins are forgiven. He sends us His Spirit to change our hearts and produce abundant fruit in keeping with repentance.
The vineyard might still have some issues this side of eternity. Sometimes it is us, our wild grapes and thorns in place of the justice and righteousness that God is seeking. Sometimes it is how we treat the servants He sends us - His word, His people, His call to repentance. And yet, the gracious Master does not plow the whole thing under, light it on fire and walk away. He sends us His Son. The very same one they put to death outside the vineyard. The rejected stone has truly become the cornerstone. The vineyard is given to a people who will produce good grapes of faith by being connected to Jesus Who is the vine.
The fruit of the Spirit only grows by being connected to the vine. So stay connected to Jesus. Hear His word with eager hearts. Receive His gifts, His very body and blood, given and shed for you and your salvation. The Master is still patient and long suffering. The Son is still risen from the dead to defeat death. The Spirit still produces abundant fruit. The vineyard is His and in Holy Baptism, so are you. In His name, Amen!
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