THE LESSONS OF THE VINEYARD

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LUKE 20:1-19
Lesson #53
THE LESSONS OF THE VINEYARD

• Memory verse: Luk 20:18
• In our previous lesson, we learned that during the week before the crucifixion, Jesus was in the temple every day until his arrest.
  • At the same time that the religious leaders were examining the Passover lamb tied to the altar to be sure that it was a perfect lamb, the religious leaders examined Jesus, the Lamb of God, closely on various themes.
• Read Luke 20:1-8 By what authority?
  • The religious leaders asked him, “By what authority doest thou these things? or who is he that gave thee this authority?” (2)
    • For believers today, the answer is obvious. Jesus Christ gets his authority from God the Father. There is no higher authority than that.
    • How do we know this is where He got His authority?
    • Read John 17:1-2
  • Jesus very cleverly used what was called the Socratic method to answer their question. The Socratic method was to answer a question with a question of your own.
    • Jesus asked them, “The baptism of John, was it from heaven, or of men?”(4)
      • If they said that the baptism of John the Baptist was from heaven, then they had no answer for why they did not repent and be baptized as John the Baptist said they should do. (5)
      • If they said that the baptism of John the Baptist was not from heaven, then they would have to contend with the multitudes of common people that had followed John the Baptist and Jesus. (6)
    • The religious leaders said they could not determine an answer to Jesus’ question. (7)
    • Because they would not answer Jesus’ question, He would not answer their question directly. (8) Instead Jesus gave them a parable.
  • Read Luk 20:9-19 The Parable of the Householder and the Heir (Mat 21:33-46, Mar 12:1-9)
    • Read Mat 21:33-46
    • Read Isa 5:1-7
    • We have the same objects in the parable in Luke as we do in Isaiah 5.
      • Who does the householder represent? The householder represents God, the Father, who has authority over his household.
      • What does the vineyard represent?
        • The vineyard represents the land of Israel. This is the land of the promise that God gave to Abraham.
        • Read Psa 80:8-19

God dug the vineyard.

God promised a particular piece of land to Abraham and his descendants by faith. (Gen 12:1, 7)

Of all the land in the world, Israel is not a particularly beautiful piece of geography. However, there is evidence that it was more beautiful in the Old Testament than it is today.

Today much of the land is dry and lacks sufficient water.

God dug and removed the rocks from the land.

Pagan tribes of Canaanites inhabited the land before the Israelites entered it with Joshua.

They were a pagan people filled with immorality, child sacrifice, and all manner of sexual diseases.

God helped the Israelites remove the Canaanites from the land.

God planted the vineyard with the choicest vine.

The Israelites were God’s chosen people. That makes them the choice vine.

However, the choicest vine were those Israelites that were faithful to God by faith and were in the bloodline of Christ.

• • • What is meant by the phrase “being hedged about”? (Mat 21:33)
      • God told the Israelites that they should be separate from other nations.
        • They must not marry with pagan people.
        • They must not worship the idols of pagan tribes.
      • God promised them that if they would worship only Jehovah, He would surround them with protection from their enemies.
        • This was a conditional promise. They must worship only the one true God if they wanted His protection.
        • Notice that Isa 5:5 says that God will remove the hedge of protection because of their failure to be God’s people and the vineyard would be trampled down.

As a result, we have seen thousands of years of persecution against the Jews as well as enemy nation after enemy nation march across the Promised Land and control it.

Notice that Isa 5:6 says that there would be no rain on the vineyard.

This is why the Promised Land changed from being a land flowing with milk and honey to a parched land struggling over water rights.

Rain is also a spiritual symbol of the presence of the Holy Spirit. The prophet Ezekiel documents his vision of the glory of the Holy Spirit departing from the temple. (Eze 10)

• • • What does the winepress represent?
      • Read Rev 19:11-16
      • The winepress is a symbol for judgment in the Bible.
        • The winepress in the vineyard is the cross of Jesus Christ where God judged man’s sins at the crucifixion in Jerusalem. (Rom 6:10 2Cor 5:21)
        • God will judge the Jewish leaders for their rejection and rebellion against God.
    • What does the tower represent?
      • Isa 5:2 tells us that God built a tower in the midst of the vineyard.
        • A tower was a structure used to watch for the coming of enemies.
        • However, it was a structure that everyone could see from a great distance.
      • The tower represents the Word of God that God gave to the Israelites. The purpose of the Word was to warn them of their spiritual enemies. However, God gave the Word to the Jews so they that would be a light to the Gentiles. They were to preserve the Word of God for the world.
    • Who do the tenant farmers (or the husbandman) represent?
      • The tenant farmers in the parable represent the Jews.
      • God gave the Jews sacred spiritual responsibilities that He did not give any other nation.
        • Some of the responsibilities the Jews performed well.
        • The Jews failed to perform other responsibilities given by God.

=1= God gave them the responsibility of preserving the Word of God. Because they successfully fulfilled this responsibility is why we have the Word of God today.

=2= God gave them the responsibility of preserving their genealogies to keep a record of the bloodline of Christ. The Jews successfully fulfilled this responsibility. This is the reason we have the genealogies of Christ in the books of Matthew and Luke.

=3= God gave them the responsibility of serving only the true God Jehovah.

The Jews miserably failed to fulfill this responsibility. They constantly fell into all manner of idolatrous religions.

God’s purpose was that Gentiles would look at the Jews and want a blessed and prosperous nation like the Jews, and then desire a relationship with the God, Jehovah..

Instead God had to continually punish the Jews for their failures by removing blessings from them. No Gentile nation was drawn to a God who judged his own people.

=4= God gave them the responsibility of being a light to the Gentiles.

Instead of being a light, they secluded themselves from Gentiles to the point where they hated the Gentiles and the Gentiles hated the Jews.

The Jewish leadership did just the opposite. They hid the light of the truth of God.

• • • What is the far country? (Mat 21:33)
      • After calling the Jews to be His people, giving them His promises, delivering them out of Egypt, helping them gain the Promised Land, they still would not be His people, so He lifted his hand of protection and left them to their own devices. They did not have an extraordinary manifestation of the presence of God after that. (Deu 34:10-12)
      • Then when Jesus came and offered the kingdom of God to the Jews, they rejected Him and crucified Him. Therefore, He ascended into heaven and left them to their own devices.
    • Who do the servants represent? (Mat 21:35-36)
      • The servants represent the Old Testament prophets. They called the people to accountability. In other words, like the servants of a landlord that goes to collect the rent.
        • Instead of receiving those servants with honor as though they were receiving the landowner, the Jews killed them.
        • The Old Testament prophets of God were persecuted and killed by their own people.
      • Isaiah was sawed in pieces. Jeremiah was stoned. Amos was murdered with a club. (Heb 11:36-38)
    • Who is the son?
      • Because the householder represents God, the Father, the Son represents Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
      • This parable is a prophetic prediction of his coming death on the cross at the hands of the religious leaders.
        • “…let us seize on his inheritance.” (Mat 21:38)

Christ’s inheritance is his title of Lordship. The Jewish religious leaders sought to retain their prestige, wealth, and power so they could be their own lord.

Notice in Mat 21:40, Jesus asks his hearers what should be done to these tenant farmers for killing the heir.

• • • • • Their answer in verse Mat 21:41 is prophetic of their own destruction in 70 AD and the grafting of the Gentiles into the body of Christ. They pronounced sentence upon themselves.
    • Who are the “other farmers”? (Mat 21:41)
      • The “other farmers” represent the Gentile believers, the church. (Rom 11)
      • Salvation was to be offered first to the Jews and then to the Gentiles. Paul became the apostle to the gentiles.
    • What does the fruit represent?
      • Isa 5:2 says that God looked for the vineyard to produce grapes, but it brought forth wild grapes. They were to produce the spiritual fruit of bringing people to God, but instead they produced rottenness.
      • The term, “wild grapes” means, = small, hard berries rotten on the vine.
  • Read Psa 18:2, 31
    • Who is the stone?
    • Jesus Christ is the stone revealed in three aspects:
      • =1= The stone that the builders rejected.
        • The kingdom of God is built on Jesus Christ. The Jews were to be the builders of God’s kingdom, but they rejected the foundation stone, Jesus Christ.
        • Instead of a building stone, Christ became a stone of stumbling for the Jews. (Isa 8:14-15 Rom 9:32-33 1Cor 1:23 1Pet 2:8)
      • =2 = The stone that is “the head of the corner” represents Christ who is the corner stone, accepted by the Gentile church.
        • The corner stone establishes the true angle for the construction of the walls.
        • Jesus Christ is the true standard of a model to the church. (1Cor 3:11 Eph 2:20-22 1Pet 2:4-5)
      • =3= The third aspect is Christ, the smitting or crushing stone of destruction.
        • People and nations who fight against Christ and Israel will be crushed at his second coming. (Dan 2:34, 45)
        • All people in the world through all history must make a decision about Jesus Christ, to either stand with Him or to stand against Him.
        • To stand against Jesus Christ means eternal destruction.
        • What did Jesus mean by the words, “Whosoever shall fall upon that stone shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.” (18)

A person that comes to Christ in humility and repentance for sin has his pride of self-reliance and self-existence broken.

The person that does not humble himself in this way will be judged in the final judgment of non-believers and reap the reward of eternal damnation and separation from God.

• • • What is the central truth of the parable?
      • God gave a sacred responsibility to the Jews, and He gave them many promises and privileges, but they failed him by killing his prophets and rejecting his son, Jesus Christ. God would therefore set aside the Jews for a time and build with a believing group of Gentiles.
      • In this parable, Jesus tells us who He is, the Son of God, and of his coming death at the hands of the religious authorities.
        • Notice that after Isa 5:1-7, there is a series of 6 curses upon the Jewish leaders. That same pattern in repeated in Matthew 23:13-39.
        • Jesus pronounces 8 curses upon the Jewish leaders of his day in the book of Matthew.
• Application:
  • The Jews were chosen by God to serve God. He gave them certain responsibilities. Christians, in this New Testament church age, are chosen by God to serve God. God has given us the responsibility to preach the Gospel and to preserve His word.
  • If God lifted his hand of blessing and protection from the Jews because of their failure to fulfill their responsibilities, He will also do the same to the Gentile Christian churches that fail their responsibility of leading others to God. (Rev 2:5 Rev 3:16)

Homework
Luke 20:20-47

• Application of Luk 20:1-19
  • Read Mar 16:13-16. This is the responsibility God gave to every believer in Jesus Christ.
    • How are you doing with your sacred responsibility?
• Preparation for Luk 20:20-47
  • Read Luk 20:20-47
    • Why did Jesus tell them to pay Caesar when the coin had an inscription that said Caesar was God?
    • What does Psa 110:1 mean? (Advanced question)
  • Memory Verse: Rev 6:16