YOU SHALL NOT MOLEST OR OPPRESS AN ALIEN

HOMILY FOR THE 30^TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, YEAR A

Rev. Fr. Ezekoka Peter Onyekachi

A woman had told the story of how a man she called her husband molested her. It started with the man beating and insulting her, and telling her she had nowhere else to go. It came in the form of drugs he introduced to her and supplied her with to keep her from getting sick. Whenever he wants to force the woman to go against her own will, he would withhold the drugs until he got what he wanted. He constantly talked to her in a manner that made her constantly lose her self-esteem. She had a son who was got out of wedlock, and who the woman had tried not to disclose her past she considered shameful. This man would always threaten his wife whom he molested with this secret that if she resists him in whatever means he would disclose it to the boy; and that was the last thing the wife wanted. She had no one to lean on. She kept on managing.

The man also physically abused this young boy that he wondered if really he was his father. Due to the woman’s character which she swore to protect, she managed and covered these misdemeanours. This man would always portray himself to visitors as a quiet and gentle man that no one thought of him in that direction. These happenings led the boy to several suicidal attempts as a result of his health. He was diagnosed as having lobe epilepsy as a result of the trauma in the hands of his father. When the woman saw that she was about to lose her son, she was pushed to seek for help. She went out of herself, disregarding the shame she always had, disregarding the name she always protected, and went to a spiritual director and counsellor. She encountered God and her life and the Son’s life changed for good. Surely, the man had to face the law. How often do we suffer because we are silent, silenced by many forces, silenced by empty threats, silenced by the fear of the unknown and the fear of shame?

The First Reading (Exod. 22:20-26) of today starts with a clear assertive statement: you shall not molest or oppress an alien? It continued: you shall not wrong any widow or orphan. The question becomes: who is an alien, widow and orphan? Aliens are foreigners who live in the midst of Israel and enjoy certain rights. Since they do not enjoy full rights on a par with Israelites, they are often victims of oppression. And so, aliens are the people living more or less permanently in a community other than their own. Widows are the women who have lost their husbands. Orphans are the persons who have lost their parents. Hence, they can all be termed the weak members of the society. However and extensively too, the weak members of the society can also be persons who face one form of abuse or the other, those who have no one to report to or to hear them out, those who are under threat, those who suffer silently yet wish to come out from such, those who have been traumatized by one thing or the other.

There is a much larger way we can explain who an alien is, and this brings me to our lead story. An alien can be one excluded from certain privileges and opportunities and who has been denied certain rights. An alien can be one who has been estranged from realizing himself, suffers degeneration and inhuman treatment, and fearful to break the bonds that imprisons him/her. He dies slowly yet no one knows what he suffers within himself. He comes out and portrays that he is ok, yet goes inside and suffers insomnia. Many have lost their lives through such alienation. Indeed, many of us have suffered from various cases of molestation, oppression and abuses, and in such occasions, we become aliens to ourselves, aliens to our esteem, aliens to our vocation, aliens to our profession, aliens to our life aspirations, and aliens to our visions and ambitions. Many have fizzled out of existence as aliens to themselves not realizing their God-given potentials. It is true that a true Christian is one who loves everyone sincerely and does not support any form of molestation and abuse, neither does he/she practice it. But it is much truer that a truly strong and just society provides and cares more for its weakest members. Come to think of it what happens then when the Church participates in dealing with her weak members and inflicting pains on those whom she ought to fight to defend?

God hates oppression. There is a divine involvement in oppression. God makes an option for the poor. There is no double ways about it. God gives Israelites condition of allowing them dwell in the land of promise. In the oracle of Jeremiah 7:6, the Lord says to the people: if you do not oppress the sojourner, the fatherless or the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place...then I will let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave of old to your fathers forever. The Lord was hot on Israel in Ezekiel 22:7, the reason being that they treat father and mother with contempt, the sojourner suffers extortion in their hands, the fatherless and the widow are wronged. There are more strict laws in the Bible to ensure the protection of the poor. In Leviticus 19:10, the Lord instructs that the vineyard owners must not strip their yards bare neither must they gather the fallen grapes. These ones are t o be left for the poor and for the sojourner. In Deut. 24:14, there is an instruction never to oppress a hired servant who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your brothers or one of the sojourners who are in your land within your towns.

The divine involvement in oppression becomes harder if the person oppressed cries out to God. If ever you wrong them and they cry to me, I will surely hear their cry, my wrath will flare up, and I will kill you with the sword, then your own wives will be widows, and your children orphans (Exodus 22:23-24). That woman got her help because she went out of herself. When we cry out to God, he surely responds. In the parable of the persistent widow, Jesus asked a very direct question and will not God give justice to his elect who cry to him day and night? (Luke 18:7). The Psalmist confirms it in his psalmody: in my distress, I called upon the Lord, to my God I cried for help. From his temple, he heard my voice, and my cry to him reached his ears (Psalm 18:6). When Job suffered and wanted to lose his feet, Elihu rebuked him and his three friends and reminded them of God’s way: that God hears the cry of the poor and the afflicted (Job 34:28). In Gen. 4:10, the voice of the poor Abel cried to the Lord from the ground, and he heard it.

What is it that can lead us to molestation and oppression others? It starts from our ego. It starts when we fail to control our thirst for self-importance. It starts when we see ourselves as gods to be worshiped. It starts when we see others as nothing. It starts when we forget that we too have our limitations and mistakes. It starts when we believe and convince ourselves that the whole world must revolve around us. It starts when we view our fellows as items for merely satisfying our pleasures. It starts when we see people around as instruments for massaging our ego. If we try to control the early beginnings, then we stand on a better plane to fight against the oppression of the poor, the strangers and the aliens; then will these cases of physical, emotional and sexual abuses rampart in our society be drastically reduced until they are ceremoniously annihilated.

The catalyst to enhance such control is LOVE. This is what Jesus summarized in the Gospel (Matt 22:34-40) as the greatest of all the commandments. It is dual: the love of God and the love of neighbour. Love must be derived from God and extended to man. One who loves God keeps his commandments. One who loves his neighbour does not molest or abuse him/her. Love is divine. Love does not molest, does not threaten, does not intimidate, does not bear grudges, does not frustrate. Love uplifts, saves, elevates and enlivens the spirit. We must dare to love. In love are many challenges. However, love anyway. One last thing: do well to use this week to apologize to that person whom you have molested, oppressed or abused. As you do this, may love accompany you and may this week be filled with love for you from God and from your neighbours. Amen. God bless you.

WHAT DOES CAESAR OWN?

HOMILY FOR THE 29^TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, YEAR A

Rev. Fr. Ezekoka Peter Onyekachi

A little boy was very fortunate to have had parents who provided everything he needed and even more. During the festive seasons, such as Christmas, the boy was sure to get more gifts and presents from the dad. He had all he wanted. He had clothing, toys, and some cash to buy ever he wanted. He really looked up towards such seasons. However, there lived another boy in the neighbourhood who was simply the opposite. The parents cared little or less, and constantly exhorted him to manage whatever they had. He would simply wash his old cloths and iron them during the festive seasons. Nothing whatsoever differentiated the festive seasons from the normal seasons. These two boys were friends and always played together. One day, the poor boy mistakenly spoilt a toy belonging to the rich boy. The rich boy was so embittered that he called his poor friend demining names, adding that he should stop handling his toys since he was sure that he could not have one. The mother of the rich boy who was at an insignificant corner heard this and hushed her son adding: how many of what you have do you think are really yours?  And that is the likely question I have employed as the topic of my reflection today: what actually does Caesar own? How many of what Caesar has does he think belongs to him?

The Gospel (Matt 22:15-21) of today provides us with a leverage for answering the question. The Pharisees and he Jews who listened to Jesus speak to them in parables (the parable of the two sons, the parable of the tenants, and the parable of the wedding feast) must have felt deeply insulted that they sought for ways of having strong evidence for his arrest. So, two parties were sent to Jesus –the disciples of the Pharisees and Herodians– to inquire whether it was lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not. The type of parties sent suggests a clear mischief and insincere desire for the question.  Pharisees and the Herodians are never friends. They were in opposition. The Pharisees were the orthodox Jews who were against the payment of taxes, especially to a foreign king because it would bring about an infringement to the divine right of God. The Herodians were the party of Herod, the king of Galilee, whose power came from Rome, and thus insisted vehemently on taxation. They had come together because they had now a common enemy –Jesus. One can imagine how their differences were forgotten in a common hatred for Jesus and a common desire to destroy him.

The tax demanded to be paid was called a poll tax. This tax had to be paid by every male person from age 14 to 65, and every female person from age 12 to 65. Matthew was also writing in a time when the Jews were forced to continue paying their taxes even when the Jerusalem Temple was destroyed, that the money would be channelled to the temple of Jupiter in Rome. So, every core Jew would be firstly inclined never to agree to such payment that would suggest reverence to another god. Thus, the evangelist had to narrate this story to encouraging his brethren to act from the famous answer of Christ: Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God. Here, Jesus lays down a solid principle. Every Christian has dual citizenship; of the earth and of heaven. Every Christian owes civil obedience to the government of his country. The Christian is a man of honour and thus must be a responsible citizen. Failure in good citizenship is failure in Christian duty. St. Paul tells Titus to remind Christian to be subject to rulers and authorities and be obedient and ready to do whatever is good (Titus 3:1). We owe the kings our respect. The Christian has a duty to the Caesars of this world in return for the privileges which the rule of Caesar brings him, such as electricity, good roads, water, security, employment, etc. Every Christian is also a citizen of heaven. He must also observe his Christian duties and must dictate with his conscience where the boundary of both citizenships lies. Fear God and honour the emperor, Peter (1 Pet 2:17) said.

Jesus demanded that he be given a coin and simply asked a question: whose image is this? The question led him to the conclusion that since the coin had the stamp of Caesar’s head; it should go back to Caesar. In the ancient times, such stamps on coins were signs of kingship. Every king had his. So, it was always the first sign that power had changed hands. When another king comes, he brings out his own coinage. And that brings me to the vanity of what Caesar actually owns. It is something which lives as long as the Caesar lives. The coins are changed with the change of kingship. So, that which Caesar owns is transient, unnecessary, and temporal. But what God owns is long-lasting, necessary and eternal. Thus, which option stand better; the one which passes away or the one which does not pass away? Money may belong to Caesar but human beings belong to God, just as money is the creature of man as man is the creature of God. The actual final logic will boil down to the fact that everything belongs to God because even the intelligence man uses is offered to him by God.

The first Reading (Isaiah 421.4-6) helps to clarify this point well. Every king belongs to God. God is free to use any king to accomplish his mission. The oracle of Isaiah regards Cyrus as an anointed king of the Lord, the Liberator of Israel. Cyrus is a Persian King. Persia rose as the world power after Babylon. And so, a Persian king is an anointed, not an Israelite. Persian religion was dualistic; there was a god of light, responsible for the good, and a god of darkness responsible for evil. But Isaiah insists that one God created both light and darkness (45:7). So, nothing belongs to any other god, but only the one true God. The central concentration of this oracle is that Yahweh is the creator of all, and so everyone belongs to him, regardless of race. It is Cyrus who will grant the decree to rebuild Jerusalem after it was destroyed by Babylon. He is God’s anointed (45:1). The idea that God’s purposes can be achieved through pagan kings was favoured by some other prophets. Jeremiah declared Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian to be the servant of God (Jer. 27:6). Thus, it is God who makes kings. He uses whosoever he desires. He now uses Cyrus to bring about Israel’s restoration. And so, every king belongs to him, including Caesar. Caesar belongs to God. Therefore, even when Caesar may claim that the coin belongs to him, we are sure that God created heaven and earth, and so owns both Caesar and the money.

To go back to our lead story, we find out that nothing actually belonged to the rich boy. He is answerable at that stage to his parents and all he possessed was because of his parents. So, the credence goes to his parents, and if there should be any form of boasting, the parents ought to spearhead it. Nothing belongs to Caesar because Caesar is answerable to God, not to himself. We are answerable to our maker. We ought not to live our lives as if we are not answerable to God, for everything belongs to Him. This is also a lesson for the kings of the world. To live like a king who is answerable to God, there must not be any abuse of power. No king should maltreat or deprive those he/she is ruling of their rights and privileges. The position of kingship is the position to serve with no selfish desire overshadowing the common good. Even as people owe you obedience and submissiveness because you represent God (cf. Rom. 13:1), you owe them respect and service because they are God-made (cf. Gen. 1:23). Therefore, giving to Caesar what belongs to Caesar is giving God what actually is answerable to Him, because everything belongs to God. When you make donations for the good of your community or the Church, you must know that you are doing it for God. When you do your work judiciously in your office, pay your taxes, does not take bribes, pay your burial levies, etc., you must realize that it is to God that you do it. May the Lord help us to continually realize that everything belongs to Him, and never to any human being. Amen. God bless you.

WE ARE INVITED TO THE GREAT FEAST

HOMILY FOR THE 28^TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, YEAR A

Rev. Fr. Ezekoka Peter Onyekachi

Every great feast attracts great number of people. And as humans, we are very acquainted with celebrations and banquets. In our own human celebrations and merriments, the person inviting others does normally expect his invitees to honour his/her invitation; otherwise it becomes disappointing. On the part of the invitee, it is also a mark of a gentleman and a show of friendliness and affection to honour an invitation from a friend. If the invitation is dishonoured without any cogent reason, then somehow there is some disaffection and a rupture of trust. No one enjoys disappointments.Today, we are all invited by God himself to come for the great feast which he prepares for us, and He expects us to come in our wedding garments. Far be it from us that we shall reject such a divine invitation.

The message of the First Reading (Is. 25:6-10a) is so clear; and that is the image of the great banquet. This banquet has some features. 1) The banquet suggests a celebration after the victory is won. No reasonable man celebrates when the time has not come yet. 2) In this case, the banquet is situated on a mountain, most probably mount Zion. In the letter to the Hebrews 12, Mount Zion is the city of God where millions of Angels are gathered for festival (v.22). It is a place where the heavenly first born sons gather (v. 23). It is a place where the spirits of the righteous are made perfect (v. 23). It is a place of meeting with Jesus the great mediator of the new covenant. It is a place we encounter the strongest blood which pleads more insistently than the blood of Abel (v. 24). We remember how the blood of Abel cried to the Lord from the ground (Gen 4:10). This implies that it is a very strong blood. However, the blood of Christ is the strongest.

3) It is a feast for all peoples, in line with the tradition that all the nations would gather in Zion. It will be a total newness. 4) The feast reflects the desire of impoverished people for a bountiful meal. It is in this feast that Our Lord supplies whatever we need in accord with his glorious riches in Christ Jesus, as the Second Reading (Phil. 4:12-14;19-20). In it, God wipes every tear from our eyes. Thus, the feast reflects the intent of Rev. 21:1-4. 5. It does not end only in feasting; for in it God will destroy death forever (cf. Rev. 20:4.14). God will ultimately remove every threat hanging over humanity, every sorrow and humiliation. Hence, this feast insists on a lasting joy; that type of joy that is holistic and that does not admit of any pain.

In the Gospel Reading (Matt. 22:1-14), Jesus himself tells a parable of the nature of this great feast. The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son, and sent his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast. This is in the context of a normal Jewish custom. When the invitations to a great feast were sent out, the time was not stated until everything was ready. When everything was ready, the servants were sent out with a final summons to inform the guests to come. So, this parable presumes that the king had already sent out invitations, but it was not till everything was prepared that the final summons was issued. The invited guests insultingly refused. This invited guests that refused to come stand for the Jews. They had long ago made a covenant with God to be God’s chosen people, but when the son of God, Jesus came, they rejected him with contempt. The result of this would be that the invitation went out to all and sundry. The people in the highways and the byways stand for the Gentiles and the sinners, who were not initially invited and were not in expectant of any invitation.

The king was angry with those who dishonoured the invitation, and had to send out troops to destroy them and to burn down their cities. They paid deaf ears to the invitation; one went to his farm, another to his business, while the rest seized and shamefully killed the servants. It is very easy for a man to be so busy with the things of time that he forgets the things of eternity, to be so occupied with the things which are seen that he forgets the things which are unseen, to hear so easily the noise of the world that he cannot hear the gentle voice of God. We can be so busy making a living that we forget to make life. And when the forgetfulness of the salient things is stretched so much, we are led to commit more atrocities that creates bigger chasm between the unnecessary and the necessary. At a very critical look, this destruction seems out of place when viewed in the context of the invitation to a feast. We must therefore situate this verse on the period of composition of the Gospel of Matthew. Matthew composed his Gospel between 80 and 90 AD. Historically, the destruction of Jerusalem by the armies of Rome occurred in 70 AD. The temple was sacked and burned and the city destroyed. Hence, Matthew tried to look unto history to narrate that destruction actually came on those who refused to recognize Jesus as the son of God when he came.

We are invited to a great wedding feast and not a funeral. Every event has its dress code. The invitation is to joy. To think of Christianity as a gloomy giving up of everything which brings laughter and sunshine and happy fellowship is to mistake its whole nature. We are invited to joy, and any who refuses the invitation refuses joy. The king had to scrutinize his new guests, and had to send out the one who was not on his wedding garment. It is true that the door is open to all, but when they come they must bring a life which seeks to fit the love which has been given to them. Grace is not only a gift. It evokes grave responsibility. One cannot go ahead living the life he was living before he met Christ. There must be a new clothing of purity, holiness and goodness. The door is open to all sinners, but not for the sinner to come and remain a sinner, but for the sinner to come and become a saint. It may be true that this parable has nothing to do with the clothes in which we go to Church, but it has everything to do with the spirit with which we go to God’s house. When one decides to visit a friend, the garment tells much. A reasonable friend knows the garment to put on at different occasions. There are ones for the market place, for the farm, for the Church and for entertainment.

It is sincerely true that church-going is never a fashion parade, but it is even truer that the garments of the mind, soul and heart reflect the garment of the body. Often, we go to Church unprepared to worship, with no petition, no self-examination, and no disposition to worship. In this case, we are not on our wedding garment. We come to church moody or to know the latest news among the members of the church that may constitute item for gossip. In this case still, we are not on our wedding garment. We must put on a new self for worship. If every one of us can be actually prepared for worship, with right intentions, dispositions, prayers and self-examination, then worship would be worship indeed. It will yield great benefits for the Church and the society in which we live. When we are called to enjoy this great feast, we must know that some who rejected the invitation in the past met their doom, and that the invitation requires particular garment, the garment of sincerity, honesty and true profession of the faith in Jesus Christ. That is the condition of being among the chosen ones of the Lord after having been called, for those with the lamb are called and chosen and faithful (Rev. 17:14). My prayer this week for everyone is to be among those who are in their wedding garment when the king comes to scrutinize his guests. Happy Sunday. God bless you.

USURPING THE VINEYARD OF GOD (They threw Him out and killed Him)

 
HOMILY FOR THE 27^TH SUNDAY IN THE ORDINARY TIME, YEAR A

Rev. Fr. Ezekoka Peter Onyekachi

The inordinate desire for property acquisition that has enveloped the world is alarming. Mankind has failed to realize that she is not the actual owner of the mother earth. She has disregarded the owner of the earth, and has ascertained herself as the centre of the universe. We have moved towards anthropocentrism; that is seeing man as the ‘be all’ and ‘end all’ of the universe. Mankind has in various ways and manner tried to prove to herself that she are the highest being that exist. She makes effort to disprove the existence of the owner of the earth. We tend to bury the truthful words of the Psalmist that the earth belongs to the Lord, and everything in it; the world and those who dwell therein (Psalm 24:1). The disheartening aspect is that even when mankind claim to be the actual owner of the earth, she does not handle her with proper care and attention. Mankind exploits the globe, instead of exploring the natural resources put therein. The injunction of Genesis to fill the earth and subdue it (Gen 1:28) is not one of exploitation but one of careful exploration. Our environment has been degraded so much that human beings have again started to cry over the effect of such depletion on human life. This explains the call to study ecology with an eco-spirituality that takes care of the world. We are labourers and should not be usurpers of God’s vineyard.   

In the Gospel of today (Matt 21:33-43), Jesus tells a parable of the tenants who went an extra mile in evil to possess and usurp a vineyard that was not theirs. The landlord sent his servants to get the fruits when the time for harvest reached, but they killed those servants and when he again thought that sending his own son would make them submit, they killed too his son. They took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him (Matt 21:31). And in fact, it is this that sentence forms the line of my reflection today. What/where is the vineyard? Who are the ‘they’ that killed? Who is that ‘him’ that was killed?

What is the Vineyard?

1. The vineyard agriculturally is a farmland. The Israelites of the time of Christ are familiar with the picture the Gospel presents concerning the vineyard. Vineyards have peculiar constructions. The hedge was a thick edge thorn hedge designed to protect the land against wild animals and thieves who might steal the grapes. Vineyards had winepress. The wine press is made of two troughs either hollowed out of the rock, or built of bricks. One was a little higher than the other, and was connected to the lower one by a channel. The vineyard was owned by landlords who usually left their estates in the hands of others, and were only interested in collecting the rental at the right time. It might be paid as a rental, or in percentage or a fixed number of the fruits. Due to the situation of the country then, the workers were normally discontented with the landlords that many times they grow rebellious.

2. The vineyard is Israel. The vineyard demands a lot of attention and fortification. Thus, it would be highly frustrating for the workers or the landlord to go through the hurdles and at the end of the day, the vines are unable to produce grapes, or worse still that the vines produce less number of grapes as would have expected, or they produce wild ones. This is the situation in the First Reading (Isaiah 5:1-7) of today whereby the Lord regards Israel as his vineyard. The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel. As his vineyard, the Lord expects Israel to produce adequate grapes, but instead the fruits ended up becoming wild. Hence, the dignity of the vineyard as a respectable agricultural venture will be withdrawn. It can only be wished what Christ wished for the Fig tree in John 13. And in John 15:2, he cuts every branch that bears no fruit. Those materials that make the vineyard honourable will be razed; if this happens, the vineyard loses its title and becomes like others. And this is how the dignity and respect of the Israelites would be held in check since they have failed to reciprocate to the divine love and care unto them.

3. The vineyard is the kingdom of God which we must look after. This is an understanding derived from the Gospel of today. Christ entrusts his kingdom to us and expects us to cultivate it, and render proper stewardship. We are like the tenants who take care of his vineyard. All of us have the rights to work in the Lord’s vineyard. God trust us so much; little wonder he totally gives us his vineyard to till and cultivate. Humans are the caretakers of this vineyard, not even the angels. In Psalm 8:6, we read: you made him ruler over the works of your hands, put all things under his feet. The world is this vineyard. It belongs to God. The Church too is this vineyard. How do we take care of the Church? How do we take care of the earth? Do our reactions portray the reaction of those tenants who killed the other servants? In fact, these questions link me to the second consideration. Many of us today have in one way or the other usurped the vineyard of God. Some of us see the Church as our property and as a place for enriching ourselves. Some of us hide under the cover of being Christians to commit atrocities. Some ministers have tried to convert the people of God to people of (a particular pastor or priest). This is usurpation. The vineyard belongs to God, and we are his labourers.

Who are the ‘they’?

1. They are the rebellious tenants who refuse to pay their master. They even went to the extent of eliminating the people he sent up to his only son. What a malice!!! The more he sent, the more they killed. They were over-ruled by material possession, and were bent on eliminating anyone to inordinately posses the land. They knew that the vineyard was not theirs. In the context of the parable of Christ, the cultivators are the religious leaders of Israel (which extends to our religious leaders today). Man deliberately rebels against God. He wants to rule and be in-charge of the vineyard himself, and not being a mere worker. He wants to be the ruler of the earth. He wants to be the head of the Church. For instance, some Church posters today are replacing the pictures of Jesus with the pictures of themselves, wives and children.

2. Those tenants wanted to take all the proceeds alone. They did not want their landlord to even share with them. What a protracted selfishness!!! Sometimes, we want to appropriate things for ourselves without considering others. We do not even want to listen to the language of sharing. We just need everything for ourselves. We claim everything. We claim to have made everybody around. Some have made themselves gods that they would not want to share their glories with anyone. We need everything for ourselves to the extent of killing, slandering and persecuting the servants of God. Thus, the servant of God is called to suffer.

3. The tenants will be put to miserable death. If we are not careful, the landlord of the vineyard would take back his vineyard and give it to another group of cultivators. The time of judgment comes. God is coming to destroy the wicked. The destruction will be terrible since he has manifested himself a very patient God. The tenants will be bundled and wretched to a miserable death. The vineyard will be cultivated by another person. God will raise up a new people to care of the vineyard. Since they refused to be accountable, they are meant to face their consequences of their actions. But lands that produce thorns and thistles are worthless and are in danger of being cursed. In the end, it will be burned (Heb 6:8). When we do not remain in Christ, we are thrown away and wither (John 15:6).

Who is the ‘Him’?

1. It is Jesus. The landlord finally sent his son. The era of sending servants were over. Perhaps, they would listen to His voice and respect him. He condescended and asked the son to leave the glory of the father’s palace in pursuance of the rebellious tenants. The son is Jesus Christ. God sent his only son. He condescended and asked his son to leave the glory of heaven and eternity so as to bring us good news; and in so doing speak face to face with man. The son was different from all the servants sent previously. Christ made this unique claim on himself. He is more than a servant.  

2. The tenants saw the son of God. There were many kinds of evidence that gave indications to the Jews that Christ was the Messiah: the Old Testament prophecies, the testimony of John the Baptist, the deeds and teachings of Jesus himself, the signs of the time (cf. Gal.4:4), etc. However, they tried to suppress these indications deliberately because of their sin and greed for position, esteem, power and security. This occurs among us today. Even though many of us may know the truth of what or whom our fellow is, we are inclined to suppressing those truthful indications out of jealousy and greed which always have the endpoint of perdition.

3. The tenants plotted to kill the son. They planned to seize his inheritance; an inheritance that was not actually theirs. Men desire to possess the kingdom, nation, property, power, rule, recognition and wealth. Whatever be the position, they are even ready to kill so as to have it. The tenants murdered the son. They committed the worst crime in human history. They killed the son of God. The extreme desire for material possession leads to doom. It makes us to disregard the most important things in our lives; to disregard the very foundation of our lives.

4. Jesus is the cornerstone. The Gospel ended with the picture of the stone. The STONE which the builders rejected has become the connerstone. Christ is that cornerstone. The symbolism of Christ as the connerstone has two things to tell us. The connerstone is the first stone to be laid. All other stones are placed after it. It is the preeminent stone in time; He is the firstborn of all creation. The connerstone is the supportive stone. All other stones placed upon it are held by it. Christ is the support and power; the foundation of God’s new creation. So, Christ is the only true foundation upon which a man can build. For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 3:11). All who are not laid upon Christ simply crumbles. It may seem that the Jews rejected Christ as we do today, but they would find out that the Christ whom they rejected is the most important person in the world.

For us today, Christ remains the foundational stone of our lives. As the connerstone, we rely on him for support and strength. ‘Standing To Operate Notwithstanding Everything’ is the lot of anyone who has Christ as his/her connerstone. With Christ, we stand to operate regardless of anything that is on our way. If we make Jesus our connerstone, we shall defeat the temptation of seeing ourselves as the actual owners of the vineyard, and so will not usurp in any way. This is my prayer for all of us as I wish us a blessed week ahead. God bless you.