Lectionary Readings: Year A – Proper 21

Several years ago, I had a neighbor who was in the process of moving from one church to another. He was excited about the new church. Telling everyone how great it was. Until suddenly it wasn’t great. He complained about everything in the church, from music to sermons to the quality of the formation classes or other activities and the people leading them. He was always the righteous person in every scenario, and the church and those who worked there were always the worst possible type of people. And that same excitement he had when the church was new, he now threw into making sure that everyone knew just how bad the church was. Eventually, he left – and took a chunk of the people with him to a new church – because they had bought into his lies and misinformation. He repeated the same cycle two more times while I knew him. And, as it turns out, when I first met him, that new church he was excited about was part of the cycle. He never apologized for his actions, and never felt he was in the wrong. 

He wasn’t concerned about doing good. He was concerned about looking good. Looking good by always being the righteous warrior in his epic campaign to find the perfect church – and to point out the errors of those churches that didn’t measure up.

There’s a whole lot of people trying to look good in today’s Gospel, even if it doesn’t seem like it from the reading. When the chief priest and the elders came to Jesus to ask him who gave him the right to do what he was doing, they were responding to a bunch of events where Jesus was doing good, but not necessarily looking good.

Just a few verses before we get to our Gospel reading, Jesus had gone into the temple, and had seen a bunch of vendors and money lenders who were taking advantage of the poor and common people who were coming to make sacrifices at the temple. Jesus flipped over the tables these people were using, and chased them out of the temple. He yelled at them for making God’s house into a den of thieves and robbers. And then, in that temple, cleared of those who were cheating others out of money, Jesus healed the sick, the lame, the blind. And those people began to praise him, saying, “Hosannah to the Son of David!” 

Now, the chief priest and the elders obviously did not like this. FIrst, they had not done anything about the abuse of the poor in the temple system; mostly because they were benefitting from that corrupt system. And secondly, and probably more importantly to them, they didn’t like that the people were calling Jesus the “Son of David.” It meant people were calling him the messiah. They were supposed to be the people who looked good, and now they were starting to look bad. Because Jesus protected the poor and innocent, and healed the sick. All while they stood by and did nothing.

This is why they asked Jesus who gave him the authority to do these things. A question about authority is really a battle of wills. Is Jesus doing what the chief priest and elders want him to do? No. So who is giving him the right to do what he is doing? If Jesus had said that God gave him the authority, then they could have accused him of blasphemy, because, after all, they were the people who controlled access to God. If he had said that the Romans or some other earthly power had given him this authority, then they could have accused him of being a traitor. It was a lose-lose situation for Jesus.

Or so they thought.

This is why Jesus responded with a question about John the Baptist’s authority. And we see how the elders squirm. Jesus has flipped the tables on them too. He is forcing them to confront why they want to get rid of Jesus. Watching a man heal the blind, and cure the sick, and watching other people recognize him as the Messiah – and not having any control over that man meant that they were not the important people that they thought they were. So either Jesus is an imposter, or he is the Messiah, and they are no longer the ones who look good. They are no longer the righteous ones.

Jesus wants the elders to ask themselves by whose authority they are doing what they do. Do they have their position because of God? Or do they have their position in life because they have not stepped in and put an end to injustice, or looked the other way when the poor and the sick have come to the temple for aid? Do they have their position because they have done whatever they could to stay in power?

Jesus was asking them to pick a side. What do you really believe? Whose will are you doing as you lead these people and serve in the temple? Who do you really follow? Who is really your God?

And they said, “We don’t know.”

That lose-lose scenario that they had wanted to throw on Jesus now came back at them. And their answer really didn’t make any of them look good.

And, as if to rub it in, Jesus tells them this story about a father and two sons. When the father asks the sons to work in his vineyard, the first one says, “No way. That sort of thing is not for me.” But then later, he changes his mind and goes. The second son looks good. He tells his father, “Sure thing! I love that sort of work.” And then, he too changes his mind, but he does absolutely nothing. 

These stories are about doing God’s will. And the elders quickly grasp that the one who did the Father’s will was the one who changed his mind – repented – and went back and did the work. Jesus is saying, “John came with a baptism of repentance, and you didn’t believe him, but the prostitutes and tax collectors did – they accepted his baptism of repentance, and now they will get into heaven before you – because they did the will of the Father. Those that society thinks don’t look good are going to get into heaven because they did the will of the Father. They did good, those people that you thought looked bad.”

The unspoken question for the elders is this: “Are you more concerned with looking good than you are with doing good? Are you willing to repent, and do the actual work God has in store for you?” Obviously, the chief priests and elders chose a different path that day.

This question to the elders is the same question for each of us. Why do we do what we do? What motivates us? Are we more concerned with looking good or doing good? Are we willing to work for the glory of God, or are we just concerned about our own glory?

There are always going to be people who want to look good instead of doing good – like this second son in the parable who said he would do the work, but didn’t. There will always be people like him, people who want to look good, rather than doing good. There are people who will always complain about something, because the easiest way to make themselves look good is to make someone else look bad. And the easiest way to make other people look bad is to focus on the negative and spread lies and innuendo. It doesn’t matter if it’s in a job, in politics, or even the church. There will always be people who cause division and discord, no matter how well things are going. People who think that they are the Messiah in today’s Gospel, and not the chief priest and elders – people like my former neighbor. People who believe they are flipping over tables, when in fact, they’re just creating division. As St. Paul says, don’t have anything to do with those people, because you can be sure that such people are warped and sinful; they are self-condemned (Tit. 3:10-11). And spending time with them will destroy you (1 Cor. 15:33).

Looking good is all about pride. It’s about us. It’s about shaping the world so that everyone looks at us, and the shiny lies we are dangling in front of their faces, rather than looking at all the wonderful things God is doing.

Doing good is all about others. This is why Paul, in his letter to the church in Philippi, exhorted the people there to be of the same mind, to have the same love, and to do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit. Instead, they should consider others as better than themselves, and in all humility, look out for the interests of others.

In humility. 

Just like Christ humbled himself and obediently did the will of the Father who sent him – even to death on the cross.

Paul wants the believers in Philippi to live in that same humility, and to do the will of the Father who sent Christ Jesus as the model of our faith.

That first son in the parable heard his father ask him to work in the vineyard, and like a petulant teenager, at first said, “Whatever, old man,” and went on his way. But then he changed his mind and went and did the work. He repented. He changed his mind. And, more importantly, he changed his behavior. He realized that God’s way was better, and so he went and did the work he originally said he didn’t want anything to do with.

And it doesn’t even have to be a big deal when we – like this first son – change our minds and repent. We don’t need to announce it from the rooftops that we have repented. No. Humility just means that we have recognized where we have done wrong. All we need to do is change our minds, and change our ways, and do the work that God asked us to do.

Because our work in God’s Kingdom makes God look good. And that’s what it’s all about.

Do good. And make God look good. Because trying to make ourselves look good always ends up doing bad.

[This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on September 27, 2026.]