Lectionary Readings: Year A – Proper 22

Today’s Gospel gets presented to us as a parable, but it’s actually what we would call an allegory. What’s the difference, you ask? A parable is a short story focused on human experience in order to teach a moral or spiritual lesson. An allegory is a story where symbols are used to identify people, places, and things in the real world, in order to make a point about the current situation.

We know that what we heard today is an allegory, because the leaders of the people knew that Jesus was talking about them. They understood the symbols in the story, and realized that it could refer to no one else but them.

So, what exactly did these guys pick up on, in order to get so mad? In our Isaaiah reading today, we see very clearly that “the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel.” It was common to refer to Israel as a vineyard, and so that symbolism automatically hits home. The owner of the vineyard is obviously God, and the workers in the vineyard are these men to whom Jesus is talking, the chief priests, the scribes, and the teachers of the law. The messengers that have been sent to collect the harvest are the prophets, who had been sent to Israel to repeatedly call them to repentance, and to get them to return to worshiping God alone. And finally, of course, the son is Jesus.

And, in this story, the son is killed. Jesus is telling them, “Yes, I get it. You hate me. And because of this hatred, you’re going to kill me. And when you kill me, you will have solidified God’s judgment against you. And then God will take the vineyard and give it to people who produce the harvest expected. Because you all did not produce the harvest.” These people, the ones who were supposed to be tending the vineyard, were not producing the harvest that God wanted. And when the chief priests and the Pharisees heard this, they wanted to arrest him, but they didn’t, because they were afraid of the crowds. They were afraid of the people who thought that Jesus was a prophet. And because they were afraid, they did not use their power to arrest him – which they easily could have done. Instead they run away.

So. This is the story. An allegory. Apparently, intended for the chief priests and the Pharisees. And if it was intended for these men that Jesus was talking to in that day and age, how do we understand how any of this applies to us? 

The quickest way to take this information is to put ourselves into the position of the players in the story. Are we the disciples? In this case, they aren’t even mentioned. The only real players are Jesus and the leaders of the people. And, I suppose that none of us want to claim that we are Jesus in this story. So we’re left with the chief priests and Pharisees. And the question we have to ask ourselves is, “Are we, in any way, doing the same thing as these scribes and Pharisees?”

Let’s take a moment and look at the messengers, the prophets, the ones who came to collect the harvest and who were instead beaten and killed. The big names that would have made an impression on the leaders that Jesus was talking to were Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel. Each of them came to Israel with a very specific call to change their ways. And, of course, all of these specific requests had a common theme – but we’ll get to that in a moment.

Isaiah came talking about how the people of Israel were forgetting their duty to seek justice. Instead, they were watching as the poor, the destitute, the widows, orphans, and strangers in the land were being treated unfairly. Social injustice was rampant, and the people of Israel were spiritually complacent, not caring about what was happening to those around them. Why? Because at that time Israel had military power, and all sorts of military and political alliances so that most of the people really didn’t care what happened to those suffering injustice – especially if they were not affected themselves. They put their faith in those alliances, their political and military power, and did not look to God for help – because they felt they could do it all themselves.

Then along came Daniel, who warned the people that there would always be powerful kingdoms in the world. And that when these kingdoms became too powerful, they would grow arrogant, and they would fall. They would fall because they had put too much faith in their continued existence in their own power, instead of into the hands of God where it belongs.

Then Jeremiah, around the same time as Daniel, came and told people that they were suffering from rampant corruption and moral decay. That they needed to return to the laws of God so that they could stand before God with a clean conscience. Instead, Jeremiah told them, “No one brings suit justly; no one goes to law honestly; they rely on empty pleas; they speak lies, conceiving mischief and bearing iniquity” (Isaiah 59:4). That is, people are making frivolous lawsuits, going to the courts over what are clearly lies, hoping to cause dissension and division and chaos. I suppose it doesn’t take much of an imagination to see how that might apply to our current culture just as well as it did to Israel during the time of Jeremiah.

And finally, the prophet Ezekiel began to prophecy. And while Ezekiel overlapped with both Jeremiah and Daniel, the people of Israel were now in exile in Babylon. They were in exile because they hadn’t listened to Isaiah, Jeremiah, or Daniel, and God had judged them and sent them off to Babylon to learn a lesson. Ezekiel’s major theme was that the people needed to take personal accountability for their actions. That they should not rely on the sacrifices made by the priests for the entire people of Israel, but that each of them should stand before God with a clean conscience, knowing that they upheld the law. Instead, the people were violent, they lived with extortion, bribery, and systemic corruption throughout the land. And because of this, the poor and the vulnerable were suffering. All while they worshiped something other than God – usually an idol of their own making, be it wealth, social standing, success, or even their own self-reliance. It’s easy to make something else more important than God. Because usually these things that become an idol are things we respect and consider wonderful: like caring for family, job successes, the security that comes with wealth. But each of these things can easily become more important than God in our lives, when we focus on them, rather than God.

Every one of these prophets came telling the people of Israel that they were failing to worship God, and were instead worshiping something else. And because they were worshiping an idol, they were failing to care for the world around them. They were allowing injustices to accumulate, they were allowing the poor and marginalized to go hungry and be treated with contempt, they were committing violence against the immigrants in the land, and they were corrupt at every level. 

And God judged the people of Israel. God sent them into exile.

This is the background that Jesus brings to the argument with the chief priests and the Pharisees. This is what Jesus is accusing them of. And Jesus is also telling them they will be receiving the same type of judgment that the Israel of history received.

No wonder they are mad. Mad enough to arrest and kill him.

If this whole thing is an allegory, and the way we find meaning in the story is to put ourselves in the shoes of the characters in the story, then we have to ask ourselves, “Are we, in any way, like these people who ignored the prophets? Are we doing the same thing they did?”

If not, then great. If you never fail, and you never do wrong, then wonderful. I applaud you, and thank God that you have achieved sainthood through your own good works.

But, if you are like me, and you see in yourself the tendencies to do some of the things that the prophets warned the people of Israel about – if you see in yourself the ability to look to other things instead of God – then, even then, there is still something beautiful to see from this story.

If these workers in the vineyard killed everyone who came to them, and if this was a story about how Israel repeatedly turned from God toward idols of power, greed, corruption, and injustice, and relied on themselves, then it reveals something about God.

God is patient. God is slow to anger. God is relenting from punishment. And God is full of steadfast love.

It doesn’t matter how many times Israel fell away from God. It doesn’t matter all that they did. God kept calling the people back. 

And it doesn’t matter how many times we fail. In fact, it doesn’t even matter what we do. What matters is what Christ has done for us, and that we accept that gift. And when we fail to acknowledge that gift, that we then return to God. This is why Paul wrote that we press on to make the value of knowing Christ our own. We forget what lies behind and we strain forward to what lies ahead. 

Why?

Because Christ Jesus has made us his own.

The people of Israel failed repeatedly. And God called them back again and again. We might fail repeatedly, but we can know that every time we return, God is there, waiting for us.

[This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on October 4, 2026.]