Sermons

Well, thank you very much to the musicians and the choir for leading us this morning. Could I ask you please to open your Bibles to Luke chapter 20? Luke chapter 20. This morning we come to what is the last recorded parable in Luke's gospel. It's a special one because it's one of the very few allegorical parables in Scripture in that there are lots and lots of details in the text that symbolize various realities in the world that Jesus is telling the story in. So, there's a vineyard, there's sent servants, there's the beloved son, there's the owner, there's the wicked tenants, there's judgment.

It's all talked about, and all of those have their corresponding realities that Jesus is trying to highlight. It's also a really unusual and special story because what Jesus does in His telling of it is really, He sums up the whole story of Israel's history. And especially the religious leadership history of the people. And so, in less than 10 verses He really succinctly ties together the themes that mark the religious leadership of Israel through its history. So can I ask you to stand while we read God's Word together. Luke chapter 20 and reading from verse nine. That's Luke chapter 20 and reading from verse nine.

(Scripture reading) "And He began to tell the people this parable. “A man planted a vineyard and let it out to tenants and went to another country for a long while. When the time came, he sent a servant to the tenants so that they would give him some of the fruit of the vineyard. But the tenants beat him and sent him away empty-handed. And he sent another servant, but they also beat and treated him shamefully and sent him away empty handed. And he sent yet a third. This one also they wounded and cast out.

Then the owner of the vineyard said, what shall I do? I will send my beloved son. Perhaps they will respect him. But when the tenants saw him, they said to themselves, this is the heir. Let us kill him so that the inheritance may be ours. And they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them? He will come and destroy those tenants and give the vineyard to others.

When they heard this, they said, “surely not.” But he looked directly at them and said, ‘what then is this that is written? The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces, and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.” The scribes and the chief priests sought to lay hands on him at that very hour, for they perceived that he had told this parable against them, but they feared the people." (End)

Let's pray.

(Prayer) Heavenly Father, we ask that You would help us this morning. Help us to understand the words that are in front of us. Help us, Lord, to be protected from a broken, wicked leadership that would hurt or distort gospel truth and would threaten to lead us astray. We pray instead that You would ground us in that reality that our lives, our thoughts, our everything must be measured against the words of Jesus Christ and that we must be found primarily under Him. So, Lord, we ask that You would give us that ability to understand the Word, but also to understand our own hearts and to see the ways that this Word must be applied within. For it's in Jesus' name we ask it. Amen. (End)

Have a seat.

Well, this story is graphic. It's intense. It's compelling and what I want to do is simply move down the text because I think if we can grasp the story and remember it in our heads and understand the context that Jesus is speaking in, it'll stick, it'll stay with us. And so, I want to just move down the text and then in the last few moments give just a couple of points, four points of application so that we can go away and think more about it. So, I want you to remember where this is all taking place. We are in the temple. And in particular, Jesus is the one that is in the temple, the glory of God, the Son of God. He is standing in the courts of the temple. He's turned over the tables. He's chased out the money changers. He's highlighted the corruption of the system.

He's frustrated and annoyed the religious leaders so much so that in chapter 19, verse 47, we read that they sought to destroy Him. They were out to get Him. They had determined that Jesus was one who was ruining their system. While Jesus Himself, according to chapter 20 verse 1, stayed in the temple and insisted and regularly, it says, preaching the gospel. Preaching good news. Speaking to the people. Now, the religious leaders did not like this. They didn't like the way He preached. They didn't like the authority with which He spoke and the authority with which He ruined their money-making system.

And so, they come and they question Jesus at the beginning of chapter 20 about His authority. And in His response, Jesus highlights the fact that they themselves, so they were the religious leaders, had never actually repented. They had never embraced the baptism of John. They had never acknowledged their folly, their sin, their wickedness before God and sought reconciliation.

And so, after Jesus highlights that point in chapter 20 verse 8, He makes clear He's done with them. He's finished speaking. He's nothing more to say to them. But He does have something to say to the people. And what happens is He begins in chapter 20 verse 9 to tell a story for the good of the crowd.

To tell a story basically to illustrate what was broken with those who had the authority in their religious system. The chief priest, the scribes, the elders of the people. What was wrong with them and the quality of leadership they brought before the people? These people that wanted ultimately to kill Jesus. And so, I want you to picture the scene. It's tense in the temple that day.

Josephus, the Jewish historian, he tells us a lot about how this temple looked, how it was laid out. And one of the things he tells us about the decor of the temple was that surrounding the entrance of the temple sanctuary, there was this huge golden grapevine, these golden grape clusters that were mounted signifying the people. That Israel was God's fruit.

They were, as they often were described throughout the Old Testament, for example, Isaiah chapter 5 verses 1 to 7, they were the vineyard. They were the grapevine. They were the true vine. They were the people. The nation that God had selected and grown out of all the peoples in this world in particular. And so there in the shadow of this golden grapevine Jesus tells a parable about a vineyard that a man planted and rent it out to tenants.

And He tells the story to, remember, verse 9, the people, it says, the people. In other words, this story is not one more told to the leaders, but in particular, it is for the ordinary person, the ordinary worshiper in the temple. The people, and it was told to them to highlight to them the brokenness of the men they thought were leading them. The men they thought were caring for them. Look at verse nine. And He began to tell the people this parable.

“A man planted a vineyard and led it out to tenants and went into another country for a long while.” Just as God established the nation of Israel apart from all other nations on the earth, this owner, he establishes, he plants, he produces this particular vineyard. And just as verse 9 indicates, the owner left in the story, he left the care of that vineyard in the hands of tenants for a long while, it says, so also God had left in the hands of religious leaders the duty to rule over and care for and apply God's law to the people of Israel for a long time. In other words, what Jesus is addressing in this moment wasn't a blip, it wasn't a one-off mistake, it wasn't a thing that was symptomatic of that particular moment, that day itself in the temple.

Rather what Jesus is saying is this is tried and tested and found wanting. The religious leadership of this nation has been broken for a prolonged period of time. There is a pattern that has been established. There are habits that mark the religious leadership of this nation that has caused them to be found wanting. There is a mark that throughout the pages of the nation's history is a stain against them. And Jesus explains that in His parable in verses 10 to 12. Look at verse 10.

“When the time came, he sent a servant to the tenants so that they would give him some of the fruit of the vineyard. But the tenants beat him and sent him away empty-handed. And he sent another servant, but they also beat him and treated him shamefully and sent him away empty-handed. And he sent yet a third. This one also they wounded and cast out.”

In this story, the master sends three slaves to represent his interest, to go on behalf of the owner and to collect the rent, to collect the portion of the crop that was due to him, that belonged to him. That was normal custom. That would have been the normal arrangement of the day.

But the first one that goes, according to verse 10, they beat up. And they send away empty handed. And then the second one comes in verse 11. And they treat him the same. In fact, according to the text, they treat him even worse because it says, they also treated him shamefully. Now, it doesn't go into details as to what they did or what exactly took place, but it was something disgusting, something distorted. Something that this particular slave would never want to have to talk about, wouldn't want to even acknowledge.

And then a third one is sent in verse 12. And again, they go even further. He is seriously wounded at the end. So, three times, not once, not twice, but three times repeatedly, servants are sent by the master and each time it seems the treatment is not just the same, it actually gets worse. It doesn't get better, it gets worse.

In these three servants, Jesus is succinctly painting a picture of the way, throughout the Old Testament, the prophets that God sent, and all the way up to John the Baptist who was sent. He's painting a picture of the way the religious leaders treated these prophets from God. And in the story, the men are servants of the owner. That's the way so often the Old Testament speaks about the prophets, God's sons. They are simply God's servants.

For example, Amos chapter 3 verse 7 speaks of His servants, the prophets. Or Jeremiah chapter 7 verse 25, Jeremiah 7, 25, “from the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt to this day, I have persistently sent all my servants, the prophets, to them day after day.” Or Daniel chapter 9 verse 6, “we have not listened to your servants, the prophets.” You see the language that the Old Testament uses repeatedly, and you can find many, many more references to individual prophets, Elijah, Elisha, others that were sent and were called servants of God.

Jesus here is not subtle; He is crystal clear. Just like the servants in Jesus' parable, when they were sent, they were assaulted. And they were mistreated throughout Israel's history by the religious leadership. So, too, the history of Israel was marked by prophet abuse. They abused those God sent.

According to tradition, Isaiah was sawn in half with a wooden saw. Now Jeremiah, we read in Jeremiah that he was thrown into a pit, but according to the church tradition, he was also then stoned to death by the people. In Ezekiel chapter two and verse six, God speaks to Ezekiel about the nature of his ministry to the people of God, and he describes it like sitting on scorpions. Now that doesn't sound very comfortable. It doesn't sound pleasant in any way, but such was ministry to the people.

The Old Testament's history of Israel can be summed up in a number of places, but one of the books that seeks to do that in particular is Chronicles. In 2 Chronicles 36, verse 14 says, 2 Chronicles 36, 14, “all the officers of the priests and the people likewise were exceedingly unfaithful, following all the abominations of the nations. And they polluted the house of the Lord that He had made holy in Jerusalem. The Lord, the God of their father, sent persistently to them by his messengers because he had compassion on his people and on his dwelling place. But they kept mocking the messengers of God, despising His words, and scoffing at His prophets until the wrath of the Lord rose against His people. Until there was no remedy.”

That is the history of Israel. And that is the history of their religious leadership, broken and corrupt. Soaked in sin and leading the people astray. When God sent His warnings, His cautions, His prophets, they grossly mistreated them.

The New Testament's testimony is exactly the same. Matthew 23 verse 31 says, “Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up then the measure of your fathers, you serpents, you brood of vipers. How have you escaped being sentenced to hell? Therefore, I sent you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town. So that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Barakai, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it. How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings and you were not willing.”

You see how cleverly Jesus in a story sums up the nature of Old Testament history. He reminds the people that time and time again, God graciously sent His words of caution. He sent His prophets to call them back, to speak to the religious leaders of the nation, call them to soften, but instead of soften, they became more aggressive and attacked the very messengers God sent. And time after time after time, that story was true. And increasingly, the toxicity and aggression of the people became more and more vile, and it all climaxes in Jesus' story in verse 13.

“Then the owner of the vineyard said, what shall I do? I will send my beloved son. Perhaps they will respect him.” And Jesus in this story, it takes an even more dramatic and unexpected turn because the pattern of this people, the pattern of these tenants is obvious, isn't it? We know where this story is going already. Nobody's thinking, oh that was a good idea. Well, we know what is about to take place. Here we have the reality of what was happening in the temple that very day.

God had sent prophet after prophet after prophet. And the people had demonstrated the corruption of their hearts. The religious leaders had shown how hostile they were to those who brought a true Word from God. And now standing amongst them was one who, 19 verse 47, those same religious leaders sought to destroy. And yet He was the beloved Son of God. There in the presence of the nation that day, stood one altogether different from everyone that had come before, the beloved, the only Son of God.

As we read the story, we want to cry. But we know where this is going. You can almost sense the tension in the room, the quietness of the crowd, because they too know what inevitably is going to happen next in the story. That word in verse 13, perhaps, perhaps. It stresses the fact the owner is taking a huge risk. It speaks of His long-suffering nature beyond all human logic, that He would seize every opportunity, every opportunity to call those hard hearts to do what is right.

He sends even, as quote verse 13 says, His beloved son. Now that title, it was used to describe Jesus at his baptism back in Luke 3, 23. That title that God called out at the top of the mountain back in Luke 9, 35. The idea is now in the temple, now in salvation history, now the owner has sent His absolute best.

Not just another prophet, not even the best of the prophets, but one on a whole other level from every prophet that preceded him. The idea is standing in the temple that day, proclaiming the Word of God, the good news to the people, is not simply one more servant of God, but God's beloved Son. John 3, 16, His only Son. Hebrews 1, verse 2, the heir of all things.

A whole separate league. But the ugliness of these wicked tenants is disturbingly unfolded in what happens next. Look at verse 14. “But when the tenants saw him, they said to themselves, this is the heir. Let us kill him so that the inheritance may be ours.” Now, their plan is crazy. And they're deluded to think this would work.

But do you know what? That is the twisted nature of sin. It doesn't work according to genuine logic. There is a sin logic. A twistedness that causes people to act in the most devastating and disastrous and gross sorts of way, thinking in their twisted mind that good will come of it.

Notice in verse 14, it's not that they don't know who they're dealing with. This is not a case of mistake and identity. They don't think this is just another servant. They know fine rightly who they're dealing with. They recognize Him. They know He is the heir. They know He has authority, and yet they are still determined to kill Him. Highlights their guilt.

They weren't mistaken here, they knew full well what they were about. That phrase in verse 14, “let us kill Him,” that's the same phrase you see Joseph's brothers use back in Genesis 37 verse 20 when they decide, knowing who they are dealing with, let us kill him. They know fine rightly what they're doing. The issue is not one of ignorance here, but the determined destruction of God's beloved. That's what they're about. They are determined to kill Him, to silence Him, to remove Him from this earth knowing full well who He is.

The fact that in the story, verse 14, they say, “this is the heir,” shows that they know the vineyard doesn't actually belong to them. It actually belongs to another, but it's profiting them in this moment. Just like those religious leaders, they knew it wasn't their system. This was a system from God.

And yet they were so entitled and devious that they had taken it and put it in their own back pocket and treated it as their own resource. There is intentionality behind their wicked actions. This is no case of mistaken identity. This is premeditated murder of the owner's beloved son.

Look at the beginning of verse 15, and they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. The language is pointed and brutal. He's taken out of the vineyard, out of the garden and killed, according to the story, just as Jesus would be taken outside the city walls and killed on the cross. As Hebrews 13, 12 says, Jesus also suffered outside the gate. The city that he had come into on a donkey as king. He is taken like a criminal outside of the walls of the capital deemed unworthy, unholy to even be within the confines of the formal city and crucified on a tree. Jesus has told a story here that in picture form sums up the abuse of the prophets and the intentional movement by the religious leaders of His day in Jerusalem to now also seek to kill Him.

It's the same testimony that Stephen, that first martyr in Acts chapter 7 would proclaim in verse 51. “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in hearts and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the righteous one whom you have now betrayed and murdered.”

The Scripture's testimony is universal as to what is taking place. And Jesus, with His profound wisdom and storytelling skill, so clearly and succinctly, brings His case against the people. Well, against primarily the religious leaders. And He highlights to the people how fallen, how broken, how prone those leaders are to violence and to lead the people astray. Yet here in Luke 20, the beloved Son's death is not the end of the story. Normally when someone dies, we think that's the story done. But not here because that injustice demands action. Look at the rest of verse 15 and 16.

What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them? He will come and destroy those tenants and give the vineyard to others. When they heard this, they said, surely not. The owner in the story has been long suffering, but he hasn't forgotten the way that his servants and now his beloved have been treated. And so, in verse 16, he moves in decisive action. The three verbs there in verse 16, will come, destroy, and give.

They're all in the future tense because what Jesus is now doing is He is not talking about the present, He is giving a prophecy. He is telling us what will take place in His story. He's telling us what should take place in this story, but He's doing more than that. He's indicating what will take place fundamentally against the religious leaders that have so polluted the minds of the people and so aggressively sought to squash the prophets and now Jesus in turn. Jesus is not simply telling a random story in the temple that day. He is declaring what is going to happen to the wicked leaders in the temple. So, what is He saying?

Now remember verse nine, He is talking to the people about their leaders, and He's saying to the people about their religious leaders, God is going to come. And He is going to decisively destroy those leaders. And He is going to give the religious leadership which so often worked on a basis of inheritance to others outside of the family. He's going to give that leadership to others. It's a prophecy about dramatic religious leadership change.

And His disciples who are kind of hovering maybe in the back of the crowd, they don't realize fully what is taking place. But rather than the chief priests, rather than the scribes, rather than the elders of the people, the baton of leadership would be taken by Christ and placed in their hand. And they, under the power of the Holy Spirit, would entrust to others, who would entrust to others, who would entrust to others, and lead the church accordingly.

Notice how the people respond in verse 16. When they heard this, they said, surely not. They were brought up to respect the priesthood. There was a family that was allowed to proclaim the Word to them. There were only some who could sacrifice at the temple.

That word heard that's used there, it doesn't mean just to audibly hear, it means to hear with understanding. It's the same word you see used time and time again in Revelation 2 and 3. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. In other words, not just audibly hear, but comprehend it. Grasp it, digest it, understand the implications of it. In other words, the idea is that there is no obscurity in the temple that people hear and get what Jesus is saying. That they know the point He is making, they know the button He is pushing.

And then they say, surely not. Our religious leadership snuffed out, taken away. They either can't believe that their religious leadership would so treat the prophets and so treat Jesus, and that's hard to believe or because of their sin, that the religious leaders, because of their sin, the ones who are in charge, the ones who give us God's Word, they're going to be punished. They're going to have judgment fall on their head. Or most likely it's all of that altogether. That's what they're saying surely not about. They couldn't believe that their leaders were that wicked and that the punishment that was about to fall upon them was that settled in the mind of God.

And so, to stress the importance of what He is saying, look at verse 17. It says, Jesus looked directly at them and said, that's the same language used in Luke 22, 61 to describe the way when Peter had denied the Lord. Do you remember the cock crowed? And Jesus came out and His eyes fixed on the eyes of Peter. And He had that look that looked right into the soul of Peter. And Peter ran out destroyed because the reality of what he had done had caught up with him.

That's the look that we see here. The people have been misled by the religious leaders, but Jesus looks and sees him with the most intense sword of look. Because now He is going to make an important point. They said surely not. And He fixes His eyes upon them.

And He proclaims in verse 17 an Old Testament quote. He quotes in particular from Psalm 118 verse 22. He's saying to them as He quotes the Old Testament, as He quotes Scripture, “you say surely not,” but this is exactly what the Bible says. This is biblical truth. Look at verse 17. But he looked directly at them and said, “what then is this that is written? The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.”

Again, Jesus is stressing the religious leaders. They are the builders. And they have rejected Him, rejected the cornerstone, the most important piece, the one that is necessary. That the cornerstone was that stone by which the whole house was built. It was the stone that had to be cut absolutely perfectly because every wall was lined up according to it. If it was a mistake and if it was miscut, everything else would be off. And when it was perfect, everything else took shape as it ought to.

And what He does is He quotes Scripture. “The people say, surely not,” and He says, The Bible says, surely, most certainly, absolutely. Why will these religious leaders be punished? Why are they corrupt? Because the Bible says so. That's His argument. Broken leadership in the church is a biblical thing. Let that sink in. Broken leadership in the church is a biblical thing. And that doesn't minimize the fact that when we come across broken leadership in the church, it doesn't hurt. It absolutely does. But it shouldn't surprise us. And Jesus indicates here it shouldn't surprise us because the Word of God speaks about that reality. It is sad. It is absolutely wicked. But it is a reality that Scripture speaks about.

And indeed, verse 19 that we went down and read as well, makes clear that Jesus was right. Because even in that moment as He ties up His story, the leaders, the religious leaders of that day, they knew what the parable meant, verse 19 says, “and they wanted in that very hour to lay their hands upon Him.” In other words, the Bible's true. And it was unfolding exactly the way the Bible said it would. And so, in Luke 20, after testifying that the people's broken leadership is something the Bible speaks of, Jesus then brings a challenge back to the people. The sentiment is, look, your religious leadership is broken.

And now, verse 18, what are you gonna do about it? Look at verse 18. “Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces. And when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.” He's been condemning and highlighting the corruption of the religious leaders. And now in verse 18, he changes focus. He doesn't say the leaders who fall will be broken. But He says, everyone who falls. He's been talking to the people, He's been highlighting the wickedness of their leaders, but now He speaks to them directly.

Now He seeks their response. This is Jesus' so what in the sermon. The leaders are wicked, so what are you going to do about it? How are you going to respond? He takes two images of an important rock, and again, He's using it to symbolize Himself, because ultimately, it's what you do with Jesus that matters. It's not what will you do with wicked leaders. It's not what will you do with a broken church. It's not what will you do with broken religion. But what will you do with Jesus, the cornerstone, the rock?

And the first image is of a tripping stone, a stumbling stone. Look at the beginning of verse 18. Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces. It's, again, Old Testament imagery. Isaiah 8 speaks of that reality. Verses 14 and 15 of the stumbling stone used to describe the Messiah that would come. He would cause people to fall, cause them to be broken. Jesus is a stumbling stone. You can't just walk over Him without stumbling, without falling.

In Ireland there's a number of Norman castles, those big old stone castles that are built. And the Norman castles were expecting people to try and lay siege to them and attack them. And so, they were obsessed with building the building, building the castle with tricks, ways to catch the attacker out. And so, one of the things they had is if you got through the gate and everybody would be evacuated up onto the first floor of the castle.

And so, you would have had to climb up stairs around these turrets to get up to the next floor. And as you moved up the stairs, up the steps, there was what was called the trick step. And basically, every step is kind of the same in height. but the trick step was an extra half foot off. So, if you were attacking and the adrenaline was pumping and you were running up the stairs to squash whoever is upstairs, you would charge up these steps and you would think everything was even and your foot naturally would catch the trip step and you'd fall on your face. Well, that's the imagery here. Jesus is describing Himself as the trip step.

Nobody passes Him without falling. You can't get past unscathed. You will be broken to pieces. The second imagery that you see is actually of a rock that falls from the ceiling. Just to stress the same point, look at the rest of verse 18. And when it falls on anyone, it will crush him. Maybe you think, Twinkle Toes, you can get past whatever trip step there is. But how on earth can you stop something falling on your head that you didn't see coming?

That's the point. There is no escaping in this scene. There is no other way out. Jesus is making it clear to the people, their wicked leaders are about to be destroyed for their rejection of Jesus, but you will likewise perish if you follow them in rejecting Jesus also.

Jesus is not content to talk about the religious leaders; he's talking about you. And he's saying what you do is important. What you do today matters. There's many things that we could say about this picture that Jesus sums up all Old Testament Israelite history with, but here's the first application point, and I just want to state them, and you go away and think about them.

The first one is this, many people reject Christ, not just leaders. That's the point at the end, and if you miss that, you miss out. There is, it is easy, it is easy to point at broken leadership in our world. It is easy to point at broken leadership in evangelical circles. It is easy to point at broken leadership in reform circles. Friends, you don't get any medal for that. You don't have to think about that very much. But the point is, yes, there is corrupt religious leadership.

And yet what you do matters. Jesus insists, verse 18, your response to Christ matters. You don't get to hide behind broken leadership. Your response to Christ matters. I am sure in a room this size; there are many of you who have been devastated by so-called leadership in the church. That through moral failure, twisted words, or abusive leadership styles have caused you to run scared. And the Lord will judge them. The Lord says, it would be better a millstone be tied around their neck and they be thrown into the sea than to have mistreated one of his children in such a way. The Lord will deal with that.

But don't miss the challenge for you. You still have to have dealings with Christ. That broken leadership doesn't take away that all-important need. Many people reject Christ. Don't let yourself be one of them. Don't miss the personal challenge Jesus shares with the crowd that day. Secondly, religious leaders can lead us away to God. It is true you have to have personal dealings with Christ, and yet religious leadership matters.

Friends, last week we asked at the close of our service that you would pray for the elders, and we simply asked that you would pray that they would be faithful. Do you see why that matters this morning? The elders of our church are wicked men, saved by grace. Absolutely. Empowered by the Holy Spirit. We pray. God is able to work through us even in our weakness. Absolutely. But we are men.

And should we err in the future, realize broken leadership can draw the people away from God. We want to be accountable to you. We need to be accountable to you for the good of the church. So many people reject Christ. Religious leaders can lead us away from Christ. And Christ is a stumbling block for all who reject Him.

In the end, Christ will do what is right. Christ will judge. There is no broken leader that escapes His judgment. And there is no broken follower that escapes His judgment either. Christ will ultimately deal with all who reject Him. And yet, so that you don't go home broken and in tears, let me make one last application point. God insists in still growing His vineyard. Still growing His people despite broken leaders.

Do you notice the consistent in the story? The vineyard grows. The vineyard produces fruit. The tenants were awful. But the grapes were produced. But friends, we're not dependent in that sense on the purity of human leadership to ensure the church produces fruit. This is God that has planted the vineyard. It is God who grows the vineyard. It is God who causes the vineyard to be fruitful. This is His design.

Bad leadership cannot stop the kingdom from growing. I say that because I don't want you to leave in despair, I want you to leave in hope. The reality of broken human leadership is a real thing. But the far greater reality is God still grows. God still insists on the fruit being produced. God still brings people to a place of repentance and faith in Jesus Christ and drawing them into the kingdom. And that which He has begun, He has promised to bring to completion.

And so rather than leave scared off human leadership, we can pray for human leadership, we can hold them accountable, we can personally have dealings with Christ, and yet we can also have hope that ultimately Christ will build His church and the gates of hell will not prevail against her.

Let's pray.

(Prayer) Heavenly Father, we thank You for that glorious reality that Christ is in charge. We thank You for that reality that He is building His church. We thank You that not one that He has died for will slip through His fingers, but everything that His atonement has purchased will come to fruition. And so Lord, we pray and ask for the leaders of this church that You would guard their hearts, that You would fix their mind on Jesus, that You would give them the grace to lead well and to care for these people, that we would be able to point them to Christ. And Lord, we pray where we are weak and where we fall, that You would protect the sheep and that You would continue to cause their growth. For it's in the name of Christ we ask it. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen. (End)

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