The Parable of the Wicked Tenants (Luke 20:9-18)

The occasion of the parable

As we know, the time is the last week in the life of Jesus, a week in which he would die upon the cross. Yet Jesus obviously was not the only person involved in what happened during that week connected to the Passover. The religious and political leaders were involved, and indeed at this time were asking Jesus all kinds of questions. Barabbas and his fellows were planning a revolt against the Romans. The people too were involved, and we see their various reactions throughout the week. Both the religious leaders and the people in general are involved as Jesus tells this parable.

The purpose of the parable

While Matthew relates this parable as it affected the leaders mentioned by Jesus, Luke and Mark relate the parable to show that, while it was told to the people as well as the leaders, it is not about the people in the main. Rather, it is about the religious leaders, described by Jesus as tenants of the vineyard. So, from Luke’s point of view, the parable is designed to warn the people about their leaders, the ones who have just tried to trap Jesus about his authority to be a teacher - the scribes and the Pharisees. Obviously, the leaders would be offended, and the people would be surprised at what he said.

Who does the parable describe?

As we read the parable we can see that there are five types of character mentioned in it. There is the vineyard composed of people, there is the man who owns the vineyard, there are the tenants who are given the task of running the vineyard on behalf of the owner, there are the owner’s servants whom he sends to obtain the fruit that should have been produced for him, and there is the owner’s son. Who do they represent? It is not difficult to supply answers. The owner is God the Father, the vineyard is Israel (this was a common Old Testament description of Israel), the tenants are the religious leaders of Israel, the servants are the Old Testament prophets up until the time of John the Baptist, and the son is Jesus.

What does the parable not describe?

We are not to push every detail as an exact description of those represented by the characters, including what is said about the owner and about the tenants. For example, with regard to the owner, we are told that after he had planted it he went away. But we know that God did not do that in a literal sense. Or we can see that the owner when thinking of sending his son wonders if the tenants will listen to him. In reality, God the Father knew that the religious leaders would reject his Son when he came.

Nor is Jesus saying that the religious leaders accepted that he was the Son of God, because we know that on other occasions he accused them of not being willing to accept the signs that indicated he was the Son of God. But he is saying that they should have recognised that he was the Son and treated him with respect. But they did not. Also, another detail in the parable is that the son remains dead, but in the real situation of the ministry of Jesus he rose three days after he was slain.

The point of a parable is its point, and in this one the point is that the Jewish leaders had rejected God and his messengers and that the time was near when the vineyard would be taken from them and given to others. Nevertheless, there are several other details in the parable that we need to consider because they are obvious in their meaning.

What does the parable describe?

Luke tells us that Jesus said that the owner planted the vineyard. Jesus meant by that description the foundation of the nation of Israel at the Exodus and subsequently. When we cast our minds over these events, we recall that God rescued them by power and through a sacrifice connected to the Passover. Then when they reached Mount Sinai, he gave them a wide range of laws that were for their good. Despite their rebellious tendencies, he also gave to them the land of Canaan through his help. He had given them so much. This is illustrated in the statement in the parable that the owner went away because he did not need to provide anything else. In other words, everything that the Israelites needed in order to live for God had been provided for them by him. They had all the resources needed for producing acceptable fruit for their God.

The parable also says that every so often the owner sent servants to help them produce suitable fruit. By servants, Jesus is referring to the various prophets that were sent by God. I suspect that the point to be observed here is that prophets were usually sent when the people were backsliding from the Lord. Since that was the case, it indicates the desire in God that they would know his blessing as his servants called them back to him. We can read about some of those prophets in the Bible. They include men like Samuel, Elijah, Elisha, Micah, Isaiah, Jeremiah and many more. In their messages, they urged the people to return to God and receive his blessing. This went on for centuries as one after another God sent his servants to a wayward people.

In the parable, Jesus states how those servants sent by God were treated. Their messages were not welcome by those in charge. There were unspiritual people in the priesthood and in the schools of the prophets as well as among the rulers of the people. They opposed the true prophets sent by God and treated them very badly. In doing so, the corrupt leaders revealed that they despised God’s offers of forgiveness and restoration.

Eventually, says Jesus, the owner sent his only son. Such a choice was like the owner sending himself. Yet the tenants in the parable decided to kill the son of the owner. We are meant to ask, ‘how would the leaders of Israel react to the coming of the Son of God?’ Remember that this incident occurs in the last week of Jesus’ life and three days later the leaders of Israel are going to hand Jesus over to the Roman rulers and demand that he be crucified. But they would not have known at this moment that he would be executed, although he did.

In the parable, Jesus says two things about the leaders. First, their motive was revealed – they wanted to run the vineyard. The coming of the son was a reminder that they did not have that position, but if they were to get rid of him, then it would be theirs. Is that not what the leaders said about Jesus? Note what they say in John 11:47-48: ‘So the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered the council and said, “What are we to do? For this man performs many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.”’ It was him or them. If he continued, they would lose out.

The second detail that Jesus mentions about the leaders is the judgement that would come their way. The judgement that he mentions is not the judgement at the last day, but it is a judgement that will involve the vineyard being given to others after it has been taken away from the tenants. In other words, the vineyard will continue, but in another way. Is this not what happened when the Lord from heaven sent the gospel to the Gentiles? Is this not what happened when the temple in Jerusalem was knocked down by the Romans forty years later?

The response to the parable

The people realised what Jesus was saying, as we can see in verse 16. They were shocked at the description of their rulers. How would Jesus help them see that what he had said was the truth? He turned to the Scriptures and drew their attention to a verse from Psalm 118 which refers to an incident that occurred during the erection of a building. The builders had discarded a stone because they did not think it was of much use. Strangely, they then found that it was an ideal cornerstone which would hold the building together.

Some Jews accepted a tradition which said that this had happened at the building of the second temple after they had returned from Babylon. Obviously, the incident, whether connected to the rebuilding of the temple or not, had made an impression on people and the psalmist included a reference to it in his psalm. Perhaps people wondered why that reference was there and what was the significance of it. Whether they had or not, Jesus says it refers to him. He is the stone who would be the means of bringing about the change that was coming, the change to the vineyard that belonged to God the Father.

He points out two consequences of him being the stone. One is that people will trip over him. We can imagine how that would have happened before the literal stone was put into the building. The leaders of Israel were doing that at the moment in their reaction to Jesus. They were in danger of falling into judgement by not acknowledging who Jesus was. The other consequence is that judgement can come by the stone falling upon people and crushing them. The cornerstone would not be a small stone. By this illustration Jesus means that he will yet be the judge, and should he fall on someone they will be crushed. We can say that in a surprising but in a divinely-strategic way, although he was on the way to the cross to pay the penalty for sin, he was also on the way to becoming the judge of all.

Some lessons

There are several lessons that can be deduced from the parable. The first is that nothing can stop the exaltation of Jesus. Sure, he was on the way to the cross because of the actions of those leaders, but arranging for his death would not result in his disappearance. Instead, it was the path to the heights for Jesus, and one aspect of that exaltation is that he will yet be the judge of all, including those leaders.

A second lesson is connected to what the parable says about the patience of God. He sent numerous servants to the tenants. The Lord is longsuffering, as several Bible verses inform us. The question that comes to us concerns how long is the time in which he has sent servants to us. Perhaps, like the tenants, you can recall several. But the point is whether you have responded to what the servants said about the gospel of forgiveness.

A third lesson is also connected to the servants and that is the consistency revealed in their demands for fruit suitable for the owner. This leads us to consider the question, what does God want from us? The fruit that he desires is described in the Bible as fruit meet for repentance or as the fruit of the Spirit. God wants the same fruit from us as he wanted throughout all the previous periods of the church. He requires nothing new in the twenty-first century as far as Christian character is concerned.

A fourth lesson concerns leaders of Christ’s church. The rulers in Israel assumed that they were serving God, but they were not. It is easy for every professing Christian to go astray, but it is more dangerous when leaders do. Jesus had already described the leaders of Israel as blind leaders of the blind whereas they imagined that they could see things clearly. It is very easy to try and take the place of Christ as Lord of his church.

A fifth lesson from the parable is the increasing brazenness of rejection of God. First, it was one prophet that was rejected; then, it was several prophets that were rejected; then it was the Son of God that was rejected. Each response was serious, but there is an increase in seriousness each time. Maybe we can think about it in this way. A person hears a gospel invitation and rejects it – that is serious. He then hears numerous invitations and rejects them – that is more serious. At some stage, he might realise that Jesus is speaking to him but rejects what he hears – that is very serious.