Dear ones, we heard today in the Gospel, a powerful image and a powerful warning from the lips of our loving Savior. It comes from a section of Matthew that we read publicly in the Church during the Bridegroom Matins of Holy Monday, because it takes place just after our Lord enters triumphantly into Jerusalem. He comes riding on the foal of an ass, and is drowned in praises from the children and the people. The time for repentance, transformation, and change had come.
Jesus begins his final days by confronting the hard-hearted scribes and pharisees. He enters into the temple and flips the tables of the corrupt money changers. Anyone that was not there in worship of God, He drives out with a whip. “My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it into a den of thieves” Jesus says, quoting the scripture.
A day later, Jesus enters into Temple again, and is asked by the chief priests: “Who’s authority are You doing these things? And who gave you this authority?” Jesus didn’t answer them…He was done with them and their blindness. He rebuked them as hypocrites and children of hell. Jesus said to them that the people they despise most, the tax collectors and the harlots, would inherit the Kingdom of God first. He then offered the parable that we hear in Matthew 21: 33-42.
I offer this small review from the Gospel of Matthew this morning as both a reminder and a warning. Yes, Jesus offers these words in condemnation for God’s chosen people …but dear ones, these words should offer a humbling reminder to us this morning, now sitting as members of the Church 2,000 years later.
A certain landowner planted a vineyard and set a hedge around it, dug a winepress in it, and built a tower. He then leased it to the vinedressers and went into a faraway country. We should ask ourselves: Who is this land owner? What is this vineyard?
If you look up into the dome of our Church in Fenton, you see the icon of Christ blessing His people. Around the outside of the icon are words from the psalms:
“Look down from Heaven O God and behold, and visit this vine which Thou hast planted with Thy Right hand, and establish it!”
When we enter into the Church, we stand in the center of the vineyard which our Lord established! We are the vine which was planted in the midst of the Holy Orthodox Church. Jesus has placed a hedge around His Holy Church as a protection from the fallenness of the world. To quote from the prophecy of Zachariah: “I have placed around you, as a hedge, a wall of fire, and my Glory will be in your midst!
What does it mean to be Orthodox? It means that we are fruit bearing vines in the midst of this Holy Vineyard. To be a member of the Church is to be cared for by the landowner, God Himself…Who covers us with Light, and hedges us in with His Love. His Glory permeates the very centers of our lives. He builds a winepress and a tower in the center of the Church…a picture of the Holy Eucharist and the other Holy Mysteries, to nourish us!
What does God, Who has done all of these things for us, except in return? For us to be a fruitful vine. This was the expectation of the Chosen People, the Jews of the Old Testament, who were called by God to work in the vineyard. Yet when God sent forth His servants, the prophets, to collect the fruit, they were met with hostility and death! God had done everything for them! He cultivated their lives! He protected them in the desert. He gave them land on which to live. He used them as instruments of His mighty hand in the world. He leased out this life…this beautiful life…and he expected a return. This is what the Jewish Elite didn’t see. But we, who have the blessing of looking back at their bad example…this is something that we must realize in our lives as Orthodox Christians.
We are living in the vineyard. God has invested deeply in us. Look at what He has given us! Do we take for granted this Love? This Church? How much fruit have we, as members of this Holy Vineyard, produced and offered back to God? Have we offered enough praise from our lips? Have we offered service to others? Love? Holiness? This is our fruit! How much have we been able to gather as a parish family?
One of the early lessons I teach the catechumens is that we don’t come to the vineyard to take. This is not a sacrament factory…we don’t come to receive, but rather to give. How have we done?
With that question in mind, I offer this small self-reflection that we should all ask ourselves this morning. It is one that I heard Fr. Josiah Trenham offer to his faithful, but I think it fits rather nicely for our parish here in Fenton as well:
“If Father Gabriel took me and cloned me….If he were to take my level of fruit bearing, my level of worship, the amount of time I spend in Church and in prayer, the amount of effort I put into ministry and serving the Church, would this parish family…this vineyard…be stronger, or weaker?
If you come once a month, it’s not hard to answer this question.
If the only time you think, say, or hear the word of God is during these hours on Sunday morning and not any other day…it’s not hard to answer this question.
If you participate in no ministry…have not given to the Church and to those in need…if you have only received, and have done nothing to grow in our love for God and for one another…it’s not hard to answer this question.
If this is us, then may the words we have said so many times so far today in the Liturgy echo for eternity…. “Lord Have mercy on us.”
While it was too late for the scribes and the pharisees Who Jesus was preaching to in this parable, it is not too late for us dear ones. Let us not take God’s loving care for granted. While we are surrounded by His Glory, let us till the ground…and work hard in this vineyard…so that we may not only offer our own fruit to God, but also show to our children, by our own example, what it means to live a life of service and love for the betterment of the Kingdom. Amen