God's Vineyard: A Call to Bear Fruit

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A certain man planted a Vineyard set a hedge about it digged a place for the wine fat or that actually in Modern English and he built a tower he led it out to husbandmen and went into a far country now in Isaiah chapter 5 he uses the parable of a Vineyard The Vineyard representing the nation of Israel and how that God planted the finest plant how he put protection around it how he did everything to ensure wonderful fruit had built the wine press in it had put the wall around it to protect it. [00:04:24]

And how that in developing it with the finest Vine and all yet when it came time to bear fruit it only bore wild grapes and so the Judgment was he was just going to Break Down The Walls take away the protection allow the vineyard to just go wild and to be trodden down uh it failed to bring forth the fruit that God was seeking now when Jesus again uses a Vineyard in a parable there is in the study of the scriptures what they call expositional cons cience. [00:05:24]

And that is when in a parable of Vineyard is used of a Nation Israel whenever the vineyard then is used in parabolic form it again the expositional constancy would say that it is always Israel the nation of Israel that is being referred to so as Jesus brings up the vineyard once again they would immediately identify the nation of Israel as the vineyard it was led out to husbandmen they would be the ones who were to nurture and to care for the vineyard in order to ensure that the vineyard brought forth good fruit. [00:06:16]

Their responsibility to keep the vineyard and to develop it to cultivate it that it might bring forth good fruit now there was a certain man planted the vineyard and set the Hedge around it in other words he established this Vineyard and when the time came that uh he should reap the fruit of the vineyard and as a general rule when you had an absentee owner he was entitled to 50 percent of the uh produce that came from the vineyard. [00:07:00]

And uh so the time came for uh the owner to get his 50 and it could not be collected until the fifth year uh the time came for uh the owner to receive the fruit and so he sent a servant unto the husbandman to gather for him or to get for him the fruit of the vineyard and they caught him and beat him and sent him away empty and again he sent unto them another servant in him they cast stones and wounded him in the head and sent him away shamefully handled. [00:07:41]

And again he sent another and him they killed and many others beating some killing some and having yet therefore one son is well beloved he sent him also last unto them saying they will reverence my son now of course the servants that were sent were the prophets and for the most part the the office of a prophet was a hazardous a position in Israel uh in fact in uh Stephen's defense before the council as he got into the rehearsing of their history. [00:08:23]

He was showing them how that traditionally their fathers had rejected God's plan how that when Joseph was rejected by his brothers they said you know we bow down and serve you are you kidding that'll never happen and yet they sold him as a slave but still in the end they did bow down and do obeisance to him according to the dream that he had but they rejected him the first time around second time around they acknowledged the position that the Lord had placed him in Moses. [00:09:03]

When Moses first came to the people they rejected Moses from ruling over them and Moses fled and spent 40 years in the wilderness the second time around they recognized that God had ordained Moses to lead them out of their slavery in Egypt and as Stephen was getting into it of course he was building up to Jesus first time around you've killed him but he's coming back again you'll recognize that he is the king of kings and Lord of lords he's building to that but before he could actually get to the punch line. [00:09:43]

Of his message he was so into how blind they were he said which of the prophets have not your father's stoned name a prophet who came out unscathed those men who dared to speak God's truth unto the people and so here Jesus is pretty much saying the same thing the prophets that God had sent to the nation of Israel were mistreated imprisoned beaten many of them killed in the book of Hebrews chapter 11. it tells us about the suffering of the Servants of God those men of faith. [00:10:23]

How they were imprisoned how they were stoned how they were Saun asunder men of whom the world was not worthy and how they were mistreated by the world and by the nation of Israel so all of the succession of prophets have been pretty well badly treated by the nation God is still Desiring fruit and so he said well my beloved Son I'll send him surely they will reverence him now here Jesus puts himself in a far different category than the prophets there are always those today that would like to reduce Jesus to one of the prophets. [00:11:03]

In fact Muhammad declares that Jesus was just one of the prophets in a succession of prophets and there are many people that buy into this line he's just one of the succession of prophets that God had sent but notice how Jesus puts himself in a far different category finally he said my beloved Son I will send him surely they will reverence him but the husbandman said among themselves this is the heir come let's kill him and The Inheritance shall be ours now pilate knew when they brought Jesus before him. [00:11:43]

That it was a conspiracy that they were jealous of Jesus and fearful that Jesus would replace them the high priesthood said don't you realize it's it's necessary that one should die in order that we might save our position in the nation they said behold how all of the people are going after him we're going to have to do something about this or else they're going to take away our our power our position and so this basically Jesus is sort of basically showing them what they have already determined that he is a threat to them a danger to them. [00:12:23]

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