Down now to the 44th question that Jesus asked. It's found in Luke chapter 20, verse 15. Not too many months ago, most of you remember that we were in the election time when the presidential candidates were vying for nomination and then for election. I remember driving, I don't know where I was going, but I was listening to the car radio And some caller, it was a caller program, somebody called him and was expressing a fear that the Republican Party was trying too hard to please the religious right, which he classified as extremist. When asked what qualified these Republicans to be extremist, he said, number one, they want to pray in school. Number two, they're against abortion. And number three, they're against homosexuality. He went on and said, I don't want the Republican Party helping these kind of extremists, to help them force their extreme values on me or my nation. His comment irritated me. In the first place, what he labeled as extreme, the three examples he gave all come from the Bible. They're all the will of God. They're all the law of God that men pray everywhere. That abortion is wrong. That homosexuality is an abomination. These are not extreme ideas made up by a religious group of people on the right. They are the commandments of God. I didn't write the Ten Commandments. All we do is echo what the Bible declares to be the law of God. Now, many say that's extreme. Well, then God is the one who is the extremist, and all we're doing is just agreeing with Him. If it's anybody's agenda, these three things, it's God's agenda. And if it's God's agenda, then it ought to be the agenda of the church and every Christian. Now, deep down, I think the caller resents God trying to impose His will on the ways and likes of people like him. In other words, just who does God think He is anyway, telling me what I can and cannot do? This is the land of the free, the land of liberty. In America, you do as you please. We're free of God and His commandments. That's why people came to this country, to get away from God. And that's the way we like it, and we don't want anybody to interfere with this freedom. I kind of think this is a smart idea. Does he not understand that he's breathing God's air? That he's walking on land that God owns? That he's living in a body that is being loaned to him by God? That he's living on borrowed time that God gives him every day? He's eating food that God supplies every day by his own generosity. He's surviving one day at a time only on the mercy of God. Then he has the audacity to call God an extremist. What do you think God should do to a person such as this one on the radio that I just described? What do you think God should do with people like that? Now, that's not the 44th question that Jesus asked, but it's very close to it. It would be a simple matter to prove the fault from the Bible that a fallen man is the enemy of God. He considers himself, that is, a fallen man, and says, I'm real fortunate if I can dodge those Christian fanatics who always want to talk about, are you saved? I hope nobody ever talks to me. Nobody ever pins me down. Nobody ever finds a way to get to me to talk to me about Jesus and about my soul. If nobody ever, ever, ever talks to me about God, hallelujah, I will rejoice and decide that I have been a very fortunate person all my life to escape all these so-called soul winning fanatics. I've been able to dodge God all my life, and He hasn't been able to reach me either through His missionary people. That's great, and I'm glad of that. Whenever the knock comes on my door, I hope and pray it's not one of those Christians knocking on my door. God, stay away from me and stay out of my life. That's the attitude of a lot of people. Try to talk to somebody and you'll find out. They don't want God to speak to them. They don't want God to approach them. They don't want God to care about their soul. They don't like the idea of a God who claims to be all-knowing, since they, of course, claim their wisdom is far better than His. He is not all-knowing. They know things He doesn't know. As far as God being holy, They don't like that because they want to spend their time being unholy. God thinks He never changes and they want a society that is constantly changing under their supervision. Isn't that the idea that God is all-powerful? They don't like that because they don't want God to make them obey His laws. They don't want Him to use His power to force them to do what they call extreme ideas of conduct. And so the opinion the lost man holds of God is that one that encourages him to have no fear of God and no respect of God. Therefore, what should God do with these kind of people? For God doesn't rate anything in this person's and the opinions of men are valued far above the opinions of God. He's ten times more afraid to offend a man than he is to offend God. And he will deliberately hinder, undermine, and stop, if he can, the will of God being accomplished on the earth. He's not a least bit interested in helping God's program succeed. He's not a least bit interested in being a subject and servant of God. And so when his freedom to do as he pleases is threatened by God, he is pleased if he can get rid of God once and for all. Now, what do you think God should do with people holding that attitude towards him? Well, what would you do if you were God facing that kind of people? Consciously, I'm not going to answer that question. All right? That's fine. Let's let Jesus answer the question. Uh-oh. Well, why not? Why not let Jesus answer the question? Although in this case we're going to narrow the enemy classification, those against God, down to those who really should have been regarded as God's friends. I'm talking about the nation of Israel in general. and his spiritual leadership in particular. Now, God had done more for Israel at this time than any other nation on the earth. And they owed him, of all people, gratitude and allegiance for what he had done for them down through the years. He had brought them into being, gave birth to that nation. He had favored them, fought for them, provided for them ever since he established and brought them out of the land of Egypt. He turned them into a nation, the greatest nation on earth, and gave them the land of Canaan as their possession. I tell you this to help you understand the symbolism that is used in the parable Jesus is about to tell us, and the religious leaders, and the people looking on. Luke chapter 20, verse 9-12. And Jesus began to speak this parable. A certain man planted a vineyard and led it forth to the caretakers, and went into a far country for a long time. And at the season he sent a servant, that is, the season to reap some fruit from his crop, he sent a servant to the caretakers. that they would give him of the fruit of the vineyard. But the caretakers beaten him, and sent him away empty-handed. Again he sent another servant, and they beat him also, and handled him shamefully, and sent him away empty-handed. And again he sent a third, and they wounded him also, and cast him Now, Jesus is picturing Israel as the vineyard belonging to God. He was the owner, He was the creator of the vineyard, and He was the Lord, owner of the vineyard. In Matthew 21-33 we have the same idea. Here another parable. There was a certain householder which planted a vineyard in his yard round about and dug a winepress in it and built a tower and then let it out to caretakers and went into a far country. God planted, God hedged, God digged, and God built Himself a nation Israel to produce for Himself fruit. It was always regarded as belonging to God, and all He asked of the people was that they give Him the fruit that He desired, the fruit of worship the fruit of righteous living, the fruit of making that nation a nation that served God and God alone and obeyed His laws and sought to get other nations to do likewise. Psalms verse 80, verse 8 and 9, Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt, that's Israel. Thou hast cast out the heathen and placed the vine in the land of the heathen, that's thou preparest room before it, and dost cause it to take deep root, and it filleth the land." We're still talking about the nation of Israel and God's blessing in making it a vineyard. Every act of God's mercy is given as an investment from which He expects to gain His due, and His due is the fruits of His desire. The interest payment for His investments is always fruit. Time and again God invested in Israel miracles and victories in battle, bountiful crops, and how was He repaid? He was treated like an enemy rather than a friend. They turned against Him. They disobeyed His laws. They preferred other gods over Him. and they pursued forbidden pleasures. That's what God got from them out of his investment. His vineyard, in a sense, produced sour grapes, and so the kind of grapes he desired. Now, the sermons mentioned in our parable sent by the landowner to raise the issue of his heart's fruit would be prophets. In other words, the prophets are the people that God sends in the Old Testament period, even in the days of Jesus, John the Baptist, God sends prophets to get the people to pay up. They will remind the people of the fruits that God expected. They warned what God would do if God did not get His fruit. And they encouraged the people to produce a desirable, righteous lifestyle, again the fruit that God wanted. How did the people treat the prophets? They beat them, stoned them, killed them, and mocked and ridiculed them, and sent them back empty-handed. That is, God got nothing of the fruit He desired. Now, the message they sent was loud and clear. They said to God, we do not want your laws governing us. We don't mind taking your land, but stay out of it. We don't feel you deserve any payment for anything you have given us or done for us. For any investments you have made in this land and this nation, we don't think we owe you a penny. We want you to leave us alone, and we want you to let us do as we please. and stop bothering us by sending us these pesky prophets. Verse 13, Then said the Lord of the vineyard, What can I do? What can I do? Well, I'll send my beloved son. It may be they will reverence him when they see him. Stop sending the prophets, and now I'm going to send my son. And when the caretakers saw the son, they said to themselves, This is the heir, the only heir. Come, let us kill him and then the entire inheritance will be ours. So Jesus continues the story. If you understand the son to refer to him, you're right. God did send his son to earth and to the nation of Israel to obtain the desired fruit that the prophets had failed to obtain. He also sent them to save the people from their sin, or sent him to save the people from their sin, and to give them a new life that would bring the Father even further fruit. Now, at this point, the parable is prophetic. Jesus tells what they're going to do to the Son even before it happens. In other words, he says, you'll kill the Son. He said this just before he was crucified. The religious leaders of that day would demand, that's the caretakers, would demand the death of the son, just like the parable. Now, the parable does not deal with the issue of his resurrection, for that's not its purpose. But he leaves the parable appearing as though the son is eliminated from the scene just as the prophets had been. That seems to be where the parable is left. And the reasoning for the people appears odd to me. It's the logic of a crazy man. If you kill God's Son, then the inheritance belonging to the Son will be ours for good and God will go away and never come back and bother us again and we will get everything we want and we'll be rid of God. We can kill God's Son and be rid of God forever. Can you feature that logic? If somebody killed your son, do you think they would be rid of you forever? That's the key to getting rid of you? To kill your child. That's the kind of logic that even the devil has. It's idiotic. It's insane. You mean if the devil said, I'm going to get Jesus killed, that God's going to leave me alone, God the Father? No way. No way. That's the logic of Satan. It's crazy. Did you think the story would end here, that the caretakers would kill the son and take over? God would leave them alone and that would be the end of the story? Now, you're dealing with a man, maybe. But when you're dealing with God, no way. Here comes their question. 44th question. So they cast him out of the vineyard and they killed him. Here's the question. Jesus asked the question. What should the Lord of the vineyard do to these people? That was my question. What should he do to these people? Let them get away with it? No. Verse 16. He shall come. Wait a minute. We just got through killing him. Now you got reference to the resurrection. Now, you killed him all right, but he came back to lie. Now what? He shall come and destroy these wicked servants, and he shall give the vineyard to others that will give him the fruit he desires." And when the people heard this, they said, God forbid! God for me." In other words, will not the Almighty Owner have the last word? That's one thing, folks, you can always guarantee. You haven't heard the last of this story Jesus said. You tell me that's not the end of the story, not by a long shot. Now you have the wrath of God revealed against His enemies. That is, there's a point when God says, enough is enough. And then there comes the cry of justice. God will not forget the debt that goes unpaid. He will not overlook his rejection. He will not overlook the death of his son. He will not overlook the lack of fruit. He will not ignore those who ignore him and reject his way of life for their life. He will not end the story by letting them go free. Jesus announces the Father would bring judgment upon Israel and replace them with the new people for his vineyard. Now, we know the people talking about here are Jews, and that God would replace them with Gentiles and Jews who make up the Christian Church, those who would accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. Today you call them Messianic Jews and you call them Christians. Those two groups would form the new group that would be placed in the garden and produce the fruit. But do you think his words were only meant for Israel? You read on. Verse 17, And he beheld them, and said, What is this then that is written? The stone which the builders rejected, the same has become the head of the corner. Whosoever shall fall upon that stone shall be broken, but on whosoever it shall fall it will grind him to powder." And these two verses, we have Jesus speaking about a resurrection road. Christ himself is the cornerstone of the new vineyard. He is a building block on which the new building will be built, the new vineyard. God will connect the Jew and the Gentile together into one new vine, one new structure. He is not a dead cornerstone. He is a living one. The Jews rejected Christ as their cornerstone. But there are Jews and Christians, Gentiles, and they who accept Jesus Christ as the living vine and begin to build their life on Him and produce the fruit in their life that He desires. Whoever today opposes that stone, falls over that stone, attacks that stone, the Bible says, shall be broken. You don't want to attack this stone. In other words, whoever regards Christ to be a stumbling stone will end up being broken. Have you ever heard of the expressions we use today of a broken home? How do you think they got that way? Stumbling over Christ. Kicking Christ. Kicking His commandments out of the house. Have you ever heard of a broken marriage? Have you ever heard of a broken life? How do you think they get broken? They get entangled with the cornerstone and the stone breaks them. They don't break the stone. The stone breaks them. You kick the stone, who's going to get hurt? You or the stone? You're going to get hurt. Your foot's going to get hurt. You kick the laws of God. You kick Christ. Who's going to get hurt? Kick Christ out of your life. Climb over His stone. Climb over His laws. Do your own thing. Who's going to get hurt? You or Christ? You're going to have a broken home, broken leg, broken lap, broken body, broken spirit, broken personality, broken character. I mean, you're going to get broken to pieces. and you reject Christ until you die, then sin will bring upon you the crushing judgment of God's crushing, grinding you into powder, which implies eternal suffering in hell. God will have the last word. Never forget it. Now, the whole issue is Jesus Christ being accepted, then being placed by Him, attached to Him, the cornerstone, and then you begin to grow in His faith and you begin to produce the kind of fruit He desires, and then He blesses you. Or you can kick against the stone, desire to put Christ out of your life, put His laws away from you, and end up being broken and also end up being pulverized. What would God do with people who persistently try to be his enemies? I know the concept, oh God is loving and God will just overlook that and forget about it and God will take them all to heaven and it will be a wonderful party. That's not what this parable says. You ask Jesus what is going to happen to people that preach God as the Jews treated Jesus in the day he lived. Let's just ask Jesus. Don't ask me. Don't ask some philosopher and some scholarly Bible student. Let's just ask Jesus, what did he say? Jesus said, the Father will come and destroy my enemies. That's what he said. and went on instead, and they will be broken, and then they will be ground into powder." I didn't say that. You say, well, that couldn't be a loving God. That's the only God I know of in the Bible. I'm reading straight from the Bible. Read for yourself. Luke 20, 17 through 18. So if you are one of those people this morning who just happened to turn in One of those people that says, I hope nobody ever corners me and talks to me about Christ and tries to get me to be a convert to Jesus. You better look out, brother. You may get your wish. Nothing worse can happen to anybody than for God to leave them alone. If you do that, you will end up a powder. Is that what you want? To end up powder? Kick the stone. and you are so you are too worse anybody ever hurt you in this lockdown you're gonna kick yourself a million times in hell for kicking christ once until next time