If you've ever dared to enter the gauntlet of the main street of Handorf on a weekend, or especially if you want to test your patience on a long weekend, you might have seen this artistic graffiti on the wall of one of the buildings, particularly as you head out of Handorf back towards the freeway. If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything. Quite a profound statement, isn't it? It's not a biblical proverb. It's often attributed to a fellow called Alexander Hamilton, one of the founding fathers of the US. But there is some wisdom and truth in it. Wisdom and truth that has some biblical overtones, or better still, which could come from a biblical foundation. Most of us would know the short parable of the wise man who built his house on the rock, as opposed to the one who built his house on the sand. If you don't stand or build on something solid, you will fall down and everything else around you. As the old hymn goes, all other ground is sinking sand. Thanks, Nathan. Or as Jesus teaches us here this morning in Matthew 22, if our lives and faith are not built upon the foundation of Christ, we'll end up stumbling on that very foundation stone of Christ. It's not that we choose to build on something else, we'll actually stumble and trip and fall on that cornerstone. And in an even further twist and escalation of that imagery, not only will we fall on that stone, that stone will fall upon those who do not receive Christ and it will crush them. It's a sobering end to this parable, isn't it? If you've got your Bibles there, open up to Matthew 21. Jesus is speaking directly here to a certain group of people, to some Pharisees and chief priests, the religious leaders of the day. They've approached Jesus, we heard last week. He's just cleansed the temple the day before. This is the day after that. He's overturned the chairs and the tables of the money changes and the animal stalls for sacrifice. And he's speaking to the religious leaders and to anyone else who has refused to heed his word, not just his word, but the word of all the prophets throughout the generations leading up to the coming of the Christ. And despite the religious leaders intent to get rid of Jesus, to do away with him one way or another, Jesus confronts them here. They're asking him a question last week. And he said, well, I'm not going to answer you unless you answer me. And in doing what he does here in chapter 21, in these three parables, he actually exposes what they stand for. In fact, that they're not willing to say what they stand for. They don't want to reveal their convictions. Last week, Jesus asked them regarding John's baptism, was it from heaven or from man? You tell me, he said. And which after a little bit of a powwow together and a bit of a discussion, they said, well, we don't know. We don't know. but they answered that way, not because they didn't actually know, we're told they answered that way because they were afraid of the crowd. Have a look back in verse 25. If we say it's from man, if we say John the Baptist, his baptism was from man, we're afraid of the crowd for they hold that John the Baptist was a prophet. And so because of their indecision and because of their unwillingness to actually speak up, Jesus didn't tell them by what authority he did the teaching and the healing and cleansed the temple. Now we do read in places, don't we? Some of the religious leaders actually did believe Jesus. They did receive his word. Paul was one of those. Nicodemus was too. Joseph of Arimathea, the one whose tomb Jesus was laid in. He was a member of the Jewish council, but we're told he was a disciple of Jesus in secret. for fear of the Jews. And in Acts we're told a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith. So they're not all lost. But on this occasion, it's clear whatever the heart of their faith, whatever's going on on the inside, their public profession of their faith is rather fickle. They're scared of who's listening. and what the results might be of that. They're unwilling to publicly profess their convictions. What they did say in public, it seems, was dependent on who was listening. They were afraid of the crowd, so they said, we don't know. Easily swayed by the trend of the day or the peer pressure, public opinion. And if we're honest, we can be a bit like that too, can't we? Depending on who we're speaking with. what the tone of the atmosphere is, what we might say or might not say. We might not say lies, but we might not say the whole truth about our convictions. We might hold back a little bit, worrying about what the crowd will think of us, afraid of getting it wrong. And I don't say that to make us feel guilty. I do that sometimes. I confess that. But I think as we read passages like this and we think about the Pharisees and the chief priests sometimes who seem to always have it in for Jesus, we sometimes look upon them as though we are the Pharisees actually. We're the ones condemning them, despising them. And that's got a little bit of whiff of Phariseeism to me, doesn't it? We have a tendency to look down on them, a tendency to despise them, those who fail to recognize who Jesus was. And if that's the way we do see things, if the way we look at the Pharisees and the chief priests does have a whiff of Pharisaism to it, then we'll do well to hear what Jesus says to them here. As we heard last week from verse 31, truly I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you. Friends, we've got more in common with the test collectors and prostitutes than we do the Pharisee, or at least we should have. Aren't we those who need the mercy of God? Aren't we those who have received his grace and need his forgiveness? And so we shouldn't be reading this from the vantage point of our own self-righteousness and looking down on the Pharisees, but in fact we should be looking at it from those who have received the grace of God and recipients of His love and forgiveness, as sinners who have no righteousness of our own. So let's not put ourselves in the place of the Pharisees, be careful. The only righteousness we have is the one we've been given in Christ, the one who became sin for us. So let's not, first of all, place ourselves above anybody as we read these parables. Not anyone in the parable or anyone around us today, but instead humbly come before the master of the vineyard, as we're about to hear, with thanksgiving and with repentance. As it's often said, we're beggars, simply telling other beggars where to find their daily bread. And so this parable before us this morning, the parable of the tenants, it's actually the second of three. It's a trilogy of parables, as Nat told us last week. And he's telling these parables to the religious leaders of the day. This one's reasonably straightforward parable. It's one of the simplest, I think, of all parables. Finishes with a very clear and confronting message, which Jesus explains to those who are listening. And it's so clear and so confronting that the chief priests and Pharisees, they recognize Jesus is speaking to them about themselves. There's no mystery here. Master of the house plants a vineyard. He takes good care to ensure the vineyard's secure and that it has every chance to be fruitful. The master is God. And as we heard in that reading from Isaiah 5, Israel is often referred to as God's vineyard or as a vine. That's why Jesus says, I am the true vine later in John's gospel. And that passage in Isaiah 5, did you hear the similar description of that vineyard that the Lord planted, the time and the effort he spent preparing the ground and planting it with choice vines. He built a watchtower to protect it. He hewed out a wine vat. He knew it was going to provide, or it was big enough and great enough to provide wine that he'd make there on his own property. And God asks Israel, what more was there for me to do for my vineyard that I haven't done for it? I've done everything I can. to make this vineyard yield good fruit and produce the best wine and protect it from any opposition or infiltration. And he looks to the vineyard and he expects it to yield grapes, good grapes, a rich harvest. And here in the parable, he leases that vineyard to tenants, to the leaders of Israel. And they're given the task of tending and caring for the vineyard, making sure that it's protected, making sure that it grows well and that it bears fruit and produces wine for the master. And when the time comes for the master to see how it's all been going, it's harvest time, vintage season as they call it in the wine and vine business. But the tenants refuse to serve their master, refuse to give him back anything. Instead, as he sends servants, they beat some, they stone others, and still kill others that he sends. More than once, and those servants in the parable are the prophets, through all the generations. Prophets like Jeremiah, who was beaten and put in stocks. Prophets like the hundred that Obadiah took and hid in caves when Jezebel was intent on killing them, cutting them off. Prophets like Zechariah, who was stoned by God's own people of Judah under Joash as king. And most recently a prophet like John the Baptist, beheaded by Herod. In the parable, the tenants do this more than once. He sent servants, they beat one, killed another, stoned another. Verse 36, again he sent other servants, more than the first, and they did the same thing. Time and time again he sends these servants. And it's a sad and repeated action that the tenants of the vineyard just continually despise the master and those he sends, beating them and killing them, refusing to heed the word of God. And ultimately refusing to heed the word of the son of God, as he comes, as he is sent, and he too is taken out of the vineyard and killed. So the parable shows this sad and repeated action of refusal and intent to actually kill and do away with God and His word. But it also shows God's amazing patience, His long-suffering patience, His persistence with His covenant people and His covenant leaders. This is a demonstration of God's gracious and divine forbearance throughout the generations, century after century, repeatedly sending His servants warning his people, sending his prophets, giving him promise, turn to me and again and I will not forsake you. Urging them to turn to him that they might receive his grace and mercy and love and blessing, that he might receive the fruit of the vineyard, the obedience of faith. If you think back earlier in Matthew, when John the Baptist, just before Jesus came, can you remember what he said to the Pharisees and the Sadducees back in Matthew 3? John came preaching and baptizing for repentance for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And then when some of the religious leaders come, he says, what does he say to him? You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath of God? And he says to them, bear fruit, bear fruit in keeping with repentance. We've had a fair bit to do with fruit lately in Matthew's Gospel, haven't we? We had the fig tree a couple of weeks ago, which showed signs of bearing fruit but didn't, and it was cursed by Jesus to wither and die. John the Baptist said, every tree that does not bear fruit, it's cut down and thrown into the fire. And then again in this parable, can Jesus make it any more clear? Can God be any more patient and kind? Can I do anything else for this vineyard of mine? Can Matthew make it any more obvious to us? The Lord expects a harvest for His people to bear fruit, not to fill their own vats or our own vaults, but for His glory, to give it to Him. And when the branches, the tenants, the covenant leaders and God's people refuse and fail to hear His word and receive it, well, the Lord is slow to anger, isn't He? Merciful and gracious, He's tremendously patient. Thousand years like a day, day like a thousand years. And yet when that time comes to an end, his tremendous patience is matched by tremendous wrath because of their refusal against all those who push back and reject God's word. And it's not as simple as like some of us, I'm sure when we get frustrated, you know, we get to the end of our tether and our patience runs out. I don't think we can just say God's patience runs out. But it's like this cry of his, I think it's a cry of grief that says, what more can I do? I've done everything I can. And yet still they refuse, still they push back. And so he sends his son. And the tenants say, aha, maybe they think the master's dead. If we get the son, then it's all ours. If I do away with him, They get all the inheritance. So they throw him out of the vineyard and kill him as well. So this parable tells us of the repeated refusal of God's people over the generations. It tells us of the repeated love and mercy and patience of God as he sends his prophets, his servants. But it's also prophetic as it foretells the death of his son, of Jesus himself. And it's a warning to those who have ears to hear. The Lord takes no delight in the death of the wicked, we're told. He wants them to repent and believe. He keeps on showing them, keeps on speaking to them. And so here Jesus looks the Pharisees in the eyes, just like he did last week. And he asked them a question. What do you think? What will that master do to those wicked tenants? They're not willing to give an opinion about John the Baptist, whether it's from God or from man. Maybe sometimes as a teacher, you ask a question to the class and no one pipes up. So you try to phrase the question a little bit differently and encourage a bit of conversation. So Jesus does something different. He says, okay, tell them a story. What do you think? The two sons last week. And then this week, which one did the will of the father last week? And this week it's what therefore will the owner of the vineyard do to the wicked tenants? He's not just teaching them content. He doesn't just want to teach them cause and effect. He actually wants them to seriously consider the implications of their own unbelief. You see, their unwillingness to give a response earlier is not just because they're scared of the crowds. It's actually because of their unbelief, because they haven't turned. Jesus puts a mirror up in front of them, the mirror of God's word. when he says to them, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants? And this reminds me of that scene with King David and Nathan the prophet after he's been with Bathsheba and has murdered Uriah. And Nathan the prophet comes up and says, let me tell you a story about a man who's got lots of sheep and he's got a guest coming and he wants to put on a meal. He says, I don't want to use one of my sheep. I know someone who's got, there's a poor man. He's got one sheep. He treats it like a daughter. little lamb, little you. And the rich man takes that one and gives that as the feast. And as Nathan's telling the story, David's indignation builds up and builds up. Nathan doesn't even get a chance to say, what do you think should happen? David stands up and says, that man deserves to die. And Nathan says, what? You are the man. And that's what's happening here in this parable. What will that master do when he comes to those tenants? And the Pharisees say, he will put those wretches to a miserable death and he'll let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruits in their season. And Jesus says, you're spot on. They've got it right. You know how it works. They knew what the consequences should be. And Jesus says in verse 42, have you never read in the scriptures? The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. From Psalm 118. The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes. They rejected the stone, generation after generation, and then he sends his son. He sent the prophets, he sent his son, and they refused to listen to him. And the father says, this is my son. He is the cornerstone, the one you've all rejected. He's laid that stone and it's the foundation. But Jesus doesn't just leave it hanging there with an Old Testament quote for them to work out. He looks again in their eyes and says, therefore, I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and will be given to a people producing its fruits. And the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him. John warned you. I'm telling you now, bear fruit in keeping with repentance. Because if you don't listen, you'll fall over this stone, and this stone will fall on you and crush you. It's a strong warning. The Lord is indeed merciful and gracious. He's slow to anger, patient and kind. In his divine forbearance, he's passed over many former sins. But there will be a time when the time of his patience comes to an end. There's nothing more he can do for his vineyard. And those who have rejected that stone, the sun, those who have presumed on God's loving kindness, as Paul says in Romans 2, are actually storing up wrath for themselves on the day of the Lord. just before this parable at the end of last week. Jesus says to them, truly I say to you, the tax collectors and prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and prostitutes believed him. And when you saw it, when you saw the way of righteousness, when you saw how it would be that you enter into the kingdom of God, you did not change your minds and believe. Some of you will know the cornerstone. There's two things, it's actually the stone of the corner. It could be the one in the ground and the foundation, the big stone at the bottom which is used to hold up the walls and also align the walls. It's cut in a way that's 90 degrees perpendicular so it actually aligns the walls for the building and the rest of it stands on that stone. Or it could also be the capstone, the top of that wall, which like a big zip sort of holds the top of the zip together so it doesn't come undone. and says it sort of finishes the builder's work. If you look at a stone building it's got lots of stones in it but in the corners they've got big stones to do that and it holds it together. I've spoken to a stonemason about some of the cracks in our place and he says if we do that we've got to dig this bit out and then put a big stone there which sort of holds the two sides together. Chances are here it's more towards the foundation stone at the bottom. and many other biblical allusions and images speak of that one. But it's interesting, this stone also falls on those who stumble on it. So it sort of has this thing of being from above as well, doesn't it? The one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him. Jesus is quoted from Psalm 118. There's other passages like Isaiah 8. He will become a sanctuary and a stone of offense, a rock of stumbling, a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. Many will stumble on it. They shall fall and be broken. But Jesus uses this quote from Psalm 118 and he speaks of something marvelous with this stone that the builders have rejected. This was the Lord's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes. Now, it's not the judgment that Jesus goes on to speak about which is marvelous, although we could argue that could be the way too. But as I said, the Lord doesn't take the light in the death of the wicked. Now, what's marvelous here is not some cruel menacing, oh, you're going to get it in the neck if you don't listen and believe. It doesn't come across that way. No, what's marvelous here, what's wonderful, that word, remarkable beyond our comprehension is the great reversal that takes place. The stone which so many thought was unsuitable, discarded and put in a, it's like just a chunk of stone thrown in the heap. God says, no, that's the one. He's the one. He's the cornerstone. God has chosen him. God has sent him. God has decided. This is the Lord's doing. And it is marvelous in our eyes. Everything in our world that we look as glorious and wonderful and precious in our sinful, stubborn and selfish ways, everything that we hold dear to and put aside other stuff, God tips on its head and says, no, no, no, this is the precious, my precious and chosen one. The cornerstone. The one that like the sun in the parable comes and they reject him. and kill him, taking him out of the vineyard and throwing him out like a piece of worthless trash, like a hunk of stone. But that stone is the foundation of the church. The whole church is built upon him, as Paul says in Ephesians 2, with the apostles and the prophets being the foundation set in place upon that cornerstone. John came to you in the way of righteousness. You've seen the way of righteousness. The way of righteousness has come to us in Jesus. They've seen him, but they did not change their minds and believe him. But we all in Christ, those who have heard his word and by the grace of God has received Christ, even as we're rejected by the world, God says we are precious in his sight. We are being built into that temple on that foundation of Christ and the apostles and the prophets. And he says, Peter quotes it, doesn't he? Behold, I'm laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious. Whoever believes in him will not be put to shame. You yourselves like living stones are being built up on that foundation. Whoever believes in him will not be put to shame. Friends, the world and all its systems, it hates God. It's not just a choice of, I don't want to say what I think about God, like the Pharisees earlier. It's not just a fear of what they want to say. No, they actually hate God and they want to do away with Him. They kill the author of life and we keep on doing it. And the world will hate us as God's children because we're part of that building, the church. But what a great promise, what a great comfort that whoever believes in Him, this cornerstone, will not be put to shame. We don't need to fear what the world thinks. There will be consequences. You might get laughed at, you might get ostracized, you might get persecuted. You might even be killed for your faith. But whoever believes in Him will not be put to shame. Isn't that marvelous? Isn't that our hope and our comfort in life and in death, that we are His and none can snatch us from His hands? Paul tells us in Corinthians, doesn't he, to the world, it is weakness, it is foolishness, a stumbling stone. But to those who are being saved, it's the wisdom of God and the power of God. Christ is. That sinners like you and I, tax collectors and prostitutes, could enter into the kingdom. and stand before the Holy God of all and call Him Father. So that when He appears in glory, when the One the builders have rejected actually comes and stands before the entire world, everyone will bow before Him and say, He is Lord. And He'll gather us up and we will appear with Him in glory. I asked Laura if I could share this this morning. But Karen in her last days, to a group of doctors and nurses at one point, as they were sharing with her the days to come, she said to them, I'm not afraid to die. I belong to the Lord. I'm a child of God and I know where I'm going and when he calls me, I will be going home. Whoever believes in him will not be put to shame. What a thing for that medical team to hear. What a witness. It's marvellous indeed to be included, to be built upon as God builds us, this is not our own doing, this is the Lord's doing, upon this cornerstone of Christ. I'd love to read you the whole of Psalm 118 to finish, but let me read you some of it. The Lord is my strength and my song. He has become my salvation. No, I want to go earlier, sorry. I'm going to go back to verse 14. The Lord is my strength and my song. He has become my salvation. That's where it was, where I was reading, that's okay. Glad songs of salvation are in the tents of the righteous. The right hand of the Lord does valiantly. The right hand of the Lord exalts. The right hand of the Lord does valiantly. I shall not die, but I shall live and recount the deeds of the Lord. The Lord has disciplined me severely, but he has not given me over to death. Open to me the gates of righteousness that I may enter through them. Many in John's day, Jesus' day, and every generation before and since have been shown the way of righteousness. Prophets came and showed them. Christ has come, he is our righteousness. But so few have changed their mind and believe and walk in that path. We only enter by grace through faith. What a wonder, how marvelous is it to be able to say, open to me the gates of righteousness, that I might enter through them. That's the confidence we can have in Christ. And give thanks to the Lord. This is the gate of the Lord and the righteous shall enter through it. I thank you that you have answered me. And have become my salvation. The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the Lord's doing. It is marvelous in our eyes. And you know what verse comes next? This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it. We're going to finish there this morning. We're going to stand and we're going to do just that. Let us rejoice and be glad in this day. As we sing, I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene and wonder how he could love me, you, a sinner, condemned and unclean. How marvellous, how wonderful is my Saviour's love for me. Amen.