Well, this evening we come to the final of the four parables that I had planned out this summer for the evening worship service. This is the same parable that I preached on this morning at Wichita Falls. With that, let's turn to Luke 20. We'll be reading Luke 20, verses one to eight. Let us rise for the reading of God's word. One day, as Jesus was teaching the people in the temple and preaching the gospel, the chief priests and the scribes with the elders came up and said to him, tell us, by what authority do you do these things? And who it is that gave you this authority? He answered, I also will ask you a question. Now tell me, was the baptism of John of heaven or from man? And they discussed it with one another, saying, if we say from heaven, he will say, why did you not believe him? But if we say from man, all the people will stone us to death, for they are convinced that John was a prophet. So they answered that they did not know where it came from. And Jesus said to them, neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things. And he began to tell the people this parable. A man planted a vineyard, and led it out to tenants, and went into another country for a long while. When the time came, he sent a servant to the tenants, so that they would give him some of the fruit of the vineyard. But the tenants beat him, and sent him away empty-handed. And he sent another servant, but they also beat and treated him shamefully, and sent him away empty-handed. And he sent yet a third. This one also they wounded and cast out. Then the owner of the vineyard said, what shall I do? I will send my beloved son. Perhaps they will respect him. But when the servants saw him, they said to themselves, this is the heir. Let us kill him so that the inheritance may be ours. And they threw him out of the vineyard. They threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them? He will come and destroy those tenants and give the vineyard to others. When they heard this, they said, surely not. But he looked directly at them and said, what then is this that is written? The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken into pieces. And when it falls on anyone, it will crush him. Let us pray. Almighty Heavenly Father, we come before you. Having just heard the word that you have for us tonight, we ask, Lord, that you would be with us as we seek to understand this word, this parable that Christ has brought to us. We ask, Lord, that you would make this word effectual into our hearts by the working of your spirit. All these things we ask in your son's name. Amen. Please be seated. before we jump into the parable and the text that is before us tonight, it would be helpful just to have a brief note of context of what's been building up to this point. And so if you look in your Bibles, if you look at chapter 19 starting in verse 28, We see Christ entering the city of Jerusalem. This is that famous event where Christ comes riding in on a donkey and all of his followers are casting down palm trees. And in verse 38, they're praising and proclaiming, blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord. Peace in heaven and glory in the highest. And then after this, we see Christ drawing near to the city and we see him weep. And we see him weep because he knows that the reason why he is coming to the city is hidden from the city. We see in this in verse 42 of chapter 19, where it says, would that you, even you had known on this day, the things that make for peace. but now they are hidden from your eyes. And in this, Christ foretells of Jerusalem specifically's destruction. And then, upon entering the Temple Mount, Luke testifies that Christ here drives out the sellers from the temple place, the marketplace, because they have turned the house of prayer into a den of robbers or a den of thieves. All of this has been met with the disapproval and the disfavor of the Pharisees and the other religious leaders, and they have begun plotting, they have begun devising plans to bring this man down. And so, before us in the parable that we have tonight, Jesus' authority is once again challenged by the priests and the scribes. In the parable that Christ brings to the priests and the scribes, he shows the authority which he has. He shows them that he indeed is the son of God, the son of the vineyard owner. They are to hear the authority which he has. They are to believe in him. If they do not, they will ultimately be brought to destruction. this is the final just judgment of God. So, we'll be looking at the passage before us in three sections. First, the challenge that is brought to Christ in verses 1-8. And then second, the parable in verses 9-16. And then the result of all of this, the takeaway that Christ has for these leaders in verses 17 and 18. And so first, we see in similar fashion as we've seen in other parables, we find Christ's teaching. And we see him this time teaching in the temple and bringing to the people the good news of the gospel. But the religious leaders approach him with this question, a question which they hope will be the question to end all questions. This will finally solve all of their troubles. They ask him, tell us, by what authority do you do these things? And who is it that gave you this authority? They're asking this because in clearing out the temple, Christ has acted as one with religious authority, and they don't understand where this authority is coming from. And he just drove out their main source of revenue by clearing the marketplace. So they're a little upset. However, Christ doesn't act in accordance with the way that these Pharisees want him to act. They have seen themselves as ones who've kept the law perfectly, and he himself is not ministering the way that they thought the Messiah would be administering. So they ask him this question, hoping to push him into a corner and to finally expose him for the fraud that they think that he is. And but, Christ, in His infinite wisdom, sees right through this motivation, sees right through the question that they ask Him, and He pushes them into a corner. Christ says in verse four, and He asks them, was the baptism of John from heaven, or was it from man? And I hope the answer to this question is clear to us tonight, that John's baptism, and He's talking about John the Baptist here, John's baptism, was carried out by the authority of heaven, as John himself was preparing the way for Christ. John was one called by God to this task. The gospel of a different John opens up explaining that there was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light. John the Baptist knows, is known to the religious authorities to be a prophet. John shared this office of prophet with the prophets of the Old Testament. Isaiah 40 verse three outlines that in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert, a highway for our God, and this is what John does. This is where we meet Christ and John at Christ's baptism. And so, the role of a prophet was to speak and to be the mouthpiece of God, to bring the word of God. It was the work of the prophets that they would be preparing the way and pointing God's people forward to Christ. the ultimate expected eschatological prophet who was promised to come. And so I hope that the answer to this question that Christ has for us is clear in our minds, that the baptism of John was from heaven as he was a prophet who was called to this work by God in heaven. But how do the priests and the scribes respond to this question? huddle together and they hash out how it is that they should be answering this question. And they come up with two options, two possible answers. First they say, if we were to say it is from Heaven, well we would be validating that John was indeed a prophet, and that he indeed had the authority to do such things. But they also know that in answering that way Christ would challenge them, and He would ultimately say, well then why didn't you believe in Him? And then the second option that they consider is, if we were to say it is from man, we would openly be denying the prophetic office of Christ, of John, sorry, openly be denying the prophetic office of John that he claimed to, and then in turn, the people would grow angry with them, and that the crowd would then stone the leaders to death. And so see here the true heart of the priests and the scribes. They know the true answer. John acted with the authority of heaven, and that he indeed was a prophet, yet they don't want to admit in their sinful hearts that Jesus is the Messiah, that He is also one that has come with authority, and that He is the one that John prepared the way for. They don't want to admit this, so they lie. They chicken out. They just say, I don't know. know the answer to this question. So, Christ knowing how clear it is the authority which He has, knowing how clear it is the authority which John had, knowing that He is the long awaited Messiah that all of the prophets in the Old Testament had prophesied about, He simply tells them, since you do not know the authority by which John baptized, so too will they not know by what authority I do these things. And so then this leads Christ to speak to them in a parable. And this brings us to our second point. Let's briefly reread this parable in verses 9 to 16. And he began to tell the people this parable. A man planted a vineyard and let it out to tenants and went into another country for a long while. When the time came, he sent a servant to the tenants so that they would give him some fruit of the vineyard. But the tenants beat him and sent him away empty-handed. And he sent another servant, but they also beat and treated him shamefully and sent him away empty-handed. And he sent yet a third. This one also they wounded and cast out. Then the owner of the vineyard said, what shall I do? I will send my beloved son. Perhaps they will respect him. But when the tenants saw him, they said to themselves, this is the heir. Let us kill him so that the inheritance may be ours. And they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. What then will the vineyard owner do to them? He will come and destroy those tenants and give the vineyard to others. When they heard this, they said, surely not. The setting of this parable is, again, simple. A man planted a vineyard. Again, this is a common event. This is even a common event for us here as Todd himself has planted a vineyard. To own a vineyard was a common thing in Christ's day. The owner of the land decided to go and to leave on a trip, and we don't know for how long, but it does say for a long time, long enough for there to be at least one harvest of this crop. He goes to another country. He gives this vineyard into the hands of those who are trained to work a vineyard, to maintain a vineyard, so that he can still yield the harvest of the vineyard that he's worked so hard on creating. It sounds pretty simple, right? These hired people, these workers, should know what they're doing. They should know that they're going to ultimately be asked, how's the vineyard doing? However, as time goes on, the owner hears nothing. There's no word regarding the nature of this vineyard that he has spent so time. There's no word about the harvest that it is yielding. And so, the owner sends an appointed messenger. to be his mouthpiece to these tenants. And he does it not only once, but he does it three times. And if you remember, back when we started this little mini series on parables, a parable is simply a spiritual reality compared with a common earthly event. So here Christ is comparing the reality that all throughout redemptive history, ever since the beginning of time, God has been sending forth messengers to be his mouthpiece to his people, to make known the word of God. And these people have come to be known as the prophets. And so the question that the parable is asking us this evening is how have the messengers or the prophets of God been received? Well, verses 10 to 12 show us pretty clearly that the servants of the owner have been beaten, treated shamefully, wounded, and even cast out. And this shows us two things immediately about these messengers and tenants and vineyard workers. First, it shows us that despite the fact that the tenants want nothing to do with the message, God has still been merciful and gracious to send his servants, to send his prophets to us to make himself known among the nations. And second, we see that the leaders, who the servants have been sent to speak to, the tenants, they don't want anything to do with the message that the owner of the vineyard has for them. They want nothing to do with the owner of the vineyard. And so this picture which Christ paints for us is one of our hard and stubborn hearts in sin. Brothers and sisters, it's because of our sin that we have been separated from God. And think for a moment on how in Adam, our first representative, we failed. Adam was meant to be the prophet who faithfully and successfully passed on the commandment and kept the commandment that God gave to him to Eve. Yet Adam failed to be the proper prophet in the garden. And so it is for this reason our hearts are at enmity with God and our hearts stand opposed to the word and to the message of God. And so it was the sinful hearts of those in the Old Testament who rejected the message of the prophets. Second Chronicles 24 19 bears witness to this as it says, yet the prophets among them Yet he sent prophets among them to bring them back to God. These testified against them, but they did not pay attention. And this isn't the only instance. Nehemiah 9 26 also says, nevertheless, they were disobedient and rebelled against you and cast your law behind you behind their backs and killed your prophets. who had warned them in order to turn them back to you, and they committed great blasphemies. Again, another example, Jeremiah 37, 15, the officials were enraged at Jeremiah. And they beat him and imprisoned him in the house of Jonathan the Secretary, for it had been made into a prison. And then if you were to continue reading in Jeremiah, in Jeremiah 38, you see that the ultimate fate of Jeremiah is to be thrown into a pit for the message that he has been proclaiming. And this is the theme throughout the Old Testament. prophets and their ministry. But it doesn't just end in the Old Testament, it doesn't just end when the Old Testament ends. The same too can be said of John the Baptist and the message that he had brought to make the way straight for Christ. It was because of this message that John was ultimately thrown in prison and then beheaded for bearing this message to the wicked tenants. And so the parable captures this and the message of what the tenants are doing with the messengers. But the parable doesn't end there. The parable doesn't end with John the Baptist or the Old Testament prophets. No, the parable continues. The owner of the vineyard hears word for a third time that his specially appointed messengers have been disrespected for a third time. And so he's left with only one option. He decides to send his son. This is the expected eschatological prophet who the people have long anticipated and long awaited to come. This one that the owner of the vineyard sends, this is the very word of God. This is Christ himself. Westminster Shorter Catechism explains to us when it's talking about the three-fold office of Christ. Christ carries out the office of prophet in revealing to us by His Word and Spirit the will of God for our salvation. The Father knows the fate of of the son. The father knows that the son will be abused. The father knows that the son will not be welcomed. The father knows that the son will be brought under an unjust trial and ultimately put on the accursed tree. But the owner is hopeful. He's hopeful that the tenants will see that this is the very son of him who has charged them to keep the vineyard. and maybe the tenants will listen to the son and that the son will bring back a good word. But it's not the case. No, the tenants upon seeing him think that they can kill him and gain whatever inheritance is due to this son. And so the same reigns true for the ultimate prophet messenger that God has sent forth to bring his word to his people. God spoke to us through his son, his beloved son, And how did the world receive Him? John 1.11 makes that clear. He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him. This Christ came in a manner which we found in the opening of our text, in chapter 20, verse 1. He came to seek and save the lost. He came to bring healing to the sick, not to the healthy. He came teaching the people in the temple and preaching the gospel. But this message which he brought and the wonders which he worked brought such offense to the priests and the scribes and the religious leaders of his day that they sought to reject him and to reject his authority, thus throwing him out of the vineyard and killing him on the accursed tree. They didn't get it. They didn't get the message. We in our sinful hearts don't get it. They didn't get that they were placed in this world for a reason. They were placed in God's vineyard to bear and to bring fruit. that they would make God known among the nations, yet instead they became like the nations themselves. And here Peter attests to this fact in his Pentecost sermon in Acts 2.22-23 when he says, Hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst. As you yourselves know, this Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. And so it is in the death of Christ, the death of the Son of God, the death of the son of the vineyard owner, that the way of salvation is not only made known, but made possible. And now we don't have time to go further into this theme of the message being rejected and the response to the message, but we could continue to talk about the apostles and their ministry throughout the beginning foundation stage of the church and how even then the message was still not received. The apostles in the early church were persecuted for this message. But what is the father to do in response to the killing of his son? He now moves to reject the original tenants who didn't get the message, didn't get the original mission that was put to them. And he is going to allow others to come in from outside of the vineyard, the chosen nation to work the vineyard. God takes his plan of salvation and moves from being a one nation chosen people to being a multi-ethnic, multinational chosen people. After all, in John 1, 12, it continues to say, but to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, He gave the right to become children of God, who were born not of blood or the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but were born of God. It's for this reason that Christ, in his great commission, gives to the disciples the command to go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations. And this reality shocks the priests and the scribes. They say, surely not. But it really shouldn't. After all, they were told long ago when God told Abraham, God said, I will make you a great nation. I will bless you. I will make your name great so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you. And him who dishonors you, I will curse. And in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed. But the religious rulers of this day cannot fathom this reality, that there would be more than just them, more than just the chosen nation of Israel. After all, it's these leaders who have kept the law perfectly. And it's them, and to them alone that salvation has been promised. And to us Gentiles, we are a pagan and undeserving people. Yet it is through Christ, through Christ the true promised son, the offspring of Abraham, that all the families, all the nations are now blessed. Because we have been granted entrance through his death and resurrection, to be called children of God. We have been transferred from the domain of darkness to the kingdom of his beloved son. Praise be to God that we Gentiles, we outsiders, have been allowed entrance into this blessed reward which is only to be found in Christ. This is the content of the parable which Christ brings to us. And Christ ends our text tonight with a result. After this thorough rebuke, which he has given to the leaders, he grounds this result in the new reality. Let us read this reality in verses 17 and 18. But he looked directly at them and said, what then is this that is written? The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken into pieces, and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him. Following the scribes and the chief priests, following their statement of disapproval, their surely not, look at what Christ does. Christ looks directly at them. Christ looks directly at them and I can't help but imagine that these scribes and these chief priests are now shaking in their sandals and they're now experiencing the authority which they once previously denied. And so Christ uses Psalm 118 to show that he is the cornerstone which has been rejected by man. It was the sinfulness of man which cast out Christ out of the city to be hung on the cross. In so doing, he laid the foundation for our salvation and redemption before God. Now, I've asked this question many times, maybe you have as well, but what's the significance of a cornerstone? Well, in relation to architecture, a cornerstone is traditionally to be the first stone which is to be laid for any structure. And all other stones are laid in reference to it. And so, Christian, this salvation which is ours in Jesus, he is the cornerstone by which we have our foundation laid. He is the first stone. He is the preeminent stone. in whom all of our hope and all of our security, we find that in Christ. We find that in our calling and election. However, this is not something which is widely accepted by all. This cornerstone, this rock of our salvation, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1, he says that the Jews demand signs and the Greeks seek wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to the Jews and folly to the Gentiles. But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. So why is this message of Christ a stumbling block to the Jews and the Gentiles? Well, it's because this law, this message of Christ, this word of God that has been sent forth, it reveals to us our sin and our total depravity. And for this reason, there are really only two reactions to that message, to that exposure. There's only two reactions. On the one hand, there are those who see their sin, they see their total depravity, and they see their need for a Savior. They see their need for repentance and they go running to Christ. And they find themselves praying to God and putting their trust in Christ and the work that He did. Or, on the other hand, there are those who are shown their sin, but instead of accepting their sin nature, they move to reject Christ because they don't want to ever admit or accept that anything could be wrong with them. And so here, Christ gives a warning to this second group. Should anyone be found in a state of offense because of this stone, because of this message, because of Christ, That is to say, if anyone comes to their sin and does not turn from their sin, as Peter says, they stumble because they disobey the word as they were destined to do. They will be crushed by the stone which no man has cut. which is the full, just judgment of God. As it says in Daniel, when Daniel's responding to the king's dream of the statue that's cast down and destroyed by the stone which is cut by no man, which is found in Daniel chapter 2. It says, in the days of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed. Nor shall the kingdom be left to other people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end. It shall stand forever. And so this multi-ethnic kingdom of God now stands forever. And we should desire to dwell in that kingdom in which Christ is the chief cornerstone. But in order to do so, we must first realize our sin and not reject Christ. For if we are to fully understand Christ and Christ's authority, we must first fully realize our sin and our need for Him. And so thanks be to God that He has so willingly made this known. He's made this known by sending to us the ultimate perfect prophet. And it's in this perfect prophet that we can put all of our faith and all of our trust. Amen. Let's pray. Almighty Heavenly Father, we thank you. We thank you continually, and it is our hearts. Thanks that you have sent to us your son. By whom salvation has not only been made possible, but made known. We thank you that in him we can continually cast our reliance. In him we are robed with his righteousness and made right before you. Heavenly Father, we ask that this word which was exhorted, that you would make it effectual unto all of our hearts. And that as we go about our week, you would continue to call this as a reminder to us to be faithful to you in all that we say and all that we do. In your son's name, amen.