you I'm in Luke chapter 20, verse nine.

Please find a Bible, turn there, we're going to go through this text together.

Let me just say right from the get-go, we have to learn the Word of God.

Entertainment is good, but it will not sustain us over the long haul.

I look back over the course of my ministry and some of the sermons that I preach and I see so much wasted space.

Not that it was bad space, it's just that when you and I leave a message, whether we're watching on YouTube online or in church in an auditorium somewhere.

We ought to have this understanding of Scripture, of the revelation of God.

We ought to leave with a better grasp of what the Bible is trying to teach us.

Why is this story in the Bible?

What am I supposed to learn?

How does it transform my life?

If that doesn't happen, then we've just kind of spent an hour and a half, whenever it is, listening to a sermon or in church, we've spent that time maybe experiencing something, but not going deeper in our commitment and our faith and our understanding of who God is.

That's important.

So in Luke chapter 20, I'm going to read this passage.

It's one of my favorite parables.

Of course, they're all my favorite.

But in this parable, we're told that there is a man, Jesus tells the story, there's a man in verse nine who plants a vineyard.

And he rented it to some farmers and went away for a long time.

At harvest time, he sent a servant to the tenants so they would give him some of the fruit of the vineyard.

But the tenants beat him and sent him away empty-handed.

He sent another servant, but that one they also beat and treated shamefully and sent away empty handed.

And he sent still a third and they wounded him and threw him out.

Then the owner of the vineyard said, what shall I do?

I will send my son whom I love.

Perhaps they will respect him.

But when the tenants saw him, they talked the matter over.

This is the heir, they said, let's kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.

So they drew him out, or threw him out rather, of the vineyard and killed him.

What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them?

This is Jesus asking the Pharisees and scribes.

He will come and kill those tenants and give the vineyard to others.

When the people heard this, they said, God forbid, Jesus looked directly at them and asked, then what is the meaning of that which is written?

The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.

Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces.

Anyone on whom it falls will be crushed.

So this is the word of the Lord.

Now to grapple with and apply the word of God into our lives, we must be willing, and I'm not going to do this every sermon, but I want to just remind you of what we're attempting to do here.

If you're going to really grapple with and understand a passage of scripture, you've got to be willing to do three things.

Number one, you've got to attempt to understand the context of Jesus' words.

What is Jesus saying in his time, in his culture?

And what is he trying to communicate to the people of his day?

That's crucial because to misunderstand context is to misapply the truth into your lives or to miss the truth entirely.

Second, you've got to be willing to contextualize the truth that is discovered or precept into our modern day lives.

So what is Jesus teaching in the first century?

And then what is the message to us today?

And then ultimately you want to consider the 40,000 foot view.

What is the overarching truth of this scripture?

So again, attempt to understand context, contextualize it to our own day, and then what is the overarching truth?

Good preaching deals with all three, and especially this weekend, I want to do that with this parable in Luke 20.

First let's deal with the context.

It's important to note that the rabbis of Jesus' day taught that when Messiah comes, he'll be able to do three miracles that only the Messiah can do.

I don't think most of you knew that.

Healings and supernatural events are part of the Old Testament and New Testament culture.

But there are three types of miracles that the Pharisees and scribes taught that Jesus would do and only Jesus, the Messiah, would be able to do, and that would identify him as Messiah.

So the Pharisees and the rabbinical leaders emphasized again and again to their students, when Messiah comes, you will be able to know him, he will be marked and identified by three miracles he does that no one else can do.

The first messianic miracle, they said, was the miracle of healing someone with leprosy, but that person would be Jewish.

So he would be the first one to heal someone Jewish of leprosy.

Now you say, well, aren't there healings of leprosy in the Old and New Testament?

Well, there are two.

But in neither case was it a Jew.

From the time of the Mosaic Law, from the time it was completed, there was no record of a Jew being healed of leprosy.

And the Pharisees and scribes taught that the marker, the identifying mark of Messiah is that he would be able to do that when he comes.

So when Messiah heals the leper, it was said by the Pharisees and scribes, there would be three tests to affirm the miracle.

Was he really a leper?

Was he really cured?

And what were the circumstances surrounding the healing?

And there would be seven days of investigation by the priest in the temple.

And as they investigated, they would come to the conclusion, this is a miracle only Messiah can do.

Jesus Christ has done this.

This is exactly why in Luke chapter five, verse 14, when Jesus heals the leper, here's what he says to the leper.

He says, don't tell anyone, but go show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing.

As he says.

testimony to them.

Who's them?

Jesus says, don't go tell everyone right now.

First honor the priest and the scribes, the religious leaders, and tell them, you have found Messiah, the one who can heal leprosy among the Jews.

So Jesus deliberately sends the leper to the priest as a message.

Good news, Messiah is here.

And you'll notice in the story and the narrative of the gospels, after this healing, the Pharisees and scribes, at that point, began to follow Jesus and investigate him wherever he goes.

Now, just quickly, as they follow Jesus and investigate him, they discover two things.

Number one, and this is important, Jesus disagreed with the Pharisees' definition of righteousness.

In their mind, it was the check the box of legality.

You do all these things legally, and then that's considered to be righteous.

Jesus comes along and says, no, yeah, the letter of the law is important, but I'm more interested in the spirit of the law, the motivation behind what it is that you're actually doing.

Second, the Pharisees and scribes, religious leaders, as they followed Jesus, recognized that Jesus disagreed with the kind of righteousness that would get them into the Kingdom of Heaven.

For the priest, it was man's righteousness, but for Jesus it was God's provision of righteousness, that He would do for us something that we could not do for ourselves.

Now as soon as they realized that about Jesus, they realized these kingdoms weren't in the cahoots, they were not aligned together, so there was going to be a battle.

In the priesthood, think about this, the context in which we're going to read Luke 20, and this is again so crucial, the priest and the Pharisees believed and acted as though they control the narrative.

That they're the owners of righteousness and the law, and they told the people of God, they said, you do what we say or you're in or you're out.

When Jesus comes along, he reminds them, these are not your people, these are my people.

These are the people of God, this is my vineyard.

And yes, all have sinned, but I have come to offer redemption and to bring the kind of life that features an overarching joy.

One that is free of sin and death and the burden of the legalism that you've placed on my people.

So Jesus performs the first miracle, the scribes and Pharisees began to investigate and they learned the difference between what they've been teaching and what Jesus has come to bring.

Now here's the second messianic miracle quickly.

The second miracle, Messiah.

According to the Pharisees and Sadducees own teaching that Messiah would do that no one else would do is the casting out of a demon who had caused a person to be deaf and mute.

Now why?

Because we know that demons were cast out by other people, but only Messiah would be able to cast out a demon that had caused the person to be deaf and mute.

And here's the reason.

Christ taught in Pharisaic Judaism that three steps must be taken.

if you are to cast out a demon.

Number one, establish communication with the demon.

Two, discover the name of the demon.

And then three, by using the name, call the demon out.

So, if the demon has caused a man to be dumb and mute, and he cannot speak or hear.

These steps could not be performed.

So the Pharisees and scribes taught that only Messiah would be able to cast out a demonic force like this.

And the reason they believed that is they believed Messiah would be so close to God, he would hear directly from God, and God himself would tell or identify the name and the character and nature of the demonic force.

Therefore, Jesus would know the name without having hearing it, and would be able to cast it out.

Now.

This is exactly what Jesus does in Matthew 12.

So in Matthew 12, 22, then they brought him a demon possessed man who was blind and mute, and Jesus healed him so that he could both talk and see.

All the people were astonished and said, could this be the son of David?

Now they had seen people cast out demons before.

So why are they saying, could this be son of David?

That's another way of saying, could this be the Messiah?

And the answer is, they've been told all their lives that the only one who can cast a demonic force out of someone who is deaf and mute is God.

and Mute would be Messiah.

Now the next question is, how did the Pharisees and the scribes and the temple priests respond to the healing?

Well, in Matthew chapter 12, verse 24, here's what we're told.

But when the Pharisees heard this...

They said, it is only Bobby Elzebub.

That's a term that means Lord of the flies.

And that's one of Satan's many names.

The idea was that flies would feast on excrement and death.

So anything associated with excrement and death had to be of satanic origins.

So they said the power that Jesus is using to cast out this demon is from the devil himself.

Now, the prince of demons, he said, it is by this prince of demons that this fellow casts out demons.

Jesus knew their thoughts.

In other words, they didn't say it out loud, but he knew what they were thinking.

He said to them, every kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and every city or household divided against itself will not stand.

If Satan drives out Satan, he's divided against himself, how then can his kingdom stand?

Jesus is saying, this is preposterous, it's illogical.

If I'm doing this by Satan...

A house divided will not stand.

This is not what Satan does.

He doesn't cast out demons.

He puts demons within.

And then he says, by the way, if I drive out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your people drive them out?

So then they will be your judges.

Jesus is saying, you don't know.

You know the power.

You know this is a messianic miracle.

If you accuse me of this, then you have to accuse your own prophets or teachers of this same thing.

But if it is by the Spirit of God that I drive out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.

Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or the age to come." Now, just quickly time out, what is this sin?

I get asked this question all the time.

To blaspheme the Holy Spirit was to refuse to acknowledge the work of God when you knew it was the work of God, okay?

to attribute the work of God, when you know it's the work of God, to something else, especially worse yet, to the devil himself.

So in essence, to deny the work of God through his son, there is no other way of forgiveness.

Since Jesus is the only one who offers atonement, if you deny the work of the Spirit on the life and ministry of Jesus, there's no way that you can be forgiven of your sins.

Ever.

And this is all to do with context.

In my humble opinion, this sin is a national sin rather than an individual sin.

Because when the Jewish believers, even today, witness to their Jewish friends, so these are Messianic Jews who witness about Messiah in modern day Israel, one of the complaints or objections they hear goes like this, well, if Jesus was really the Messiah, then why do our rabbis not believe that he was the Messiah?

Messiah.

So even in Jesus' time, the Jewish masses knew the three miracles that Jesus would do, but yet when they saw them, because their own religious leaders did not believe Jesus was Messiah, also denied he was Messiah.

They followed their leaders.

And as a result, there was punishment and destruction that came upon the children of Israel in AD 70 when Jerusalem was destroyed.

Judgment did come to that generation.

The vineyard then was entrusted to new vineyard keepers, and we'll come back to that just in a moment.

So one miracle, two miracle, Jesus had done them both.

Now here's a third miracle, the third messianic miracle.

It was said that only the Messiah would be able to heal a man who had been born blind.

Now, other people had healed those who were blind, but we're talking about a man who had been born blind.

And in John 9, Jesus does exactly this.

And notice the question.

The disciples ask when they are introduced to this man born blind.

I'm in John chapter 9 verse 1.

As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth.

His disciples ask him, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?

Now you and I look at that and we think, what?

You can't sin before the age of accountability, and you definitely can't sin before you're born.

But the questions come from the Pharisees and scribes because of a misunderstanding of two things.

Number one, there is a verse in Exodus 34, verse seven that says, God does not leave the guilty unpunished.

He punishes the children and their children for the sin of their parents to the third and fourth generation.

So rather than understanding the Bible's teaching that the flaws and weaknesses and sins in moms and dads are passed down to generation through the life patterns and their habits and their own weaknesses, I know that I see my own weaknesses in my son and my daughter, and I also see my mother's weaknesses in me, the same temptations, the same predispositions.

But they took it to mean, that somehow if your father was guilty of something, then you too were guilty of it.

That was the first misconception.

The second thing had to do with what we call in Pharisaic Judaism, the teaching that taught that the fetus has two inclinations.

One was called Yetzar-hara, which means evil inclination, and two is Yetzar-hatav, which means good inclination.

And the Pharisees and scribes of Jesus, they believed that during the months in the mother's womb.

There is a struggle of the fetus for control between these two, between evil and good.

And I think some of you mothers are going to find this quite humorous.

If the evil inclination wins, then the baby kicks the mother.

You thought the baby was kicking because it was happier, just letting you know he or she is there.

Well, according to Pharisaic Judaism, when the baby kicks, the evil inclination has won and the baby kicks, and this is important, because it resents dependency and contingency.

It wants free.

She rather, or he, wants free.

She wants freedom and self-sufficiency.

So what Jesus does, there's much more to say about that, but what Jesus does is dispel both points by saying in verse 3, neither this man nor his parents sinned, said Jesus, but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him, John 9 verse 3.

Now.

The other thing about this third miracle is that it happens during the Feast of Tabernacles.

And you say, well, so what?

Well, Jesus told the blind man to go wash in the pool of Siloam.

During the Feast of Tabernacles, the one pool that was used for all the festivities was the Pool of Siloam, which means there would have been huge crowds gathered there who knew this man, who knew that he had been born blind, and now would be able to testify that now he could see, he was healed.

They would know if this is true, then Messiah is here, the kingdom of God is present.

So Jesus is demonstrating and giving the third messianic miracle to communicate, first of all.

to religious leaders of his people and to the Jews that Messiah has come.

What's the point of all this?

The scribes and the Pharisees and the religious leaders of Jesus, they knew.

They knew that Jesus was Messiah.

By their own standards and tests, they knew who Jesus was and they still rejected him.

Now the question is, now stay with me, this is where we go into modern day application.

Why?

Because they knew if Jesus was Messiah, because Jesus was teaching something different than they thought would allow them to control and maintain authority over the people, because they thought they owned the people.

They thought they were the owners of the vineyard.

They believed that if Jesus was the true Messiah, and they knew that he was, they would lose all their power and authority.

It would all be gone now.

That the people would stop following them and start following Jesus, which is exactly what happened.

They did not want to lose their influence with the Romans.

They possessed freedom and self-determination.

Jesus comes along, they know his identity, and they still refuse to submit.

In fact, after the miracle of John 9 where Jesus heals the man born blind, The conclusive messianic miracle, the religious leaders began their investigation.

If you read John 9, it is a lengthy account, somewhat humorous, because when they realized this is the third messianic miracle, they go to the man born blind and there's an inquisition.

Who did this?

How did he do it?

What was going on?

Then they're all happy with the answer, so they go to the parents of the man born blind.

They're not happy with their answer.

They go to the townspeople, then back to the parents, and then back to the blind man.

The reason is they're not getting the answer.

that they want.

And so in John 9 30, the man answered, now that is remarkable.

This is what he says to the religious leaders.

He's a little bit cheeky.

He says, this is remarkable.

You don't know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes.

You're the one that's been teaching.

When Messiah comes, he would open the eyes of a man born blind.

So how can you not know where he's from?

Nobody has ever heard of opening the eyes of a man born blind, he says.

If this man were not from God, he could do nothing or he could not do this.

To this they replied, You were steeped in sin at birth, how dare you lecture us?" And they threw him out.

So they basically said, you're a sinner anyway, just go away.

Because they're not willing, the result of their obstinacy, the reason they are obstinate rather, is that Jesus told them.

and demonstrated for them who he was, but they're so power hungry and not willing to give up control of their lives and power and authority to someone who loves them like they could never be loved by anybody else.

It just didn't matter.

Regardless of all the signs, they were not going to change.

As a result of this, in Scripture we're told that Jesus said he would give no more signs to the people of Israel other than the sign of Jonah.

which is exactly what happens in John 11, the famous story of where Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead.

But notice, in John 11, we're told that when Jesus comes to Lazarus' tomb, that he weeps.

There's great sorrow.

And then the Jews said, "'See how he,' referring to Jesus, "'loved him,' referring to Lazarus.' But some of them said, "'Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man,'' they're talking about the man born blind, "'have kept this man from dying?' They get it." This is Messiah.

And if he opened the eyes of a man born blind, he's got power over life and death and could have spared this man's life.

And what does Jesus do?

Exactly what they're expecting.

He raises Lazarus from the dead to show that he has power over life and death.

And then what is the response?

Now you would think this would be incredible miracle.

Man, this guy, this dude just raised a guy from the dead who had been dead four days, four days.

And how did they respond?

Then the chief priest and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin.

So from that day on, they plotted to take his life." So now they're thinking, how can we kill him?

It's amazing.

Now there's one more thing, just quickly.

This is extra, no charge.

But remember what we said about Jesus healing Jewish lepers?

Every time he healed a leper, there had to be seven days of investigation by the priest.

It's tedious investigative work.

Was he really a leper?

Was he really cured?

What were the circumstances of the healing?

In Luke 17, I sometimes wonder if Jesus just wanted to have a little fun with the scribes and Pharisees because he heals 10 lepers.

So that's going to take 70 days of investigation.

You talk about busy work.

Jesus is trying to just remind them.

No matter what sign I do, it's not going to change you because you're hungry for power and authority and self-reliance.

So I'm going to give you a little busy work while I continue to do my ministry.

Now, that was a long journey, but that gives us the context now of everything happening in Luke 20.

It's going to help us understand, because we're told that one day Jesus was teaching in the temple, and the chief priests and the teachers of the law came to him one more time and said this, by what authority are you doing these things?

They knew by what authority.

They're just looking for some excuse to end the life of Jesus, something that he might say that would offend the Mosaic law or their power and authority.

They were very frustrated.

They knew Jesus was Messiah by their own teaching.

So the next question then becomes, Jesus tells the parable that we read about the owner and the tenants in the vineyard in response to their question of by whose authority do you do this?

Jesus ultimately says, I'm not going to answer your question because you know, and I'm not going to waste my time, but I will tell you a parable.

And he tells this parable.

And he basically says this, there's a vineyard and the owner of the vineyard is God.

They would know that very clear because the Old Testament refers to Israel as the vineyard of God.

The vineyard then is Israel, the people of God, Israel.

The tenant farmers are the religious leaders of Israel.

They've been entrusted by God himself to grow the vineyard, to nourish the vineyard and prepare them for Messiah and to accomplish his work in the vineyard for his purposes.

And the tenant farmers.

the religious leaders, were given a call by God to tend the vineyard by his word and for his prophet.

The servants of the owner, the ones who come to remind them, hey, this is ultimately God's vineyard, not yours, and we're showing up to collect the fruit of God, are the prophets.

Every time the prophets were sent to the people of Israel, not every time, but most often they kill the prophets or stone them because they didn't want to hear the word that this does not belong to them.

to you.

God is the owner of every good and perfect thing.

He's the owner of Israel.

It's his world and everything that lies in it.

And then the son or heir obviously is Jesus Christ who comes and when he comes to remind them of ownership, they kill him.

Now that is the point of the parable Jesus tells.

So we learned that their fundamental mistake, the religious leaders fundamental mistake, was they thought they were the owners of God's property.

And when you're the owner, you govern by your word and for your own personal profit.

So that the scribes and Pharisees actually began to believe that the people of Israel belonged to them.

And they could do with God's people as they pleased to be governed by their word, to be used for their purposes in the advancement of their kingdom.

Now what is the result?

What does God say will be the result of this?

It's pretty harsh.

I'm in chapter 20 again, Luke, verse 16.

What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them?

He will come and kill those tenants and give the vineyard to others.

When the people heard this, they say, God forbid.

The teachers of the law and the chief priests looked for a way to arrest him immediately because they knew he had spoken this parable against them, but they were afraid of the people.

Okay, the religious leaders understood.

You've abused your responsibility.

You do not own the people of God.

You do not, you're not the owners of the vineyard.

God is, and the vineyard, the people of God are to be used for his purposes, for his glory, and be governed by his word, not your own word.

And now what I'm going to do is judge you and take the vineyard away and give it to somebody else.

Now, here's the final part of the message.

What does all this have to do with you and me then?

What are we supposed to learn from all this?

Well, first, you and I have been grafted into the vine.

You and I are the church, the ecclesia, the called out ones who've been now placed in the vineyard.

So while this has a first century contextual meaning, if we contextualize this into modern day, into our lives, we learn from scripture that the owner of the vineyard is still God, Genesis 1, 1.

The earth is, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

He's the owner.

Psalm 24, I believe, says the earth is the Lord's and everything in it.

The vineyard now is not Israel, although they're part of it, but now the church, all God's people and all God's resources.

For those of you who study theology, I'm not a proponent of replacement theology.

I'm simply saying that as we contextualize this and try to find the meaning for our lives, the vineyard...

is the people of God and all of God's people and all of the resources of God.

The tenant farmers, now we don't have one prophet, we have the priesthood of all believers.

So our responsibility now as the farmers, we are the sowers and reapers by his word and for his profit.

And the servants of the owner are the prophets and the preachers, the people who deliver the message and who come to tell you and remind you, remember, you're not the owner.

The first fruits of all of our lives go to the owner.

It's for his purposes ruled by his word, and the son of the heir is still Jesus Christ.

So that the modern day message for you and me is this, we are under the illusion, and this is all of us, myself included.

This is something we have to fight with all the time in our personal lives.

We are under the illusion of it.

independency and self-sufficiency, but our real condition, however, is to be free.

is dependency and contingency, but we refuse to believe it.

Now what does that mean?

We think we're self-sufficient, we think we don't need God, we think we're the captain of our ship and we can do with our lives whatever we want, but our real condition, however, is we are totally dependent on God for his goodness and resources, and our lives are contingent on what God wants to do with us at any season or point of our lives.

That's hard to take.

So what is the warning to us in this parable?

We will have the temptation to live our lives as owners.

just like the religious leaders of Jesus' day, rather than tenants.

And here is how you know you're all in when it comes to the kingdom of God.

You live like a tenant, not an owner.

A tenant living like an owner says, I don't wanna live by somebody else's rules, I don't want any boundaries in my life, and I want credit for any and all accomplishments.

Every time I do a series like this, for some reason, I'm a big sports fanatic.

I always think of when I look at someone, well, there's a new player for the Cincinnati Reds.

And I go to Dodger games, and I'm a little upset with the Dodgers right now.

It's another sermon.

And the Angels I like, but they, I don't know, they just lose all the time.

That's another issue.

But the Cincinnati Reds are kind of one of my favorite teams because I went to seminary.

I did my graduate degrees in Cincinnati, Ohio, and I got to go to Reds Stadium.

And I became familiar with the Reds.

organization, but they also have been losing like just for the last, what, eight, ten years.

Just losers.

I mean, it's just frustrating.

But this year, they've kind of turned things around and they got a new young player by the name of Eli De La Cruz, and he is so fun to watch that I've gotten my MLB app out and I've started watching games again just to watch him.

This guy plays with such passion.

And he's being clocked, he's a shortstop, he also plays third base, actually he can play anywhere, he's multifaceted, multitalented.

He threw a fastball after he fielded it in shortstop, he threw a fastball to first base of over 100 miles an hour.

Now that's just incredible.

How does a shortstop, how does he have an arm like that?

And he's hit home runs, one was over 459 feet.

I look at that and I'm reminded, he does that.

I mean, I wish I could do that, but I can't.

People who are able to do that, it is a gift from God.

Sometimes when I see golfers, because I would consider myself an above average golfer, I may be living in an illusion, but I consider myself an above average golfer.

But when I meet a really good golfer, and when I watch the professionals golf, I look at them, it kind of depresses me at first until I remember, hold on a minute, he's able to do that, yes, because of practice, but I could practice every day, all day long.

for the rest of my life and never be as good as those guys, because it is a gift from God." Now here's the point.

That's true about every facet of our lives.

Tenants give glory to God for all good things, while an owner believes he is self-made and self-sufficient.

But perhaps the most important distinction is this, that tenants living like tenants manage all that God has given by his word and for his profit.

And right there is the key.

The assumption even in the first century, even in a pre-capitalistic society, was that the tenants managed the vineyard on behalf of the owner and did so by his word and for his profit.

In other words, by his word, you can't treat the vineyard any way that you want.

You constantly acknowledge the owner's ownership by operating under the owner's policies.

All of this belongs to the owner.

And he is leasing it to you and me.

We get to use it and experience it, yes, but it ultimately belongs not to me and for my purposes, but to him and his purposes.

So if you are a tenant, you can't say to the owner if you own a vineyard, or if you're tenting or leasing a vineyard, you can't say, you know what, I really like this vineyard.

I think I'll turn it into a shopping mall.

a sports arena, or maybe a shooting range, or a potato farm.

No, it's a vineyard to be used ultimately for the owner's purposes, not yours, and it must be managed by his word.

Now let me tell you what a tenant acting like an owner does.

He or she thinks that he's the exception to the rule.

He talks about extenuating circumstances.

He's very good at rationalization.

He's He likes the feeling of ownership and authority.

So he says to himself, or she says to herself, I will use this for my purposes under my word, and when I have been successful, I will return the profits to the owner.

The problem is you never know when the owner's gonna return.

You know, the Bible, and this is so important, folks, please stay with me.

You know, the Bible tells us that for every single one of us there's a temptation.

there's a temptation to think that we're the owner.

And if you go back to the original parable, God sends messengers again and again and again.

He's very patient, very gracious.

First time, second time, third.

Most of us would never do that.

If we owned something and we sent someone around to collect the rent and they took us inside and beat us up, we wouldn't have a second or third chance.

We would send the police, evict them, and move on.

But God is so patient because God knows our nature in our flesh.

The Bible tells us you and I are loved, valued, significant in Christ, treasured, adored, the apple of God's eye.

And we love to hear that and we should and it's true.

But there's something else the Bible tells us, it warns us, that is paramount, that we all have to deal with.

The Bible says there's something so powerful that we repress.

We don't want to admit something.

And when someone points it out to us, like a pastor, we get angry.

The Bible actually says that you and I possess, whether we're willing to admit it or not, a certain sense of contempt or animosity, even hatred, toward God.

In some ways, you and I are like the tenants in Jesus' story.

We actually live and operate in a way that it's all about us.

Whereas tenants who know that they're tenants manage their lives by His Word and for His profit.

The Bible tells us even our own body doesn't belong to us.

First Corinthians 7, for the one who was a slave when called to faith in the Lord is the Lord's freed person.

Similarly, the one who was free when called is Christ's slave.

You were bought with a price.

We are owned by God himself because he's the giver of all life.

The earth is the Lord's, the people in it, and everything in it.

In 1 Corinthians 6, Paul said, flee from sexual immorality.

All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually sins against their own body.

Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have received from God?

You are not your own.

You were bought at a price.

Therefore, honor God with your bodies.

Paul says you don't get to determine how you even use your body.

Not only your stuff, but your body.

You're not the owner, Christ is.

You manage your body by his word and for his profit so that you can be a light in the darkness, a city on a hill that cannot be hidden.

And something inside us, the Bible says, something inside that says or hates that is frustrated because we want to be the owners.

It starts when we're little kids, you're not the boss of me.

And even though we never say it out loud, we often live as though that's what we believe.

And the Bible reminds us again and again that everything in our possession, everything in the vineyard is ultimately for His profit.

Let me go back again, Psalm 24, 1.

The earth is the Lord's and everything in it, the world and all who live in it.

And we also manage what he's given us not only by his word, but for his...

What does it mean for his prophet?

Well, the produce of the land of our lives, as we contextualize this, is the land of our lives.

And we can't just say, well, we're going to eat it.

Ultimately, it's supposed to benefit the owner.

It's about what he wants to achieve.

It's about his agenda.

It's about advancing his purposes in the vineyard.

After all, he's the owner.

So a tenant acting like a tenant joyfully uses his or her gifts to profit the owner and build his vineyard.

And they do it with a glad heart.

Now notice something crucial in the parable back in Luke chapter 20.

At harvest time, he sent a servant to the tenants so they would give him some of the fruit of the vineyard.

This is just amazing.

Remember this series is about being all in.

It's about understanding the purpose of your life.

Don't you find it amazing that although the owner owns the entire vineyard and everything, all the produce belongs to him, he doesn't come back and ask for everything.

He simply asks for some.

of the fruits.

That's why I tell you that this idea of first fruits is not merely a mosaic law or some kind of tax on the nation of Israel.

This first fruits idea starts in Genesis and go all the way through the book of Revelation.

It's a sweet deal if you think about it.

What God is saying is, yeah, this is my vineyard, I own it, you're my servants, and you get to experience and use all of these good things in this world that I've created and in your life for your pleasure, as long as you understand that I'm the owner and ultimately you govern these things by my word, including your body and everything that you have, and for my profit.

It started all the way back with Cain and Abel.

And even gleaning in the Old Testament was a practice that we discover in the life of or the story of Ruth and Naomi, that the Israelites could grow their crops, but they were to leave the outer edges and not harvest that so that the people who were less fortunate could come and harvest that and be able to survive.

In other words, that was the purpose of God, to feed those who were less fortunate.

The New Testament goes beyond law of the first fruit into grace.

And in 2 Corinthians 9 we read, remember this, whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously.

Each of you should give what you've decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

And God is able to bless you abundantly so that in all things and all times, having all you need, you will abound in every good work.

So what does it come down to then?

Because when Paul writes this, he's assuming that the people of God who live under grace now, not law, have as their primary passion to reap a great harvest for the owner of the vineyard.

That's their passion.

So he says, if that's what your real passion is, sow, sow generously into the kingdom so you will reap a great harvest.

And this is why I started this series by asking you that simple question last week, that if I followed you around for two weeks, what would I discover through your conversations and your actions and how you spend your money and how you spend your time?

What would I discover what your life is ultimately about?

What drives you?

What is your purpose?

What gives you meaning?

What causes your heart to beat a little faster?

What are you most passionate about?

It all comes down to that question again, what is your life ultimately about?

And the lessons we're supposed to learn from this parable that Jesus tells is that the posture of our life, yes, we work, we play, we raise a family, we pursue our dreams, we live our lives, but the entire vineyard is ours to use, but not ours to own.

And when you see this in a life, it's glorious.

It's beautiful.

Couple of months ago, I had a young man in the auditorium here named Ian Young.

Ian Young was an entrepreneur, one of those young guys that everything he touches turns to gold.

By the age of 35, he had a fishing business and was reaping incredibly well.

temporary benefits.

But then he experienced a Jesus revelation and it dawned on him that all this was the blessing of God, that everything was the property of God.

And he immediately sold his business and started what is called in Europe, God TV.

You and I don't know much about it here because it's not as popular here, but in Europe and post-Christian Europe, it's a big deal.

You've got this young man who decided that the mission and call of his life is to live on as little as possible so he can give away as much as possible to get the gospel to post-Christian Europe.

I've got another friend that many of you have heard about.

His name is Clive Raharui, another entrepreneur that made a lot of money doing a lot of business in the South Pacific.

And suddenly he shows up at my door here in Los Angeles one day and says that God, he said he's had a Jesus revelation, and God has shown him that he's supposed to give up all of that entrepreneurial life in business and use his life for the sake of the kingdom of God and to get the gospel throughout not only Europe, post-Christian Europe, but throughout the South Pacific and beyond.

Now these are guys that run in circles that I'm not familiar with, and I don't understand how they're wired.

That's not my gift.

But I can tell you when you see men and women who've been transformed, who suddenly got it, that every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father above.

And they realize that they are not owners, they're just simply tenants, and they're gonna be held responsible for the way that they've invested the gifts that God has given them.

whether they've done it for their kingdom or for a kingdom beyond themselves, when they get that it changes everything.

The Bible goes to great lengths, stay with me, almost finished.

It goes to great lengths to tell you and me that there's going to be a temptation in our lives.

In Romans 8, we're said, where we read, because the carnal mind is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the law of God, nor can it be.

Basically, that word means anger or enemy.

There is a part of us that resents the fact that we're not the owners.

And the temptation will be that we will live as though we are.

and we will not operate our lives by his word and for his profit.

And the Bible goes to tell you that when you have a legitimate Jesus revelation and the Spirit of God comes on the inside to live, suddenly that illusion of independency and self-sufficiency is destroyed.

and you realize that your real condition is dependency and contingency, and everything is dependent upon God.

And when you realize that, you shift, there is a change.

Your heart is melted because of the grace of God and the goodness of God, and suddenly you continue to live your life.

Yes, you do the things required to live on this planet, but your ultimate goal is to live your life and use your resources according to the word of God and for his profit.

Now, let's finish this.

Is it not true that even though you and I live with the illusion that we're somehow in charge and we're the owners, and that we have repressed, which means down deep inside in a subconscious level, we know it, but we push it down.

We know that nothing we build, our kingdom will not last.

I've mentioned many times that I am so happy at this point in my life that I am no longer afraid of death, but that does not mean that the death cloud does not hang over me anymore.

It's still there and we know that life is temporary.

We're just not afraid of it anymore.

But since we know that it's true, since my life has not turned out the way that I planned and quite frankly, seldom does it turn out the way that you planned.

Some people will say, since my life has not turned out the way that I planned, there must be no owner.

There must be a crap show.

shoot.

It's all luck of the draw.

But that's illogical.

Because the fact that our lives do not turn out the way we think they should, does that not prove the opposite?

That means we're not the owners and we can't dictate it and we can't mandate it that there must be an owner on the outside.

Life, despite what self-help books will tell you, will not let you control it.

You can read 10 Steps to Success, Your Best Life Now, whatever the formula, but it's only a matter of time before the illusion is shattered.

Go ahead, set your agenda, make your plans, plan your life out, but in one instant...

Everything could change.

Life will never let you believe for very long that you're the owner, no matter how hard you try to control it, like an eight-year-old driving a car, you can't see what's coming.

Now if life will never allow you to believe that you're the owner, the most obvious explanation is that you're not the owner, that somebody else is.

And the message of the parable is that don't live like an owner, but posture your life so that you can sow your resources into eternity, God's kingdom, rather than your own kingdom.

Now, I said we were near the end.

The problem is nobody can force you to do this.

This is a byproduct of true conversion.

Somebody who postures their life this way and lives this way, it's a natural result of conversion.

It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

His passions become my passions.

We say that he not only changes what you do, but changes what you want to do.

Conversion has to happen on the inside.

And I find it extremely interesting that this is how Jesus ends this parable.

I'm in Luke 20.

Let's read what he says at the end of this in verse 17 and 18.

Jesus looked directly at them and asked, then what is the meaning of that which is written?

The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone.

Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces, but he on whom it falls will be crushed.

Do you see what Jesus is saying?

There is no...

middle ground.

You either build your life on the stone or you'll be crushed by the stone.

You either build your life on the stone, the cornerstone, or you will be crushed by it.

In other words, you fall on the stone in humility.

You allow Jesus to crush this enmity that we all have, where we're upset because we want to be in charge, we want to be the owners.

You allow him to come into your life and break that, to open your eyes toward spiritual reality, to see how much he loves you and what he's been willing to do for you and how much he's given to you by securing your eternity.

heaven with him so that your heart will be melted and you will be broken and you will realize you're not the owner you're the tenant and everything in your life is to be governed by his word and for his profit Either you do that, but then we're given a stark warning, or you will be crushed by the stone.

In other words, if you remain his enemy till the end, if you beat up those who come and warn you, if you are determined to be the captain of your ship and live your life the way you want to live your life for your and by your word and for your profit, then you'll be crushed.

You'll be crushed by the stone.

Am I trying to scare you?

Yes, how else do you deal with someone in denial?

But listen, in 2 Corinthians 5, 21, we're told that God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Now you think about that for a moment.

If Jesus was willing to be treated like an enemy for us, how can it be dangerous to give control of our lives over to him?

He can't.

And notice again the mercy and grace of Jesus.

He keeps sending messengers, three separate occasions.

You and I would send one messenger and be done with it.

But he sends messenger after messenger into our life to remind us you're not the owner, you're the tenant, start living like one.

And the beauty of it is, is anytime he gives us a command, it's based on his knowledge of design.

So the best way to live where our soul feels alive And where we do away with this overarching cloud of death and depression and anxiety, the best way to do it is to live our lives as tenants for a purpose greater than ourselves to change the trajectory of our lives.

And I'm praying through this sermon, you'll have the courage to make the change.

Father, thank you for the truth of your word.

Thank you for what it says, what it speaks to us.

And I pray in Christ's name, that for those who've heard this message, they would be willing to honestly ask the question, whose kingdom am I building?

Do I live as an owner or as a tenant?

Am I living my life and governing my resources and my own body itself by his word and for his profit?

And if I'm not, that I would hear the warning and I will allow the cornerstone.

to fall on me and humble me and open my eyes to this reality.

And I will not be crushed by being and living as an enemy to God for the rest of my life.

In Christ's name I pray this prayer for courage, amen.