In Mark 12:1-9, Jesus tells us about some very wicked vinedressers who not only refused to give the owner of the vineyard its fruit, but killed or beat every servant he sent to them. They even killed his only son. Does this sound familiar? Well, it should, for this is just what the Jews did to Jesus, and the prophets, whom God sent to them.
In the first verse, Mark talks about a man planting a vineyard, setting a hedge about it, building a wine press, building a tower, and letting it out to husbandmen to work for him. After this, it says he went to a far country.
Parable based on Old Testament
We know that the certain man represents God and that the vineyard He planted was Jerusalem; we know this because of Psalm 80: 8,15, where it speaks of God planting a vine from Egypt in a place of His choosing.
II Chronicles 36:16 and Nehemiah 9:26 tell us that the servants God sent to gather fruit are His prophets sent to Israel whom the Jews and the people of Jerusalem killed or stoned or beaten. Then God sent His only son, but they saw him and said to themselves, “If we kill the heir, the inheritance will be ours to take.”
This is what happened to Jesus when he came to Jerusalem in his Father’s name, as it says in Acts 7:52 and I Thessalonians 2:15; Jesus was God’s only son, just like the man. And Psalm 2:2 tells us how the Jews and the kings of the earth have tried to set themselves up against God and his anointed one to try and take the inheritance for themselves.
After relating the parable, Jesus asks those listening, “What will the master of the vineyard do to those vinedressers when he returns?” They answer truthfully: “the master will utterly destroy them and give the vineyard to those worthy of it.”
We are in the parable
The new wine dressers are us, the Gentiles. As the gospel went out, Jesus gave us the opportunity to become part of the people who work in God’s vineyard. In Acts 13:46, 15:17, and Luke 21:24, we are told how God will destroy those who killed His son and His servants and give His vineyard to others. We are the others, the Gentiles who have been baptized into the saving name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
So now that we have been given the opportunity to work in God’s vineyard, how can we pass it up? We should all be willing and eager to enter into this vineyard and give God His fruit in due season, now that we are a part of God’s children.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One