Chapter 23—The Lord’s Vineyard
This chapter is based on
Matthew 21:33-44
.
The Jewish Nation
The parable of the two sons was followed by the parable of the
vineyard. In the one, Christ had set before the Jewish teachers the
importance of obedience. In the other, He pointed to the rich blessings
bestowed upon Israel, and in these showed God’s claim to their obedi-
ence. He set before them the glory of God’s purpose, which through
obedience they might have fulfilled. Withdrawing the veil from the
future, He showed how, by failure to fulfill His purpose, the whole
nation was forfeiting His blessing, and bringing ruin upon itself.
“There was a certain householder,” Christ said, “which planted
a vineyard, and hedged it round about, and digged a winepress in it,
and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and went into a far
country.”
A description of this vineyard is given by the prophet Isaiah: “Now
will I sing to my wellbeloved a song of my beloved touching His
vineyard. My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill; and
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He fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with
the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made
a winepress therein; and He looked that it should bring forth grapes.”
Isaiah 5:1, 2
.
The husbandman chooses a piece of land from the wilderness; he
fences, clears, and tills it, and plants it with choice vines, expecting a
rich harvest. This plot of ground, in its superiority to the uncultivated
waste, he expects to do him honor by showing the results of his care
and toil in its cultivation. So God had chosen a people from the world
to be trained and educated by Christ. The prophet says, “The vineyard
of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah His
pleasant plant.”
Isaiah 5:7
. Upon this people God had bestowed great
privileges, blessing them richly from His abundant goodness. He
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