2023 10 08 Sermon
Just Crazy Enough
Pentecost 19 A
Matthew 21:33-46; Philippians 3:4b-14
Rev. Karl-John N. Stone
I had tickets for the Brewers game last Thursday. That was the game that didn’t happen because the Brew Crew were eliminated from the playoffs the night before. This means that (in my reckoning of time) summer is officially over. Autumn is here. Now the leaves will fall and the wind will blow—but with just one timely hit with runners on base on Wednesday night, summer could have continued. Christian Yelich, their star hitter who struggled for a couple seasons, seemed to have regained his old form. He had three hits in the game Wednesday night. The Brewers had a total of 15 baserunners in that game, but only two of them scored. That’s the thing about baseball. It doesn’t matter how many hits you get, it only matters if you score more runs than the other team. This time the Arizona Diamondbacks had fewer hits, but they scored more runs—5 to be exact. Therefore, the playoffs have been taken away from the Brewers and given to a team that produces more runs.
The Brewers were a very good team; they won 92 regular season games—better than the 84 wins the Diamondbacks had. But once you get to the playoffs none of that matters. The better team doesn’t always advance. The team that “produces the most fruit” (in the form of runs and wins) in the playoffs does advance. It was a disappointing way to end the season; but I’m used to disappointment—after all, as many of you may know, the New York Mets are my #1 team. But next spring, even though they are probably going to break my heart, I’ll be back rooting for these teams again—because I love baseball.
Jesus told another of his parables in today’s gospel; this one actually borrows heavily from the imagery of Isaiah 5:1-7, with the vineyard of choice vines that were meant to produce fine grapes, but instead yielded wild grapes. Even though Jesus never fielded a baseball team with his disciples, he did know a thing or two about those virtues that I gleaned from baseball—the importance of producing “fruit”, and sticking with people because of love.
It’s a puzzling parable because the people Jesus describes act kind of crazy. It doesn’t start off that way, though. The landowner does everything he can to establish a successful vineyard—he plants choice grape vines, puts a fence around it to keep the wild animals out, digs a wine press so the fruit can be processed, builds a watchtower for added security. The tenants working the vineyard are even successful in their farming—but then they turn on the same landowner who had provided the foundation for them to be successful.
The landowner sends servants to collect his produce. The tenants beat one, kill another, and stone a third. The obvious response would probably be to have them arrested. But instead, crazily enough, the landowner sends more servants—and just as crazily, the tenants choose violence once again. It’s been said that the definition of crazy is doing the same thing over and over but expecting different results. So the landowner gets even more crazy, sending his son and reasoning that “they will respect my son.” By now, it is surely no surprise that the tenants kill the son, too—and even crazier, they think that by killing him they will somehow get the son’s inheritance. Now, why in the world would the landowner give these wicked tenants his son’s inheritance?
Jesus asks the chief priests and Pharisees, who were listening to this parable, what they think the vineyard owner will do. They answer (as any one of us might): “He’ll put them to death and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruit at harvest time.” Jesus’ reply is interesting, because he basically agrees with the second part of what they said. And he actually applies their own answer to them: “the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to those who produce the fruit of the kingdom.” But Jesus has quite a different interpretation than the first part of what they said. The landowner of the parable—representing God—will not put the wicked tenants to death. Instead Jesus answers by quoting Psalm 118:22-23. “The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing and it is amazing in our eyes.” This is the Easter Psalm; the Psalm we say every Easter Sunday. The stone the builders rejected represents Christ, who was rejected to die on the cross. The cornerstone—that place of greatest honor in masonry construction; the stone that holds everything else together—this represents Christ’s resurrection. Having defeated sin and death, the risen Jesus now holds all things together, including the salvation, healing, and reconciliation of all humanity.
As crazy as the parable is, it turns out that Jesus is the craziest of all—because he chooses not to meet sin and violence by inflicting more sin and violence on others, but instead with his own death and resurrection. And since he is risen to new life, this means that he remains in relationship with people, even with those who wanted to kill him. Because he is risen, Jesus has chosen to stick with humanity—out of love. Jesus sticks with people. Jesus even sticks with us, because he loves us. This is the “surpassing value of knowing Jesus Christ my Lord…who has made me his own” as St. Paul puts it in Philippians chapter 3, so that we may “know Christ and the power of his resurrection”, and be reborn as new people through faith.
Through our faith in Christ, and through Christ’s faith and love for us, we can join Jesus in “producing the fruits of God’s kingdom.” We are free in Christ to offer our faithful service in tending God’s vineyard. God’s vineyard belongs to anyone who shows mercy and grace, because mercy and grace is what Jesus pours out for us each and every day. We are free in Christ to be good “tenants of the landowner”, and Jesus has shown us what this looks like: caring for God’s world; caring for people as they are (not as we might want them to be); caring even for our enemies in the hope that we do not have to remain enemies but can become friends; and if not full-fledged friends, then at least neighbors who appreciate our differences of experience, beliefs, ways of life, ways of understanding the world. That way we can seek the common good together.
This is what things look like in the kingdom of God, because Jesus is crazy enough to do everything for love and for the building of relationships. As we seek to follow Jesus by producing the fruit of God’s kingdom, we can be just crazy enough to risk building relationships and loving people like Jesus did, embracing everyone as our brothers and sisters. Amen.