THE ANGLICAN CHURCH OF THE REDEEMER, FRANKLIN, MA Matthew 21:33-43 God has given us many gifts how are we using them? October 2, 2011 The first

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1 THE ANGLICAN CHURCH OF THE REDEEMER, FRANKLIN, MA Matthew 21:33-43 God has given us many gifts how are we using them? October 2, 2011 The first worship service at the Church of the Redeemer was on January 6 th, 2008, The Feast of the Epiphany almost four years ago and we ve come together almost every Sunday since then to worship God Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The first service in Norwood was on September 27 th, 2009 two years ago. As I worked with Linda Hardin on the October newsletter and reviewed the items in Acts29, I was reminded again that we are a blessed people God has provided in so many ways: our church facilities here at 31 Hayward Street, the people He has called together both parishioners and the gifted people God has sent to serve with us David, Linda, Pastor Dan and John Day, for your financial support of the ministries at Redeemer, for the AWANA Club for young children that s beginning today in Norwood and for the great time we had together at the pot-luck supper and the dessert contest last Sunday. And I m certain each of you could make your own list of the many ways in which God has provided. He has given us much; the question is: what are we doing with what He has provided? Last week I said: As Christians we re called to be about His work the mission and ministry of our Lord Jesus Christ and generally we serve Him by serving others. Any time you use your spiritual gifts, your talents or your abilities to help another person in the Name of Jesus Christ or to help build up His Church that s called ministry; it doesn t matter if it s a big thing or a little thing. When most people hear the word ministry they think of a priest or a minister but the truth is that if you are a follower of Jesus you also are a minister. It doesn t matter if you re old or young, male or female. In baptism you become a priest a person called to serve God. All of us, as sons and daughters of God at the Church

2 2 of the Redeemer, need to pray, to take time to refocus and to ask God whether we re doing what He wants us to do. God gives His people many gifts; how we respond how we use them reflects our understanding of what it means to be a recipient of His amazing grace and provision. My prayer is that each of us will take an opportunity to review how we re responding to God s call on our life. The readings from Isaiah, Psalm 80 and Matthew s Gospel all refer to vineyards. In the Bible a vineyard is often a symbol for Israel, God s chosen people. In Psalm 80, the psalmist cries out for deliverance from enemies who have tried to destroy his people. Restore us, O God of hosts; show the light of your countenance, and we shall be saved. Isaiah warns that the vineyard God has planted and nurtured is about to be destroyed and His people sent into exile because of their disobedience and unfaithfulness. [God] looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold, an outcry! In Jesus parable about a vineyard, He picks up many of Isaiah s images. The people in the crowd who listened to Him that day would have identified with His words. There was a large, golden vine decorating the courtyard of the Temple where He taught and their land was full of vineyards. It was common practice for tenants, or sharecroppers, to manage the property of absentee landowners and to pay a portion of their produce as rent. As the crowd, including priests and elders of the people, gathered around Jesus in the Temple, He said: Hear another parable. There was a master of a house who planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a winepress in it and built a tower and leased it to tenants, and went into another country. Although it s not true of all the parables, in this case the details of the parable appear to have direct references. The master of the house is God; the vineyard is Israel; the tenants are the religious leaders who had just challenged Jesus as He taught in the Temple.

3 3 When the grapes were ready for harvest, the master sent servants to collect rent from the tenants. But they beat one, killed another, and stoned another. And it happened twice. The servants represent the prophets, such as Isaiah, who God sent to proclaim His will to a rebellious and disobedient people. But this wasn t enough to convince them of their arrogance and wrongdoing; so the master sent his son and he said to himself: They will respect my son. But the tenants saw this as their opportunity to get the vineyard for themselves. And they took him and threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. They deserved retribution for the way they had treated the servants, but instead they received the best the master had to give, his own son. This parable points us to Jesus, God s only begotten Son; His coming into the world is the ultimate expression of God s love and willingness to reveal Himself to all people. As the crowd listened, they knew what Jesus was saying. In spite of what the master of the house had done for them, the tenants were ungrateful and unfaithful to their agreement they were unwilling to share a portion of the grapes that were only made possible because of their agreement with the master. And then Jesus drives His point home by quoting Psalm 118. The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes. Jesus implies that He is the cornerstone the cornerstone on which God s kingdom is built. He is the solid rock, the firm foundation; He is our rock. God has given us many wonderful gifts; how we use them reveals our understanding of what it means to be a recipient of His provision. The parable reminds us that we re totally dependent on God for our very existence. Just as the master entrusted his vineyard to tenants, God makes us tenants of His creation, His wonderful vineyard. On our better days we may remember this, yet it s easy to believe that the vineyard is ours to do with as we wish and to forget that it belongs

4 4 to God. We may want a relationship with Him, but we want it on our own terms; we often want to set the agenda and then fit God into it. This kind of behavior reflects the same arrogance and disobedience demonstrated by the tenants when they tried to deny the rights of the true owner of the vineyard. Let me be more specific: God has not only given each of us many material gifts, He also has entrusted us with something of much greater value, the Gospel, the message about Jesus Christ. If we are to be a faithful we must bear fruit and share our gifts with others, not only our material resources, but also the faith that s in us. We are commanded to be faithful witnesses, by word and example, so that others may see what God is doing in our lives and be attracted to Jesus. Charles Spurgeon, the great 19 th century English preacher, said, [God] has put us here and given us this life, like a vineyard, for us to cultivate; but many have cultivated that vineyard entirely for themselves themselves or their families and friends, and not for their God, their Maker. As Christians, we re challenged to live lives that are different; not a life that simply mirrors our culture. The Christian life demands a reorientation, a restructuring of priorities in ways that are different from the ways of the world. Believers need to understand and impact our culture by having a Christian or biblical worldview that s what we re exploring on Thursday evenings during the Doing the Right Thing series it s an exploration of Christian ethics. The Church must be a force to revitalize moral life, to renew and restore sanity to our society and to provide a foundation for moral decisions so that we will not continue to be subject to what Pope Benedict called the dictatorship of relativism. They are moral absolutes; some things are always wrong; some things are always right. The Church was a counter-cultural movement in the first century and God is calling us to be counter-cultural again. George Barna did a survey of 152 separate items comparing people in the secular culture and people in churches and he

5 5 concluded that there was virtually no difference between the two. Dr. Henry Blackaby commented: How then should we live?... Don t fuss at the world. It s acting just like its nature. We ve got to be salt and light again. We ve got to have an observable difference. Think back to the parable. God had done so much for Israel and He expected them to bear fruit for His glory, but they rebelled, they were disobedient and they refused to bear fruit. In His mercy God sent prophets to help them get back on track, but Israel mistreated and even killed them. And then He sent His Son and He was nailed Him to a cross! They cast Him out of the vineyard. In the parable Jesus refers to Himself as the stone which the builders rejected. The Apostle Peter wrote: As you come to him [to Jesus], a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. the honor is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe, The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone, and A stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense. They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do. [1 Peter 2:4-5, 7-8 ESV] Peter identifies Jesus as a stumbling stone for Israel, but also as the foundation stone of God s holy church. The sinner who stumbles on the stone in humility will be broken, but saved; the one who resists Christ will be crushed by the stone in judgment. So what does our culture look like? One example: a Gallup poll reveals that the New England states have some of lowest church attendance in the 48 contiguous states. Although Nevada ranks 46 th, the six New England states hold the other bottom rankings New Hampshire and Vermont have lowest reported church attendance in the nation and Massachusetts is not far behind 31% (less than one third) of Bay Staters say they attend weekly or almost weekly. The

6 6 U.S. average is 42%. I m not that suggesting church attendance is a cure all, but it should help. As we reflect on the ways in which our lives might offer an observable difference to the culture and people around us, I have three questions for you to think about: First, what you are doing in God s vineyard? Second, how are you using the gifts He has entrusted to you? and Third, is God calling you to do something different with the gifts that He has given? God gives us many gifts; how we use them reflects our understanding of what it means to be a recipient of His amazing grace. How can we, individually and as a parish, join with our Anglican brothers and sisters and other believers to reach people in our towns, in New England and throughout North America with the transforming love of Jesus Christ? I pray that each of us my press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. God has given us so much. As you read through the October Acts29, take a few minutes to give thanks to God for our many gifts and ask yourself two questions: (1) How are we using them? (2) What are the consequences of not using them to the glory of God? questions for us to pray and think about this week. Let me know what you are hearing from the Lord. Amen. Father Jack Potter+