Jesus said to the chief priests and the elders of the people: "Hear
another parable. There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a hedge
around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a tower. Then he leased it to
tenants and went on a journey. When vintage time drew near, he sent his
servants to the tenants to obtain his produce. But the tenants seized the
servants and one they beat, another they killed, and a third they stoned.
Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first ones, but they
treated them in the same way. Finally, he sent his son to them, thinking, 'They
will respect my son.' But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one
another, 'This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.’
They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. What will the
owner of the vineyard do to those tenants when he comes?"
They answered him, "He will put those wret-ched men to a wret-ched
death and lease his vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at
the proper times." Jesus said to them, "Did you never read in the
Scriptures: The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; by
the Lord has this been done, and it is wonderful in our eyes? Therefore, I say
to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people
that will produce its fruit."
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Reflection:
In what instance/s in our life does Jesus knocks in our hearts? It’s when
He wants to get closer to us, Jesus does this to us in so many ways. For
example through a friend who may want to share the words of Jesus to us. It may
be through a written commentary about life and our faith that may deeply awaken
us. It may be through important events in our life such as sickness or even
problems.
Some of us may listen to this knocks of Jesus and we open our hearts to
Him and change our lives for the better. But many of us may not listen and may
not even give careful reflection about this. Thus, we move on with our lives as
if nothing significant has happened to us. We continue to distance ourselves
from Jesus or we continue to treat Jesus like a medicine that we only take when
we are in need.
In our gospel for this Sunday Jesus gives us the Parable of the tenants.
The tenants were allowed by the landlord to take care of his vineyard. When it
was harvest time already of course the landlord was naturally asking for his
share because the land was his property.
So the landlord sent two batches of servants but the tenants refused the
demand of the landlord by killing some of the servants that he sent them.
Finally the landlord sent his only son thinking that the tenants would now
listen to him but they killed him as well.
The greedy tenants in the gospel are the chief priest and the elders, the
landlord is God. The servants that God sent were the prophets and the only son
is Jesus whom they have killed as well. The reason they did this to the
prophets and Jesus is they disliked their call of renewal and repentance.
In some ways we also take the role of the greedy tenants because we
continue to greedily love this world more than Jesus. Many of us may have
already fallen in love with what this temporal world offers us that we refuse
Jesus' demand of repentance. We continue to refuse to listen to His voice that
asks us that we let go of all of our sinfulness and worldliness.
Nevertheless,
Jesus is still persistently knocking at our hearts. Patiently waiting for us to
open it so that He can come in, cleanse all our sins and take control of our
lives. - Marino J. Dasmarinas
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