Matthew inserted this story into his Gospel he probably had in mind the situation of the infant Church which was expecting an early return of the Lord Jesus in glory and judgment. A constant theme of the preaching in those days was that Christians should hold themselves in readiness for a sudden and dramatic re-appearance of Jesus to bring the present world order to an end and usher in his Kingdom in power. They believed firmly that the slack and the silly, the careless and the worldly-minded would then be shut out. Belief in this Second Coming of Christ has endured in the Church. We say that we believe “that he shall come to judge both the quick and the dead.” Most conventional Christians have pushed that thought to the blurred edges of their belief, but it is significant that in times of great disturbance and insecurity, like ours, the doctrine of the Second Coming always reappears. I believe that it is true that history moves to a climax and that humanity, like the individual, faces in the end a death and resurrection. Whatever our thoughts may be about this Second Coming of Christ, we cannot escape the fact that we all face the crisis of death, and that there are other moments of crisis in our life and the life of nations, in which we are suddenly confronted with the reality of the Kingdom of God.
When Jesus told this story his hearers were confronted by the greatest crisis in world history, although the powers of his day, the rulers, the policy makers, the agitators, and the observers—seemed totally unaware of it. How many are aware of it today? The crisis was the advent here in our world of the Savior, the Son of God, the Word of grace made flesh, who was offering the Kingdom of God to all who would accept. He was the bridegroom and his invitation went out to all without distinction. He had not come simply to reinforce the ethics of the Old Testament or formulate some new code. He came to invite the religious and the irreligious, the respectable and the disreputable, the saint and the sinner, into his Kingdom. As he watched the crowds who had greeted him at first begin to fade away, as he saw the opposition mounting and the danger signals on every hand, his teaching took a more sombre turn, and his parables had the thrust of a rapier. As he moves to the Cross where he was to give his life in sacrifice for the whole human family and inaugurate the “new covenant” in his blood, he made his last appeal: “Here is your chance. Don’t miss it. Don’t wait till the door is shut.”
If we feel like saying: “Well, I wasn’t there when that great crisis struck, and the future crisis of his Second Coming means little to me,” we still cannot escape the fact that he comes still in the great crises of our own experience. How easily we settle down to a minimum level of faith and hope, how subtly we allow our very familiarity with the truths of the Gospel to dull our spirits to the presence of Christ when he comes. There is an element of routine in Christian discipleship. The sensible bridesmaids, and not only the silly, “slumbered and slept” till the bridegroom arrived. But in that routine there is need for alertness, the preparedness, the expectancy of the true disciple. There was no oil crisis for the sensible when they suddenly awoke.
We say that the season of Advent is a preparation for Christmas. What do we mean by that? Is it a reminder that we should be buying those presents and mailing off these cards? Is it a preparation for conventional celebrations at home and in church? Advent means Coming, and the preparation above all others that is required of us is a readiness to meet the Lord as he comes to us. Who knows how he may come to the one who is alerted to the reality of his Kingdom and suddenly finds that the message of the carols is no ancient mythology but a piercing and glorious truth? Who knows how he may come to one who has been a typical agnostic if heart and mind are open at the moment of crisis?
“Don’t miss it!” That’s what this parable says to me. “Don’t keep putting off the question of the Kingdom until it is too late, and the door is shut.” It is Jesus who is speaking to us, this Jesus who keeps coming with his Kingdom in all the crises of our lives, this Jesus who has made possible for us a special meeting with him in the sacrament of his Supper.
Years ago it was a Presbyterian tradition to prepare for this Sacrament with prayer and fasting. Then the exercise was abbreviated to a Friday night service of preparation. It was a way of putting oil in the lamps so as to be ready for the bridegroom. With our custom of more frequent communion, in which I firmly believe, we run the risk of forgetting preparation, of even partaking of the bread and wine, in Paul’s words, “not discerning the Lord’s body.”
Jesus comes to us here again this morning. He offers us this feast as a symbol of that great wedding feast that is his picture of the Kingdom. And his word again is: “Don’t miss it; don’t miss what I have to offer through indolence or carelessness or dullness of spirit.”
“King of kings, yet born of Mary,
As of old on earth he stood,
Lord of lords in human vesture,
In the body and the blood,
He will give to all the faithful
His own self for heavenly food.”
The door is open. Only if we are awake and alert can we meet this Lord, and know the joy of the wedding feast which is his Kingdom.
Advent Parables: The Case Of The Troublesome Tenants
Editor’s Introduction
This Advent sermon holds ecological as well as Christological meaning for us today. When the owner’s “own dear son” comes round to the vineyard to collect the rent from the vine-growers, they kill the son even as they had earlier killed the owner’s messengers. What can the owner do now but come himself and put the tenants to death, giving the vineyard to others?
Ecological insensitivity is clearly one of the most obvious ways in which we prove today that we are irresponsible tenants of God’s vineyard. And that irresponsibility, as we are slowly but surely learning from climate disasters, carries a death sentence for the offending vine-growers.
The climax of the parable, however, leaves us with the picture of the landlord shaking his head and saying “Surely they will reverence my son.” Advent prepares the way for “the pleading of the Father who not only reminds us of our responsibilities, but offers us the companionship of his Son, and the renewing influence of his Spirit.” Again the question is put to the vine-growers: “Surely they will reverence my son.” David Read concludes this Advent sermon with the reminder of an even more basic question put to us at Christmastime: “Do you?”
Advent Parables: The Case Of The Troublesome Tenants
A Sermon preached by David H. C. Read at Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church on December 8, 1974, Advent
Text: Mark 12:1–12
Readings: Isaiah 5:1–7; Mark 12:1–12 (NEB)
There was once a church member who liked to come to worship every Sunday morning and always sat in the same pew. He loved to sing the most familiar hymns and to stand up and sit down at the usual times. Since he lived in a city where old buildings were always being torn down, in a country where old ways of thinking and behaving seemed to be rapidly disappearing, and in a world of great instability and insecurity, he liked to feel that there was one place at least where everything was as it used to be. So week by week as he worshipped the God of his fathers he expected to see the choir in the stalls, the Communion Table in the middle of the chancel, and the preacher, at the right time, in the pulpit. Then one day he came into church and found that everything was topsy-turvy. The choir had disappeared and their voices came floating down from the balcony behind him. The chancel was swept clean of the familiar objects and strange trappings confronted his indignant eyes. He had barely time to absorb all this when he found himself required to sing a hymn he had never heard before, and then, worst of all, to listen to a sermon delivered from his left and not his right, from a lectern and not a pulpit. At this point he reached for
