Friday of the Second Week of Lent - March 1, 2013
Friday of the Second Week of Lent
Matthew 21:33 – 43
“Listen to another parable: There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a winepress in it and built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. When the harvest time approached, he sent his servants to the tenants to collect his fruit.
“The tenants seized his servants; they beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. Then he sent other servants to them, more than the first time, and the tenants treated them the same way. Last of all, he sent his son to them. ‘They will respect my son,’ he said.
“But when the tenants saw the son, they said to each other, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him and take his inheritance.’ So they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
“Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?”
“He will bring those wretches to a wretched end,” they replied, “and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.”
Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures:
“‘The stone the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
the Lord has done this,
and it is marvelous in our eyes’?
“Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit.”
“The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit.”
The kingdom of God is not an entity we enter into as much as it is a framework for life that we take on. We don’t “work” to enter it as much as we adjust our lives to it – which is its own kind of interior work, to be sure.
In computer-eze, the kingdom of God is like an operating system that guides, directs, and processes all the function of the computer.
I don’t think we have the kingdom, then lose it. We can, though, ignore it, refuse to adapt to its framework, or live as if it didn’t matter. We can compartmentalize life into the secular and the spiritual, work and recreation, relationship and solitude, in a way that creates artificial categories for our living.
Those to whom the kingdom of God is “given” are those who receive it and respond to the invitation to realign life according to this kingdom.
In fact, this kingdom is offered to every person – it is not a matter of some being chosen insiders and others being excluded outsiders. Those to whom it is “given” are those who receive it, who open themselves to its reality in their own life, those who are willing to adjust and align according to a framework that aims to bring the world to wholeness.
Matthew 21:33 – 43
“Listen to another parable: There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a winepress in it and built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. When the harvest time approached, he sent his servants to the tenants to collect his fruit.
“The tenants seized his servants; they beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. Then he sent other servants to them, more than the first time, and the tenants treated them the same way. Last of all, he sent his son to them. ‘They will respect my son,’ he said.
“But when the tenants saw the son, they said to each other, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him and take his inheritance.’ So they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
“Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?”
“He will bring those wretches to a wretched end,” they replied, “and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.”
Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures:
“‘The stone the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
the Lord has done this,
and it is marvelous in our eyes’?
“Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit.”
“The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit.”
The kingdom of God is not an entity we enter into as much as it is a framework for life that we take on. We don’t “work” to enter it as much as we adjust our lives to it – which is its own kind of interior work, to be sure.
In computer-eze, the kingdom of God is like an operating system that guides, directs, and processes all the function of the computer.
I don’t think we have the kingdom, then lose it. We can, though, ignore it, refuse to adapt to its framework, or live as if it didn’t matter. We can compartmentalize life into the secular and the spiritual, work and recreation, relationship and solitude, in a way that creates artificial categories for our living.
Those to whom the kingdom of God is “given” are those who receive it and respond to the invitation to realign life according to this kingdom.
In fact, this kingdom is offered to every person – it is not a matter of some being chosen insiders and others being excluded outsiders. Those to whom it is “given” are those who receive it, who open themselves to its reality in their own life, those who are willing to adjust and align according to a framework that aims to bring the world to wholeness.
Comments
Post a Comment