>>Israel is called, or at least was called the Napa Valley of the Middle East, grew abundance of grapes and made delicious wine. The way vineyards worked back then, we get a sense of this from the parable was that a vineyard owner would go searching. He’d go out into the wilderness, out into these valleys and he’d go searching for a cluster of grapes. Hopefully, he thought, they were delicious sweet grapes. He’d cut off that cluster and then he’d take it back to his home and he’d plant that cluster of grapes in his own vineyard and he’d graft that cluster onto some other vines and now he’d have these sweet grapes. 

He would build hedge rows. He would build trellis, these wooden contraptions to keep the vine upright because they can’t stand up on their own and you can’t have them on the ground. He’d build fences and other cages to keep raccoons and mice and whatnot, squirrels out from eating them. Then he would dig a big pit in his vineyard, so when the grapes came to fruition they would pluck the grapes and throw them in this big pit, and they would trample them to produce the wine. Then if he was really successful, he’d build a tower for either storage of the wine, storage of the grapes, looking out, maybe surveying other pieces of land to get more grapes. It was all about finding that initial cluster of sweet grapes. 

Now, what Isaiah is saying in his image in our first reading, is that the vineyard owner chose poorly. He thought he had delicious grapes, but the ones he actually got were wild and they turned out to be sour, so everything is ruined. Jesus tweaks the parable a little bit. The grapes are delicious, they haven’t gone sour, they weren’t wild, they weren’t mistakenly picked. It’s the tenants of the vineyard who’ve gone sour, who’ve gone bad, so the owner goes all this great length to put this thing together. The vineyard is producing fruit, or it should be, and the tenant workers have rebelled. What you see here is now the care of the vineyard owner to take back the rebellious vineyard. He doesn’t just let it go. 

The way he went to that great extent to search in the desert, and then he’ll build all that stuff. Now, he’s going to hire mercenary soldiers. He’s probably going to have to build siege equipment to take over the vineyard, because it’s become like a fortress with the tower and so forth, and he’s going to get it back. I guess the image for us is, we’re not wild grapes. Maybe we were before Christ. Maybe we were again, like Isaiah’s image, we were sour, and the whole thing is ruined. 

What happens with us now is that we actually are delicious and beautiful and fruitful, but these wicked tenants come into our hearts, evil thoughts, the enemy, propositions from the world that don’t bring us peace or anxiety or any joy. They bring us anxiety and restlessness. Those things come in and try to take control, but the constellation of this parable is the father and Jesus they’re not going to sit by idly and watch us go down. They’re going to come for us. They’re going to fight for us because they want us to produce good fruit. 

Do what you can. If you feel like the wicked tenants have come into your soul these days lower your defenses, spend some time in prayer. When you receive the sacraments, pray that God the Father may take you back and the vineyard may start producing good fruit again. Amen.