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“AUTHORITY TO GIVE”
Text: Luke 20:9-20
Sunday April 6, 2025 – Lent 5
Trinity – Creston
Grace, mercy, and peace is yours from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!
Our text for this Fifth Sunday in Lent the Gospel Lesson from Luke 20 that was just proclaimed.
Let Us Pray: Dearest Jesus, send your Holy Spirit to remind us that you desire to use and to give your authority to give us good things, not only things that are temporal but even yourself that we may have eternal life. Amen.
Dear Fellow Redeemed in Christ:
“No rules, just right.” “Have it your way.” “No shirt, no shoes, no service.” For a steak dinner or a fast-food burger, we love the two . . . and we’re just glad we can comply easily enough with the other.
The first two could, apparently, make successful themes for major national ad campaigns. The third, well, you might see it on the restaurant door, but never on its commercials.
That’s because we all like the idea of having everything our own way, of being our own boss, and we don’t at all care for somebody else telling us what we can and can’t do.
Okay, that’s all pretty frivolous, but there’s a real point here, isn’t there? We all have a certain problem with authority—even, whether we like to admit it or not, with God’s authority.
In our text this morning, that problem has been simmering, and in the next few days—or, in our church year, in the next two weeks—it’s going to boil over into the crucifixion of God’s own Son.
You see,
3. Sinners’ natural perception is that God’s authority prevents them from getting what they want.
a. The tenants in Jesus’ parable of the vineyard decide that the master’s authority over his vineyard stands in the way of them having it themselves (vv 9–10).
b. Jesus’ authority has been persistently opposed all throughout Luke’s Gospel.
(1) The view from 30,000 feet: 5:17–26, 33–39; 6:1–11; 11:14–16:31.
(2) The immediate context: 20:1–8, 20–26, 45–47.
c. In the parable, the authority that the vineyard owner delegates is also challenged.
(1) The servants (vv 10–12) represent the many prophets God sent to his people (Elijah, Elisha, Jeremiah, John the Baptist, and others) whom Israel rejected.
(2) The owner’s son (vv 13–15), quite unmistakably, represents God’s Son, the Christ, whom God’s tenants, Israel, would kill just days later.
(3) Incredibly, they believe this will cast off God’s authority and make them their own masters.
d. You, followers of Jesus, you, his holy priesthood, have problems with God’s authority too.
(1) You will be challenged by those who despise God’s authority—and therefore your faith—and by the whole world system that makes evil seem normal or even good.
You hear from many that you have the authority to decide when life ends. Many think that they can decide when to terminate a pregnancy or choose to end life if they are suffering, terminally ill, or deemed not valuable because of physical or mental challenges.
You will hear that if you are not satisfied that God made you a male or female you have the authority to change your body or simply state what you desire to be or be called, ignoring God’s design for you.
(2) You yourself challenge God’s authority, spurred by your sinful nature operating in cahoots with the world. There are things we want that we think he’s holding back.
You may justify bending the rules a bit or consider an occupation that may allow you to make more money, something that may be legal but is not necessarily moral.
God gives us life in the first place. He gives us our identity in baptism. He comes to us with his word, in comes to us with his body and blood in the Lord’s Supper to nourish us and sustain the faith he gives us.
However, at times we choose to ignore the ways he comes to us and seek him in places that we are told not to look for him. Sometimes we ignore the authority God gives others to feed us and tell us what we need to hear.
2. Those who remain stubbornly opposed to God’s authority will indeed then receive no good news (vv 15–18).
a. All that they have will be taken away.
(1) The parable foretells the death of the Son but gives no indication of his resurrection. The same Jewish leaders, when confronted with Jesus’ resurrection, will only see it as bad news (Mt 28:11–15).
(2) “What then does this Scripture mean?” Jesus will ask in his cryptic and ominous quotation from Psalm 118. For those who reject Jesus, it’s bad news!
b. Those in our world who continue to oppose God’s authority—including the mission he’s delegated to his Son—will also lose everything.
(1) Easter two weeks from today will be no celebration for those who really wish Jesus dead.
(2) Do we repent of challenging God’s authority by our sin, or will we be crushed?
1. But how does God in fact desire us to see his authority over us?
a. Jesus’ enemies had entirely forgotten the point of millennia of God’s authority over them.
(1) The master had planted this vineyard and entrusted it to them (v 9). God had graciously been using and blessing Israel all along.
(2) He sent his son, even after his servants had been mistreated, begging the tenants to repent (v 13).
(3) If they refused, he would “give the vineyard to others.” It’s still always God’s desire to use his authority to give.
b. God has now given the vineyard to us.
(1) Christ Jesus died also for all the times we challenge God’s authority—but he has risen! (Pronounce forgiveness—assured by the resurrection—for each earlier example of thinking God is holding us back.)
(2) Therefore, God holds no good thing back from us! He gives us everything truly good as a gift.
(3) God wants us to understand that this is how he always wishes to exercise his authority.
The Father and the Son Desire Us to See Their Authority Not as Withholding but as Giving.
Conclusion: “Fear not, little flock,” Jesus says, “for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you” not just the vineyard but also “the kingdom” (Lk 12:32). Giving is his style. Amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all human understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. Amen.
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