By Doug Bell
Matthew 21:
33 ¶ “Hear another parable. There was a master of a house who planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a winepress in it and built a tower and leased it to tenants, and went into another country.
34 When the season for fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the tenants to get his fruit.
35 And the tenants took his servants and beat one, killed another, and stoned another.
36 Again he sent other servants, more than the first. And they did the same to them.
37 Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’
38 But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and have his inheritance.’
39 And they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
40 When therefore the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?”
41 They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons.
42 ¶ Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: “‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone;fn this was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?
43 ¶ Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits.
44 And the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.
45 ¶ When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he was speaking about them.”
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In this Parable we find Jesus telling the Jews that they will no longer have ‘favored Nation’ Status. They Had been called by God to be His Witnesses to all the other nations, which they failed miserably. The most notable and famous of the Vineyard in the Old Testament in Isaiah 5:
1 ¶ “Let me sing for my beloved my love song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill.
2 He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it; and he looked for it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes.
3 ¶ And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard.
4 What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes?
5 ¶ And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down.
6 I will make it a waste; it shall not be pruned or hoed, and briers and thorns shall grow up; I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.
7 ¶ For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting; and he looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold, an outcry!
The Nation of Israel had turned from faithfully following the True God, and were following a God of their own imagination! 2 Timothy 3:5, “having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power.” Jesus words help us to understand that Israel was rejected and the ‘favorable’ status designation was going to another.
Their main ‘Sin’, was that The Son of God, their Messiah had come, and they rejected Him, and put Him to death! Matthew 27:25, “And all the people answered, “His blood be on us and on our children!” Because Israel had rejected The Son of God, God now was rejecting them.
In Matthew 24:
“3 ¶ As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?”
What were the disciple asking Jesus about?
1.) When will the Temple be destroyed?
2.) When will you return to do that?
3.) When is the “end of the Age?”
Notice: they ask, NOT when is the “end of the World,” BUT, when will be the end of the “AGE.” Their are scholars (R. C. Sproul, William Hendriksen, Kenneth Gentry Jr., etc.) Who believe the disciples are talking about how at the destruction of Jerusalem, God will put an end to the ‘era’ of the Jewish Nation. They will no longer have ‘special’ status and all the promises and blessings given to Israel will be “taken and given to another.” Here those it is given to is the ‘Church’ (of which Jesus is the head).
In 70 AD, Jerusalem was breached and completely destroyed by The Romans. Part of what was destroyed, the entire Temple complex. To this day, ‘Animal Sacrifices’ are no longer made, because they were no longer needed! (Hebrews 9:24-28). Thus, the “ERA” of the Nation of Israel is now over, and with the end of that era, it is also the end of the Old Testament and the beginning of the New!