Return the fruits of goodness to God

RETURN THE FRUITS OF GOODNESS TO GOD

Mt. 22:33-43

This parable of the vineyard leased to tenant farmers was addressed to the priests and religious authorities, but there are lessons that we can learn from it.  To Jesus' audience it presented God's goodness to the Chosen People, what God expected of them in return and how they actually responded.  For us today, it paints a picture of God's goodness to us in many ways.  He makes us tenants of this beautiful world.  He sends His Son to be God-With-Us, as one like us.  He offers us freedom from sin and eternal life with Him through the merits of His Son Jesus.  God asks of us that we return to Him with love the fruits of all the goodness we have received from Him.  We can choose either to do this, with Jesus as our teacher and model, or to respond like the ungrateful wicked tenants in the story. 

Let us look more closely at the meaning of this parable.  The landowner represents God; the tenants represent the people of Israel; the servants represent the prophets sent to Israel to bring them back to serve God more faithfully.  The son and heir represents Jesus, God’s only Son, whom they reject and kill.  God punishes them and gives over His vineyard to those who will produce the fruit He seeks – the Christian Church.  Those listening to the parable understood that Jesus was relating for them the history of Israel and criticising Israel for not serving God with faithful lives.  This parable was an indictment to those hearing it.  They were the Chosen People of God.  God had done everything possible for them to bear the necessary fruit and they had acted unjustly and ungraciously.

Now let us consider the meaning of this parable for us today.  What God has done for the people of Israel He has done for each one of us.  The Father by His graciousness, love and mercy, has placed us in this beautiful world as its stewards, so that we can live the life of the Kingdom of God.  What is this life?  It is an exchange of love with God which we are called to enjoy now and eternally.  Everything we have, we receive from God. 

Everything we achieve is by God’s grace.  We have nothing of our own.  As St. Francis says, ‘our only true possessions are our sins’.  Everything else we have is a gift from God.  Everything that we have been given is for the glory of God’s Son – the Son Who reconciled us to the Father and Who became man to lead us to the Father.  We were created to return all this goodness to God by living for His glory, in praise and thanksgiving. 

Therefore, we should joyfully and humbly acknowledge what God has done for us in Christ, reconciling us to Himself by forgiving our sins, adopting us as His beloved children, granting us blessings of salvation and the indwelling and friendship of the Holy Spirit in this life and preparing for us a heavenly future of joy.  As St Peter says, “An inheritance which is imperishable, undefiled, unfading, kept in Heaven for you.’  (1 Peter 1:4).  We must acknowledge that the Father did all this for us despite our being unworthy sinners with no claim upon Him whatsoever.  As St. Paul says, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God.” (Eph. 2:8).

Because God has been so gracious to us, it should evoke from us a growing appreciation of God’s great mercy towards us and of increasing gratefulness for all the graces He has poured out upon us.  The Father wants us to love His Son and honour Him with our lives, handing over to Him everything we have received from Him.  We are called to a response of love for God and also for neighbour, as we seek to grow in obedience to God’s commandments as we strive to manifest ‘the fruit of the Spirit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness (and) self-control’ (Gal. 5:22-23).  As we return the good fruit to God in this way, He replenishes His goodness in us a hundredfold, and so our loving exchange with God continues into eternity.

God entrusts the vineyard to us, human cultivators.  In this world He always calls us to do His work and build His Kingdom.  He does not force us to do His will.  We have the choice of obeying Him or deliberately rebelling as the tenants in the parable did.  He sends messengers to remind people of His commands and calls them to repentance, but people often do not want to hear. 

We see this in the history of the Old Testament prophets, most of whom were rejected for preaching unpopular truths.

If we try to follow Jesus in returning our lives to God in love, behaving as good stewards of the Kingdom in today's secular society we must expect to meet with some rejection, and maybe ridicule.  This need not discourage us, for the same things happened to Jesus Himself. 

Lord Jesus You challenge us today as You did the Jews two thousand years ago.  May each one of us be responsible stewards and return to Your Father with love the fruits of all the goodness we have received from Him. 

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