What's a vineyard for, anyway?

These recent weeks have had much to say about vineyards.

In last Sunday’s lesson, a man asks two sons to go to work in his vineyard, and in the week before, laborers are hired throughout the day to work in a vineyard. It’s a rich metaphor. 

These parables are part of a long series in which Jesus is describing what God’s Kingdom is like. In the ancient world, a vineyard was a meaningful symbol to evoke. It surely called to mind images of joyful abundance; people might picture gathering with others in celebration, like at a wedding feast with an open bar from which the wine flows freely.  

And we might have our own associations, too. Perhaps fruit of the vine recalls memories of visiting a vineyard in Virginia, or elsewhere. Or maybe instead a vine of sugar snap peas climbing up a trellis.

I think of my mother’s garden. While she would work and till the soil, my siblings and I would gather around to watch and pester her with all kinds of questions. Eventually, she’d pick sugar snap peas or cherry tomatoes and plop them into our hands. Let me tell you, there’s nothing quite like a tomato picked fresh from the vine, and the way the smell of pure summer stays on your fingertips all day. 

Memories of God

In my earliest memory of God, I am enveloped in yellow. Color and shape begin to surface. Blurry, bright, and slow rising from some deep recess. Feet are firmly planted below, while palms face upward: I see but dimly, straining for some sight beyond. I am standing in a garden,

Center + ShadowDavid Potter

There are many ways we might see the wonder of creation in the image of a vine. And for all the many meanings in a parable, it’s especially helpful to remember why it exists in the first place.

The purpose of a vineyard is to grow good fruit.

This is much the same purpose in all corners of creation, both literally and metaphorically: whether that be the purpose of a backyard produce garden, the relationships we cultivate in our church communities, the whole of God’s Kingdom, or even the “vineyards” of our own lives. It’s all about the gift of good fruit: which is grown to enjoy—and dare we even say to delight in.

Because, really, what good’s a garden if it doesn’t bear fruit—if it doesn’t provide nourishment?

Now, what we do with the fruit in the different areas of life is of course another matter… It can be all-too-easy to get caught up in all kinds of concerns and distractions, and while chasing after them forget just what a vineyard is for in the first place. This is just the case for the tenants in our parable.

These “Wicked Tenants,” as they are called, seem only concerned with getting the inheritance above all else, and by any means necessary. And when they, or any of us, lose sight of what the gift of creation and life is for, we can slowly forget the purpose of the vineyards that have been entrusted to us…

Somewhere along the way, it would seem for these tenants that purpose became less about growing good fruit and more about producing profit. At some point, their concern of “what’s in it for us” began to take center stage. With time, feeding and nourishing people slowly becomes more and more of an afterthought, and it doesn’t take much for things to go off the rails from there.  

Whether it’s the tenants of a vineyard or the citizens of a nation, when securing our needs first is important above all else, justifying all kinds of once unthinkable brutality gets more and more easy: perhaps through trade agreements or foreign policy, or through senseless beatings and killings.

But this is not why a land of abundance exists in the first place. And it’s surely not how things work in the Kingdom of God. 

I think what’s most notable in our parable is what Jesus doesn’t say… 

After Jesus lays out this scenario, he pauses and asks those listening: “So, what would you have the owner of the vineyard do?” And in response, they say to him, “Put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to others who will produce real profits to harvest.”

In their imagination, retaliation comes swiftly and with greater might and power than all others—perhaps it even includes a campaign to eradicate all “Wicked Tenants” from the face of the earth. Maybe their response is shocking or unsettling. In losing sight of the vineyard’s purpose, they find themselves living in a narrative endlessly repeating the same, tired cycle of retributive violence and vengeance—which only begets more violence and vengeance.

It’s important we understand this is their response, and not the words of Jesus. Just as they do not speak for the fictional vineyard owners, they do not speak for God. 

We do have a practice in the Church though of recognizing people who model for us something of God, whose lives tell us about how we might love in the way God loves. This is just what a saint is.

This morning, the Church marks the Feast of Saint Francis: a humble man who is now perhaps best known for a prayer which he didn't write but does capture the truth of his life, anyway. It begins, “Lord, make me an instrument of your peace…”

Francis lived with slowness and simplicity, poverty and pacifism—which doesn’t make for the best recruitment strategy. Of all the saints, it has been said that Francis is perhaps the most widely popular—and the least imitated. But Francis wasn’t always a champion of peaceful coexistence with all creatures.

We might even go so far as to say that Saint Francis was a failure.

As a young man from a wealthy family, Francis’ life was filled with vain and empty pursuits. He dreamed especially of becoming a knight, with all the glory that comes through military achievements. Recognition and conquest was the only fruitful life he could really imagine. 

Shortly after going into battle with the local army in Assisi, he was captured and held as a prisoner of war for an entire year. Afterward, he joined another failed campaign; this time though, when he couldn’t achieve the glory he desired, he gave up.   

IThrough this failure, a relationship with the Living Christ begins to take shape, and it leads him to choose a different way. What seemed inevitable for this boy determined on knighthood eventually changed direction. And it's for this reason we continue to talk about Saint Francis of Assisi today. 

And I think this is really what our gospel lesson would have for us this morning.

Though it may at times seem we are locked in an endless cycle, violence is never a foregone conclusion.

Because Jesus always has something else in mind. Just as his life concludes, there will be no retribution—swift, powerful, or in any other form. The way of Jesus disrupts and breaks cycles of violence. 

However many times we may reject the way of peace and fail to walk in love, God is working to restore it as the cornerstone of our lives. However many times we may lose sight of why we're even here in the first place, God reaches out to restore us in love. 

We witness this presence of God's Kingdom wherever we find in creation the good fruit of the Spirit: in "self-control, gentleness, and faithfulness; goodness, kindness, and forbearance; peace, joy, and love."

May we witness this good fruit in our lives and through all creation, and in seeing what God is doing let ourselves be amazed.