What will the owner of the vineyard do?

And he began to speak to them in parables. “A man planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a pit for the winepress and built a tower, and leased it to tenants and went into another country. When the season came, he sent a servant to the tenants to get from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. And they took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. Again he sent to them another servant, and they struck him on the head and treated him shamefully. And he sent another, and him they killed. And so with many others: some they beat, and some they killed. He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ And they took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others.

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This is a somewhat troubling parable and our Lord's ending to it is a bit frightening. A few simple thoughts, in the light of this passage, for we who live today:

• Our possessions, like those in Israel, are on loan. We are managers and not owners. We tend to forget that God holds the title to our homes, our cars and to our souls.
• Our obligation to God is to return the fruit of our labors, our resources and our beings. This is not an unreasonable request for we who are renters and not owners.
• God sends to us people and things that remind us of who we are and who He is. It is here where the coming of Christ is so important - both to the the ancients and to us.

There has never been a greater reminder, or more chilling example, to us of this parable than when they nailed the Son of God to a torturous cross. May we live remembering it.

I am a renter and not an owner Lord. Help me to live a life that reflects that truth.