Matthew 21:28-32

Disclaimer:

This sermon is stylistically different than most that I preach. It was for a special play at our church to celebrate 150 years since the church was founded. I played the Rev. H. H. Maynard who led revivals in Hudson in the late 19th century. The attempt was to be more or less stylistically authentic. However, even though the style is somewhat harsher than I usually preach, the main ideas are fully in line with what I would attempt to get across if I were preaching on the same text throughout the normal course of events. I hope you enjoy this somewhat altered offering. (P.S. The scripture version read before the sermon and cited throughout is the King James Version)

04/25/10
Matthew 21:28-32
Hudson UMC

My brothers and sisters, God’s holy word lays before our very eyes today two very different people. Jesus told a parable of two sons of the same father; both were hypocrites in their own way. Their father told both of his sons, “Son, go work to day in my vineyard.” One of them refused his father to his face, rejecting even his own family, but then thought better of it and went and did what he was asked. The other agreed to his father’s face, but rejected him by his actions.

In ancient times, when our Lord ministered in Galilee, the people who encountered Him could be put into two groups. There was the poor, the weak, the despised, who never went to the Temple, who were continually being rebuked by the religious authorities because they did not keep the law. They had spit in God’s face over and over and over again, rejecting the promises that He made to their fathers. But when Jesus came among them, they changed their minds. They left their sins by the side of the road and followed Jesus, going and sinning no more and spending the rest of their lives laboring in God’s vineyard, being filled with joy by serving such a loving master. These people were like the first son, who said, “Lord, I will not serve you,” but later changed their minds and worked for God. And, though they had lived lives of sin before, because they changed their minds, they will be blessed forever in the kingdom of God.

There was, however, another group that encountered Our Lord during his time on earth. The Scribes and Pharisees, the teachers of the law and the prophets, were people who, when God called them to give their lives to him, said with a bold and confident “Yes, Lord, I will serve you!” They spent their lives studying the words of God in the Old Testament, even teaching this law to others, and yet they found themselves to be strangers to true religion, to the religion of the heart, by which alone we can be joined to God and have eternal life. In spite of their weighty professions, in spite of the great show they made of their religion, they were hypocrites. As Jesus said, “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For ye are like unto whited sepulchers, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.”

As Jesus preached to these “holy” men, he saw that they were just like the second son, who said, “I go, sir” and did not go to work for his father. They saw themselves as holy men and they were even able to convince the people that they were holier than they were, but nothing, not even the craftiest wiles of man can trick the Lord God. Jesus looked into their hearts and saw that they were full of hypocrisy and had no life in them.

It was to these people that Jesus told the story of the two sons. After He finished, He asked them, “Whether of them twain did the will of his father?” The self-righteous leaders answered, “The first.” Brothers and sisters, even these sinful men answered rightly. Even drowning in their sea of sin, they were not able to deny the truth of God’s parable. They saw, even in their hypocrisy, that true religion is not in thinking but in doing. And so, even though they could see the truth of Jesus’ words, they did not live by them. “Jesus saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, That the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom before you.”

Brothers and sisters, give your ears. Our Lord does not just say that the publicans and harlots go into the kingdom at all, but that they go into the kingdom ahead of all those who say they work for God but instead serve themselves. Indeed, those who will not serve the God they profess to love will not enter the kingdom at all, neither before nor after the publicans and harlots, no matter how holy they may think they are.

There is a word for us here today, fellow sinners. Are there any among us like the second son, like the Pharisees, who profess with the mouth, but whose heart is far from God? Do you not hear the words of Our Lord and fear lest you, too, might end up, not as a citizen of the kingdom of heaven, but rather cast out into the outer darkness, where the fire is not quenched and the worm dieth not? Do you not feel the weight of eternity resting on your shoulders? Can you endure the wrath of God that will be poured out on all unrepentant sinners on the last day? Jesus warned those who spoke a fine religion but did not live it that God would say to them, “Depart, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels!” The Bible teaches of a lake of fire which those who are condemned must endure for ever and ever. “For ever and ever! Why, if we were only to be chained down one day, yea, one hour, in a lake of fire, how amazingly long would one day or one hour appear! I know not if it would not seem as a thousand years. But (astonishing thought!) after thousands of thousands, he has but just tasted of his bitter cup! After millions, it will be no nearer the end than it was the moment it began!”

Those who would put on a show for men, to impress those who are easily fooled, would do well to take the warning of Christ here. For all your show, even the harlots and prostitutes will enter the kingdom before you. The religion of the heart must change the way you live, must make itself known in holiness of thought and life, and love for God and neighbor. Without holiness, the Bible tells us, we will never see the Lord. I urge you, be reconciled to God. No longer trust in your fine words to deliver you while your life is still rancid and steeped in sin.

But the Gospel is just as clear in this text as the warning. There are many who associate with faithful people in order to make it seem that they, too, are truly the people of God even though their hearts are strangers to true religion. However, there may also be those here today who have rejected God their whole lives, who, like the first son, have had second thoughts, who would like to stop living in rebellion of your heavenly Father and go labor in His vineyards. You may have thought to yourself, “Surely, there can be no hope for me. I have rejected God, spit in His face, refused His offer of love. Surely nothing but sadness and despair await me.”

Sinner, know that, no matter what it might look like to the outsider, remember that it was the first son, who, in spite of his words of rejection, actually went and labored for his father, that was the son who did his father’s will. The one who said he would work but did not go is the one who was the rebel in heart. Both the sons were hypocrites, but while the second son was a hypocrite to God, making promises he did not keep, the first was only a hypocrite to Satan, breaking only his promises to sin.

In Christ, those who are enemies of God become His friends; those who are children of Satan become the children of our heavenly Father; sinners become saints. If you are the first son today, who has rejected God in the past, do so no more and you will be accepted with no questions asked, but with open arms of love. If you are the second, who, even by your presence here this morning, are trying to hide that your profession is no deeper than your skin and has not reached your heart, make good on your promises. No longer be almost a Christian, but one in truth. For with God all things are possible.

Amen and Amen.