Tuesday of Holy Week
It is Tuesday of Holy Week and it sure seems as though things are ramping up in the interactions between Jesus and the religious leadership. What happened the day before was not something that sat well with the Jewish leadership. Jesus was illegitimate in their eyes and he was taking the attention away from them…he was usurping their authority and power in the eyes of the people.
Tuesday was filled with interaction - much of it involved the religious leaders seeking to trap Jesus in his words. But they couldn’t do it. You can’t trick perfection. You cannot trip up the Holy One of God. In fact, they were consistently shut down in their attempts through the gracious and pointed words of Jesus.
There is much to read and consider in this day, and I certainly cannot write on all it, so let me briefly highlight the parable of the tenants.
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;
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. 46 And although they were seeking to arrest him, they feared the crowds, because they held him to be a prophet. (Matthew 21:33-46)
Clearly the tenants are the Jewish leaders who are fighting against Jesus. But they have rejected the truth. They have rejected the stone upon which everything is built. There is fulfillment of prophecy here - Isaiah 8:14 and Daniel 2:44, but more importantly the call is to see Jesus as who he is. He is not some usurper of authority; he is the ultimate authority He is the one upon which all stands or falls. And he is asserting what is rightly his. He is the cornerstone, chosen and precious (1 Peter 2:6-8). He is the one we are called to believe and to realize that there is salvation in no one else (Acts 4:11,12).
It is amazing that the perfect Son of God gave himself to be wounded for us so that we could know life and salvation.
Here is a song to meditate on this day - “O Sacred Head Now Wounded.”