Tuesday in the Third Week of Advent, December 15, 2020

Matthew 21:28-32

Jesus said to the chief priests and the elders of the people: “What is your opinion? A man had two sons. He came to the first and said, ‘Son, go out and work in the vineyard today.’ The son said in reply, ‘I will not,’ but afterwards he changed his mind and went. The man came to the other son and gave the same order. He said in reply, ‘Yes, sir,’ but did not go. Which of the two did his father’s will?” They answered, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Amen, I say to you, tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the Kingdom of God before you. When John came to you in the way of righteousness, you did not believe him; but tax collectors and prostitutes did. Yet even when you saw that, you did not later change your minds and believe him.”

In the Gospel reading reading for today’s Mass, in which John the Baptist’s name once again turns up, the Lord speaks of a father’s two sons.  The father is a landowner and he has a vineyard on at least part of the land.  He tells the first son to go out to the vineyard, either to work there or to oversee the servants who are working there.  This son tells his father that he will not do this.  His refusal to go out to the vineyard is not a simple matter of inconvenience for his father: it is an act of rebellion that puts the family at risk.  The son is needed in the vineyard or the father would not have told him to go there.  Failure to work there, particularly if this is during the harvest, when time is of the essence, jeopardizes the family.  Furthermore, as an act of rebellion, there is a question of whether the father and the family will ever be able to count on this son, whom the father may disinherit as being undependable.  It should also be understood that this was not a boss versus employee matter: going against one’s father was a serious act of impiety and an insult to his honor.  Reflecting on the consequences of his actions, or perhaps on all that he owed his father, the first son did repent of his refusal and went out.  This repenting would have come at some cost to his pride, for in the act of his refusal he had made a claim that he did not need or care for his father and his family.

On the other hand there is the second son.  When the first son at first refuses to go, the father tells the second son to go to the vineyard, to which he answers that he will.  And then, knowing that the first son has refused to go out, he does not go.  This second act is worse than the first because the second means that no one will go out to the vineyard.  It is as if the second son deliberately seeks the wreck of the family’s fortunes, whereas the first son simply does not care.

In view of this dire situation, the Lord Jesus asks the question of the chief priests and the elders of the people, “Which of the two did his father’s will?”    The answer seemed clear enough to them and they answered, “The first.”  The Lord then replied to them, “Amen, I say to you, tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the Kingdom of God before you.”  This sharp public rebuke shocked and angered them, but the Lord gives them no time to reply: “When John came to you in the way of righteousness, you did not believe him; but tax collectors and prostitutes did.”  John had been dead for two years at this point, but no one had forgotten him, or that they had dismissed John as a renegade.  Jesus continued, “But tax collectors and prostitutes did [believe him]. Yet even when you saw that, you did not later change your minds and believe him.”  

The Lord says that John “came . . . in the way of righteousness”, the righteousness which the chief priests and elders were supposed to embody, and he brought sinners back to the practice of their religion, which is a work of righteousness.  The Lord points out to the chief priests and elders that they had rejected their title to righteousness by their inaction and lack of interest in the salvation of sinners.  Thus, they had refused to “work in the vineyard of the Lord” even though their position obligated them to do so.  Those who had become tax collectors and prostitutes had indeed committed sin, thereby saying to God that they would not “work” as his children, but changed their minds later through the preaching of John, who reminded them of all that they owed to their Father.

Jesus seems to rebel against the chief priests and the elders, but in truth he points out that they themselves had rebelled against the God of righteousness.  They should have received the mass conversions of the tax collectors and prostitutes as John’s validation from heaven, for, “by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7, 16).  This in turn should have aroused them to do their assigned work, but they refused to do it, preferring to abide in their own complacency.

God has assigned work to each of us, tailored to the abilities and talents which he has given us.  Let us be eager to show ourselves as his true sons and daughters by joyfully toiling in his field.