As you know, last Sunday, we celebrated Harvest Thanksgiving in our parishes. As usual on our day of Harvest Thanksgiving, we heard readings relating to harvest time , and we heard the parable of the Rich Fool, a man who had a great harvest but kept it for himself which, whilst it might have made him rich and important in his own eyes, made him poor and foolish in God’s eyes. But we could have used many different readings last Sunday to say something very similar because the Scriptures are full of imagery taken from an agricultural setting and perhaps especially from harvest time. How many parables did Jesus tell, for example, that speak of harvesting crops of grain and fruit?

But these stories very often speak about harvest as a time to separate the good from the bad don’t they? As a time to separate the wheat from the chaff and the weeds, and as a time for separating good fruit from bad fruit. And because Jesus explained his parables to his disciples, we know that when the Scriptures speak about harvest they’re very often using harvest imagery as a metaphor for something else, and that the stories themselves are allegories intended to convey a deeper meaning. Jesus’ explanation of his parables tell us that what this harvest imagery is very often being used for is to speak about a different kind of harvest, not as harvest as a time to collect produce from the land, nor as a time to separate good crops and good fruit from bad, but as that time when God will gather all people together from the earth and separate those who’ve done good, those who’ve done his will, from those who’ve lived according to their own will and done evil as a consequence.

And this is the theme of our readings this morning. Our reading from Isaiah speaks about a vineyard that’s going to be destroyed because it produced nothing but sour grapes. We know this is an allegory for Israel and its unfaithfulness to God because Isaiah tells us;

For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel,
and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting;
and he looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed;
for righteousness, but behold, an outcry!

Isaiah also speaks about the care the owner of the vineyard, the Lord, had lavished on his vineyard. The Lord asks what more he could have done for his vineyard. He says,

What more was there to do for my vineyard,  that I have not done in it?

We know that one of the ways the Lord cared for his vineyard was by sending prophets to call the people back to obedience to the covenant they had with the Lord, and back to righteousness through that. We also know that the prophets were harshly treated by the people. They were imprisoned, beaten, and if they didn’t want to be killed, as some were, they had to flee for their lives. And this is the theme that Jesus takes up in this morning’s Gospel parable. He speaks about the landowner, the Lord, sending servants to collect the produce of his vineyard, the grapes, the good fruit of the vine. But instead, the servants are beaten and killed. These of course, are the prophets. Finally, the Lord sends his son because he thinks that the tenants of the vineyard  are sure to respect him, even if they didn’t respect the servants he’d sent. The son in the parable is obviously Jesus himself. But of course, the tenants treat the son in the same way because they think that if they kill the Lord’s son, they can take the vineyard as their own. Jesus asks what will the Lord do to these tenants when he comes himself? And of course the answer is that he’ll put an end to them and give the vineyard to new tenants who will give the produce of the vineyard to their Lord.

This is a parable that serves as a warning. We know that the Lord’s vineyard is the House of Israel because the Scriptures tell us that . So this is a warning to Israel that, as Jesus tells his hearers,

“….the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits.”

We know that the fruits the Lord is looking for are justice, mercy, righteousness, love and so on. We also know that, through faith in Christ, the kingdom has been given to us; we are those new tenants of the Lord’s vineyard. But does that make the Lord’s demand for good fruit from us any less than it was from the old tenants? No, it doesn’t. The kingdom is given to those who do produce fruit. So this parable also serves as a warning to us too, that if we don’t produce the good fruit the Lord is looking for, we’ll come to the same sorry end as those old tenants who mistreated and killed the Lord’s servants and his Son.

We might think that this warning doesn’t apply to us is the same way that it did to the people of Israel. I’m sure we all accept that whilst the Church does produce good fruit, and it does produce a lot of good fruit, there are a few bad apples in there too. But we don’t beat people up and kill them for pointing that out, in the way that the people of Israel did to the prophets. And we certainly don’t mistreat and kill Jesus so that we can take over the Church for ourselves. Or do we? Actually, yes, we do. We do these things in all sorts of ways.

As I said, we must accept that amongst the good fruit the Church produces there are a few bad apples. But try pointing out to a bad apple that they are one and see what happens. People who see things that are wrong in the Church, or people in the Church who are doing wrong, and speak up about it can be just as harshly treated as those servants of the Lord, the prophets, were by the people of Israel. They might not be physically beaten and killed, but they can be made to feel very unwelcome in the Church and by the Church. They can be criticised, be the subject of slander, and be ostracised by the Church, or at least by those members of the Church with the most to lose if people actually listened to these prophetic voices and acted on what they said. They might not be imprisoned or killed, but they can be silenced to the extent that they may as well be locked up or dead. It happens. But what do we think the Lord will do to those who treat people so badly for simply asking people to produce the fruit the Lord wants? Will he not treat them in the same way as the landowner treated the tenants in this morning’s parable?  

But even if this happens, surely we can’t be accused of killing the Son so that we can have the Church as our own?  Well again, yes, we can, and we do. How often have we seen things happen in the Church, things done by people of the Church, that are contrary to the teaching and example of Jesus, and yet these things are simply accepted and become the norm? How often have we seen and heard things that are contrary to the teaching and example of Jesus being promoted as the way the Church needs to do things? One way we see this so often in the Church is in the way the Church mirrors society. I’ve mentioned before the example of a parish in a world-famous medieval market town which has eleven clergy attached to it, whilst in less affluent or perhaps less famous places, two, three or more parishes have to share one priest between them. Is this inequality based on worldly wealth and status really what Jesus taught and showed in his earthly life? No, it’s not. And if the Church thinks this is right and good and acceptable, isn’t this a case of the tenants killing the Son and taking over the vineyard?

Another way this happens very often in parishes is in the ‘Church as social club’ situation that I’ve also spoken about in the past. That’s what happens when certain people in a parish decide the Church should be made up of their friends and people who think like them, like the same things they like and want the same things they want. What usually happens then is anyone who doesn’t fall into those categories can be made to feel unwelcomed, unwanted and unvalued. Those who aren’t in the ‘club’ can be excluded from things and prevented from having a voice in the Church. People can be deliberately kept off PCCs and other decision-making bodies in the parish or, if they should happen to be on something like that, shouted down in meetings or have their ideas ridiculed. Do we find authority or approval for treating people like this in Jesus’ teaching and example? Do we find approval or authority for taking over the Body of Christ in this way in Jesus’ teaching or example? No, we don’t. But this happens too, and when it does, what is this other than tenants killing the Son so that they can take over the vineyard? And what do we really think the Lord will do with those who do these things when he comes? Will he not bring them to the same sorry end that the landowner did to the tenants in this morning’s parable?

Scripture tells us that if we want to be gathered into God’s storehouse we must bear good fruit. The prophets tell us this; Jesus tells us this. In his Letter to the Galatians, St Paul lists the fruits we’re called to produce, the fruits of the Spirit; love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, gentleness and self-control. And Jesus tells us that we’re to show these fruits, these qualities, to all people, not just to our family and friends, not just to those whom we like and who like us, not just to those whom we agree with and who agree with us, not just to those who are wealthy, high and mighty in worldly terms, but to all people, whoever and whatever they are. This is what it means to bear and produce the good fruit of the vine that God wants from us. If we can produce this fruit, we have Jesus’ assurance that the kingdom of heaven will be ours. If we don’t. Well, then we have Jesus’ warning what we can expect come harvest time.

Amen.    

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Propers for the 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Trinity 18) 18th October 2023

Entrance Antiphon
O Lord, you have given everything its place in the world, and no one can make it otherwise.
For it is your creation, the heavens and the earth and the stars:
you are Lord of all.

The Collect
Almighty and everlasting God,
increase in us your gift of faith that,
forsaking what lies behind and reaching out to that which is before,
we may run the way of your commandments and win the crown of everlasting joy;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

The Readings
Missal (St Mark’s)        
Isaiah 5:1-7
Psalm 80:9, 12-16, 19-20
Philippians 4:6-9
Matthew 21:33-43

RCL (St Gabriel’s)          
Isaiah 5:1-7
Psalm 80:9-17
Philippians 3:4-14
Matthew 21:33-46

I don’t think it’s any secret that Harvest Festivals are not universally liked. Some people absolutely love them and for those people, their parish’s Harvest Festival is something to really look forward to and also to spend a lot of time and effort on. Other people though, loathe Harvest Festivals and for them, the parish’s Harvest Festival is something to be left to others in preparation, and to be suffered on the day itself. I don’t want to go into the reasons people have these very different opinions of Harvest Festivals, but what I will say is that, personally, my problem with Harvest Festivals is with how completely OTT some people can go with them. I’ve known churches where people have acted as though the annual Harvest Festival is more important than Christmas and Easter rolled into one. That’s quite preposterous in itself but has been made all the worse by the petty rivalries and jealousies and arguments that have been caused because of people’s over inflated opinion of the Harvest Festival, and very often of themselves too, it must be said! But that’s a problem with people and their behaviour, not with Harvest Festivals per se.

These days we seem to have largely moved away from speaking of Harvest Festivals and instead, we call them Harvest Thanksgiving services. And I think that’s a much better name for them because it’s a name that reminds us of what these services are really supposed to be about. They’re not about who gives the most or gets the most, they’re not about who has the best or most prominent display in church on the day, they’re about giving thanks to God for the food we eat. And it can’t ever be wrong for us to be reminded of our need to give thanks to God, whatever the reason.

But as we think about our Harvest Thanksgiving, we’re also reminded that it takes a lot of hard work to produce the food we eat. It takes people to sow the seed, raise the crops to fruition, harvest the crops when they’re ripe, process them so that they can be eaten, and transport them to shops and markets for us to buy. And this reminds us that, as well as our need to give thanks to God for all his good gifts to us, we have to work with God and use what God has given us if it’s going to be of any benefit to us, or to anyone else either. And this applies whatever the gifts we’ve been given and every particular gift we’ve been blessed with.

We all know, I’m sure, that to be given a gift and not to thank the one who’s given us that gift, is to be ungrateful. But showing ingratitude is not simply a matter of failing to say ‘Thank you’ to the one who gave us the gift. To be given a gift and not use it can also be seen as showing ingratitude because by not using the gift we’ve been given we can show that we don’t appreciate it, didn’t really want it and don’t see that we have any need for it. We can also show our ingratitude for a gift by wasting it. And we can show our ingratitude to God too by not using the gifts he gives us, by wasting them or, perhaps especially, by misusing them.

God gives us gifts for a reason. We might speak about having gifts in order to build up the Church or to bring the love of Christ to other people, but we could simply say that our gifts are given to us so that we can fulfil that great commandment to love God and love our neighbour as ourselves. And so, if we use our gifts to do these things, as God intends us to use them, we show our gratitude to God for the gifts he’s given us. And by using them in the way he intended us to, we also give glory to God because in the process of using our gifts we show something of God and say something about God to the world. But there’s a flip side to this. If we waste our gifts by not using them, then we show our ingratitude to God, we also fail to fulfil the great commandment, and we give no glory to anyone. But misusing our gifts is just as bad, if not worse than not using them at all.

If we do good works to show our love of our neighbour but don’t give thanks to God for the gifts that have enabled us to do that, who are we really glorifying, God or ourselves? And if we use our God given gifts for selfish purposes, then whether we thank God for them or not, we’re glorifying no one but ourselves. For example, if we rise to the top in our work or profession, there’s no point in thanking God for the gifts that have enabled us to be successful, if we’ve used, abused and trampled underfoot anyone and everyone who’s stood in our way, along the way. And if our success has enabled us to have a very high standard of living, there’s no point in thanking God for the gifts that have given us that, if we couldn’t care less about people who are struggling to make ends meet, especially if our success has come at their expense.

Doing these things is glorifying ourselves at God’s expense, patting ourselves on the back for something we should be thanking God for. And this is the lesson, the warning, of the parable of the Rich Fool. This man was successful, and his success had made him rich. I think we can assume from that that he was a gifted man, who’d used his gifts. Being gifted though doesn’t guarantee success unless you’re prepared to work hard at what you’re doing. So we can probably also assume that he was a hard-working man. So, gifted, hard-working and successful. But also very ungrateful and very selfish. A man who patted himself on the back for what he’d achieved rather than thanking God for the gifts that had enabled him to achieve it. A man who used what God had given him for his own selfish purposes, so that he could sit back, relax, take it easy and have a good time, whilst other less fortunate people worked his land, harvested his crops, pulled down his old barns and built  bigger ones, and gathered his crops into them. Perhaps a measure of this man’s selfishness can be seen in his words. Have you ever noticed how self-centred they are? His monologue is all about ‘I’ and ‘me’. Do we really think this man pulled down and built barns and gathered crips into them personally? Surely someone else would have done this for him. But this a very common way of speaking isn’t it. Rich, powerful people saying ‘I’ have done this when what they really mean is someone else has done this for me. In effect, taking the glory for someone else’s toil and sweat and then keeping the lion’s share of the benefits for themselves.

Such was the Rich Fool in the parable. A man who was richly blessed by God, and richly rewarded in earthly terms, but who was poor in God’s sight because he was ungrateful and selfish. A man who had a great deal to thank God for and who could have given great glory to God because of that by using his gifts in the service of God and his neighbour. But a man who, instead, chose to glorify himself. And that did make him poor, and foolish, because, in the end, self-glorification can only last as long as our earthly lives last. In the end, all out pride and boasting about how great we are and how well we’ve done, all that ends. And when it ends, all we have is the hope that God will glorify us by raising us to eternal life with him. And if we want that hope to be a sure hope, then we’d best make sure that we’ve not been the kind of fools whom Jesus spoke and warned us about in this morning’s Gospel.

To use some harvest imagery taken from the hymn, Come, ye thankful people, come, we have been planted in God’s field and we have been given all that we need to ripen into fruitfulness in God’s service. Our hope is that , when the Lord himself comes to gather his harvest, we may be among the wholesome, pure and fruitful grain that will be gathered into God’s store. So let’s be thankful for what God has given us. Let’s show our thanks, not only in praise, but by using all his gifts in the way he intends then to be used, to give him glory by showing our love for him and our love of our neighbour through the thankful, unselfish way we use his gifts. If we can do that then, by God’s grace and mercy, we can relax in the knowledge that we’ve stored up many good things for ourselves, not just for many years, but for eternity. 

Amen.

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Propers for Harvest Thanksgiving 1st October 2023

Entrance Antiphon
The earth has yielded its fruit, the Lord our God has blessed us.

The Collect
Eternal God,
you crown the year with your goodness,
and you give us the fruits of the earth in their season:
grant that we may use them to your glory,
for the relief of those in need and for our own well-being;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

The Readings
Missal (St Mark’s)        
Joel 2:21-24, 26-27
Psalm 67:2-3, 5, 7-8
1 Timothy 6:6-11, 17-19
Luke 12:15-21

RCL (St Gabriel’s)          
Deuteronomy 8:7-18
Psalm 65
2 Corinthians 9:6-15
Luke 12:16-30

Entrance Antiphon
I am the Saviour of all people, says the Lord.
Whatever their troubles, I will answer their cry, and I will always be their Lord.

The Collect
O Lord,
we beseech you mercifully to hear the prayers of your people who call upon you;
and grant that they may both perceive and know what things they ought to do,
and also may have grace and power faithfully to fulfil them;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

The Readings
Missal (St Mark’s)        
Isaiah 55:6-9
Psalm 145:2-3, 8-9, 17-18
Philippians 1:20-24, 27
Matthew 20:1-16

RCL (St Gabriel’s)          
Jonah 3:10-4:11
Psalm 145:1-8
Philippians 1:21-30
Matthew 20:1-16