“Read them the riot act!” Oh my, who has not, at some stage found themselves making that statement?

We are in an election cycle just now and how I hear versions of ‘Read the riot act’ coming from all sides of the community.  “Under the government I lead, there will be no crime” for example… with no details or explanations on how best to do that… not to mention any costings.

One of my jokes about life in the Uniting Church is this: that when it comes to making decisions, we take the Band-Aid off so slowly, that everyone gets hurt!  You may have seen it time and time again… and when we do need to make a fast decision, very often, we make slow ones.  Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m all for slow things.  I’m more tortoise that hare; I’ve got a slow cooker; I’m usually one of the last in technology… Most Spiritual practices are about slowing down…

But as our Basis of Union reminds us, we are a Pilgrim People.  That is, we recognise that we are living into a dynamic.  The eternal truths we are exploring ensure that we are always invited into a mystery that keeps opening us up, inviting us into futures as yet unimaginable… as we seek the lead of the Spirit Holy in our life together.

So as we approach another parable this week, we might be best to ‘go slow’ before we are ready to get on with things.  This parable sounds like an allegory; a way of telling the story of what God was doing in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.  That is certainly how I have come into this story.  But commentators are far more sensitive to the placement of stories in the Gospels… and why and what might the writer of Matthew’s Gospel be doing, by placing this story after the parable of the two sons, we looked at last week.

In context, Jesus in this chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, is being challenged by the religious as to his authority to be doing and saying what he’s saying. “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?” Jesus said to them, “I will also ask you one question; if you tell me the answer, then I will also tell you by what authority I do these things. Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?” (Matthew 21:23-25a) The parameters are about what is of earth and human, and what is of the Spirit and the mystery we name God.  Things human: things heavenly, if you like.

And this parable is in a sequence of others, 

In the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant: we looked at that story a few weeks ago, we have the key figure begin the story… there was a man, a king… (18:23-35) … and the king forgave the debt, but the slave did not do likewise.

Then we have the  Parable of the Generous Vineyard Owner (20:1-16), who is a man, and who is a housekeeper (not a king).  Commentators suggest to us that not every story is to be read as “god”. In that parable, the Man was generous, paying all workers, regardless of their start time, the same amount promised.  A challenge to our transactional, and capitalist ideas of economy: and a reminder that God’s Kingdom has different values.

And today we have the Parable of the Wicked Tenants (21:33-46), and this begins with the key figure being a man, who is also a housekeeper… (not a king)

We will come to the finale of the parables, where a man, a king will be the central character… in The Parable of the King’s Son’s Wedding (22:1-14), or as some of us will recall it, by the song… ‘I cannot come to the banquet, I have married a wife I have bought me a cow, I have fields and commitment, that cost a prey some, pray hold me excused, I cannot come’

So, today’s story is about a man… and so, perhaps not an allegory of God.   And if the allegory is about a man, then what’s the story trying to illuminate to us?

The man is patient like God is, and man sends repeated delegations: but don’t you think, in the last instant, instead of sending his own son… he’d ‘read them the riot act’ and send in the army, the navy, the airforce and ‘we’ll take them out’?   And, in this telling of the story, Jesus even asks the listeners what they think will happen to the workers who do the wretched thing and end up killing the man’s only son. And they reply that the owner “will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.” (Mt. 21:41)  The human logic is ‘read the riot act’ and get on with it.

If we immediately superimpose the story of God, in Jesus  and the events of the Crucifixion, we are starting to speed up: and we might do an unconscious leap from Human solutions to Heavenly ideas, and miss the point.

Because this story is about any authority Jesus might have; and in this telling of the story Jesus places central, something that even we, those who follow Jesus, seem to need to learn, time and time again…  Jesus quotes Psalm 118:22: “The stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.”  I mean what?  Why would the off-cast stone, be the very thing that tells us something of God’s nature, Gods’ work in Jesus, and a way forward that is different for human community?

Jesus goes on to call this stone (a skandalon), a stumbling block: “The one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls.” (Mt. 21:44) There’s a reference here to Isaiah’s prophecy that the Lord of Hosts will became “a stone one strikes up against,” that God will become “a rock one stumbles over.” (Isa. 8:14) That the weak stone is stumbled over when it is rejected by those who think they are strong.

Who would choose, as cornerstone the stone, the very one that the builders tossed aside? The problem here is not Jew vs. Gentile, but faith vs. un-faith in the authority of Jesus.  Faith vs. un-faith in the Ways of Jesus.  Faith vs. un-faith in the life stories of Jesus.

Yesterday I attended the Thanksgiving Memorial  Service of a man named Al Wunder.  Al was a remarkably quirky man who, having graduated from Berkley University in California USA, in creative and interpretive dance (it was the 1970s), came to Australia to teach classes in the early 1980’s.  He fell in love with an Australian woman: and they made family and a creative life together running improvisation classes to hundreds of us lucky students.

His methodology was positive feedback.  Sounds simple: it’s profound: deep: slow learning: slow discerning: but leads to authenticity.  Authentic performance: Authentic practice.  Quite simply, after you had done your Solo improvisation performance in class, you were invited to share with the witness group, what you liked doing.  (and sometimes, there wasn’t much: but he would correct you and ONLY ask for what you liked about what you did.) And those witnessing were only invited to share what they liked watching.

In the gap, was the learning, the potential to change, the creative space of possibility: and all in all, Al taught what therapists practice: Over All Positive Regard for All People.   Much like the man in the parable, the owner of the house… in his dealings with the wicked tenants.

Before we reach for the riot act, maybe this story is also building capacity with in us all, for the practice of Over All Positive Regard for All People.  After all, if all political parties campaigned on that: if all potential leaders of this State practiced Over All Positive Regard for All People… if all policies, thought bubbles or outright lies were assessed on the basis of Over All Positive Regard for All People… imagine…  imagine the kingdom of God alive amongst us.

As to the parable, it challenges us in our human power and the need to control life: and suggests that our human power will usually result in violence… the exercise over life and death, by human hand.  But in Gods story something very different happens, because our story of Jesus doesn’t end with human violence; it begins with the skandelon: the weakest stone, rejected, becomes the new paradigm.  A resurrected Jesus; who comes to the ones he loves, after such devastation, and whose FIRST WORDS says ‘Peace… I come in peace… see, see these wounds… and I’m here.’

The Parable of the Wicked Tenants portrays a drama similar to the biblical drama of God sending the prophets and Jesus, but God supplies a decidedly different ending to the story: raising the Son to return as forgiveness, not vengeance.

I hope you can feel the nuance here… I hope you can begin again, to ponder into this story… into this parable, to live more deeply into the skandelon of Jesus, of God in Jesus… and then, in your living and loving, bring this expansive and hopeful message to every corner of your living…