Prayer
As always, we start with prayer. Is there anything we can pray for concerning you and those whom you love?
Praise
Be Thou My Vision
1. Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me save that thou art.
Thou my best thought by day and by night;
Waking or sleeping, thy presence my light.
2. Be thou my wisdom, and thou my true Word;
I ever with thee and thou with me, Lord.
Thou my great Father, I thy dear child;
Thou in me dwelling, with thee reconciled.
3. Be thou my breastplate, my sword for the fight;
Be thou my dignity, thou my delight.
Thou my soul's shelter, thou my high tow'r;
Raise thou me Heav'nward, O Pow'r of my pow'r.
4. Riches I heed not, nor vain, empty praise;
Thou mine inheritance, now and always.
Thou and thou only, first in my heart,
High King of Heaven, my treasure thou art.
5. High King of Heaven, my victory won,
May I reach Heaven's joys, O bright Heav'ns Sun!
Heart of my heart, whatever befall,
Still be my vision, O Ruler of all.
Passage
Mark 12:1-12
The Parable of the Tenants
12 Jesus then began to speak to them in parables: “A man planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a pit for the winepress and built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. 2 At harvest time he sent a servant to the tenants to collect from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. 3 But they seized him, beat him and sent him away empty-handed. 4 Then he sent another servant to them; they struck this man on the head and treated him shamefully. 5 He sent still another, and that one they killed. He sent many others; some of them they beat, others they killed.
6 “He had one left to send, a son, whom he loved. He sent him last of all, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’
7 “But the tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ 8 So they took him and killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard.
9 “What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and kill those tenants and give the vineyard to others. 10 Haven’t you read this passage of Scripture:
“‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone;11 the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes’[a]?”
12 Then the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders looked for a way to arrest him because they knew he had spoken the parable against them. But they were afraid of the crowd; so they left him and went away.
Ponder
1. Is there anything from the song above or from the Markan passage that you have never noticed before that touches you in a different way than before when you read it THIS time? What is it?
2. Im this parable, the Owner of the vineyard (God) keeps sending more people even though they are being severely mistreated. What does this tell you about God’s character?
3. The tenants, in hostility, reject the heir of the vineyard for their own gain. But what about these days? How is Jesus being rejected these days for the world’s present gain?
4. Jesus, the Ps 118 Cornerstone of the passage, is rejected—but what does that mean for God’s family these days? God often uses those who are overlooked. When was the time that you saw a person being overlooked or rejected who then showed you who God is or what God was up to that YOU did not expect?
5. In this passage, “God creates, cultivates, entrusts, and expects from the workers.” But what fruit does God expect from us?
6. We are now in the month of April: the month of Easter: when God sent His only Son, His Heir, to die. But in all the stories and Gospels and parables, how does this one parable differently strike you? What makes this particular parable special to you?
Pray & Part