Mark 12:7-12

Mark 12:7-12  “But the tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir.  Come, let’s kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’  So they took him and killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard.  “What then will the owner of the vineyard do?  He will come and kill those tenants and give the vineyard to others.  Haven’t you read this scripture: “‘The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?”  Then they 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. 

Jesus is the capstone in every Christian's life.  We cannot build on anything else and have real life.  Our personal temples that the Holy Spirit inhabits are built on faith in Jesus Christ, on his works, his death and resurrection.  In the earlier parable about the farmers and the landowner, we see them kill the son of the landowner, so that they might gain ownership to the land.  If we kill Jesus in our "land," in our lives, and try to live our lives on Earth without him, our lives will be considered as failures by God because Christ came to redeem the land and to make it righteous or acceptable to God.  Many people try to build their lives on good works, on being a good person.  They claim that this will give them leverage in the kingdom of God, that God will have to accept them if they are good, but the scriptures clearly say, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.  (John 3:16)  Also, And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.  He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.  I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.  (1 John 5:11-13)  

Without Christ owning our "land" or without him being the chief cornerstone of our temple, we are without real life, eternal life.  From the beginning of time, man has fought over land.  The Old Testament is full of these conflicts.  The Middle East's history consists of violence over land.  But the true land that the New Testament proclaims is the land that each one of us possesses in our being, which is our souls.  This land is valuable: this land will never cease to bear fruit if it is in the hands of the Lord.  The land that kings and rulers have fought over for thousands of years will cease, will be destroyed by fire.  But the domain of the heart will never cease.  Who will be the Lord of your land?  Who will provide sustenance to it so that it will always flower and bloom?  That is the question of salvation.  

If you are only staking out territory here on Earth, if your concerns rest entirely with this land, your life will end in disappointment, for someday you will have to leave this world and everything in it behind.  Someday, someone else will inherit your land, your house, your possessions.  Some day much of what you struggled for will be given away, junked, or sold in some second-hand or antique store.  Other people will pick up your possession and evaluate whether it is worth having or purchasing.  But if your belief is in the Lord Jesus Christ, your land, your valuable possessions will always be yours.  Your treasures will have been packed up and sent before you to heaven.  “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.  But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.  (Matthew 6:19-20)  Your children and children's children will see you in the throne room with God himself, for you will be as He is, eternal.  The stake is high: eternal life with God, or his total absence, known as hell.  Life passes quickly here, like a wisp of smoke, but decisions here are eternal.  We can struggle over land or possessions here on Earth or we can place our trust in God through faith in Jesus Christ.  The decision is ours.