God Sent His Son and We Killed Him

It recalls the language of Genesis 22:2 when God says to Abraham, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love.” It draws us to that most wonderful verse in the Bible, John 3:16. It even echoes that magnificent messianic prophecy, Isaiah 9:6-7:

Take note of this last line. We will hear its echo at the end of our text.

As James Edwards notes, there are several significant differences between the mission of the servants who go first and the son who follows:

If verses 1-5 convey the hope of God for His people, verse 6 conveys the faithful love of God for His people. The Father sent His Son as an act of grace.

In the parable, seeing the son may have led the tenants to wrongly conclude that the landowner was dead. They surmised that if they assassinate the son, then they could claim his property as their own. The phrase “Come, let’s kill him” is used by Joseph’s brothers in Genesis 37:20.

I appreciate David Garland’s insight:

Three days later we would see all of this unfold in what the religious leaders of Israel did to God’s Son. Throwing the landlord’s son out may allude to Jesus’ crucifixion outside the city walls. They would murder Him, an astonishing offense. In God’s sending His Son we are reminded of Christmas, the incarnation, the gift of God, and His amazing love. In the killing of the Son, we are reminded of Easter, the crucifixion, the grace of God, and His amazing sacrifice. John 1:11 rings in our ears: “He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him.”

Charles Spurgeon said, “If you reject Him, He answers you with tears. If you wound Him, He bleeds out cleansing. If you kill Him, He dies to redeem. If you bury Him, He rises again to bring us resurrection. Jesus is love manifest.” But he then adds:

To reject the Son is to reject the One who sent Him. It is nothing less than an act of spiritual insanity.

Mark 12:9-12

Romans 11:22 says, “Note then the kindness and the severity of God.” To slight and reject the Son is to invite the “wrath of the Lamb” into your life (Rev 6:16). Again the great London preacher Charles Spurgeon says it so well:

271The One rejected and murdered will be vindicated, and how we now respond to this radical change of events could not be more important.

Jesus provides the answer to His parable, one the religious leaders would be forced to concede. In the process they condemned themselves, and they condemn us as well. The owner will destroy those who refuse his son!

Historically, God judged Israel for their rejection of His Son. In ad 70 Jerusalem was destroyed, and the nation was brought to ruins. Today that same judgment falls on all who have “trampled on the Son of God, regarded as profane the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and insulted the Spirit of grace” (Heb 10:29). It is indeed “a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb 10:31).

Jesus quotes from Psalm 118:22-23, changing the metaphor to a building. It is the same psalm shouted by the people at His triumphal entry. It is clearly messianic. He knows who He is and why He has come!

The stone rejected would become a symbol for the Messiah and an explanation for how the Jewish people rejected Jesus (Luke 20:17; Acts 4:11; Rom 9:33; 1 Pet 2:6-8). They cast the stone aside as worthless. God, however, in a marvelous reversal, takes what man rejects and makes it the cornerstone (lit. “the head of the corner”), the stone most important to the whole structure, ensuring its stability and symmetry. It refers to the capstone atop a column, keystone in an arch, or cornerstone of a foundation.

The rejection, humiliation, and crucifixion of Jesus is an apparent tragedy, but God will use it all for a greater purpose that can only be described as, “This came from the Lord and is wonderful in our eyes.”

Sadly, the religious leaders are blind to all of this. Knowing He told the parable against them, they were conniving to seize Him. They move ahead with their plan to murder the Son sent by God. Like the demons who recognize Jesus as a threat to their very existence (Mark 1:24), they refuse to submit to His lordship and plot how they might destroy Him. Mark 12:12 is a disappointing summation of their response: “Because they knew He had said this parable against them, they were looking for a way to arrest Him, but they were afraid of the crowd. So they left Him and went away.” As Paul272 would later explain, all of this is foolishness and a stumbling block to them; for us, however, it is the power of God unto salvation (1 Cor 1:18-25).

Calvin was right: “Whatever may be the contrivances of men, God has at the same time declared, that in setting up the kingdom of Christ, His power will be victorious” (Calvin’s Commentaries, 17:34). God will win even when, for a fleeting moment, it seems He has lost. An empty tomb proves it is so. Redemptive history reaches a glorious climactic victory in this beloved Son, this rejected stone.

In The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis, Queen Lucy says to Lord Digory, “In our world too, a stable once had something inside it that was bigger than our whole world” (Lewis, The Last Battle, 161). To this we might add, “In our world there was also a cross, and hanging on it was someone greater and more wonderful than our whole world.” It was the Lord’s doing. And it is marvelous in our eyes!