Gospel of Luke

Chapter Twenty

Day 20 of 24
At the end of Luke 19, Jesus parked his donkey, entered the temple in Jerusalem and began to cast out folks who were buying and selling things there. He called them thieves and robbers who were defiling the house of the Lord.
Jesus took no prisoners that day but His bold actions continued to turn the religious leaders against Him. They openly questioned His authority. Daily, they attempted to catch Jesus saying one little thing or the other so that they might trip Him and trap Him and take Him down. Soon, they would see to it that Jesus was lifted up...to die.
Instead of answering their questions, Jesus allowed them to become characters in His parable of the day. This parable of the vineyard so plainly exposed the Pharisees that even they admitted to each other that Jesus had spoken these words specifically with them in mind (see Luke 20:19).
God designed a beautiful world and placed man there to care for it and nurture it. Man went his own way. God sent Noah and a flood and began again. God called Abraham to become the father of the chosen nation. He sent Moses and the Law to show them how to live and worship. He gave them kings and prophets to lead them and inform them of His truths. Over and over again, man continued to go his own way.
Finally, in a certain prophecy of His own impending death on the cross, Jesus shows them that even The Son of the Father will be rejected and killed. In the process of that announcement, Jesus also declared Himself to be the fulfillment of the prophecy in Psalm 118. He will be the rejected stone, but He will be made the Chief Cornerstone.
This declaration of His Messiah-ship angered the religious leaders beyond recovery. They wanted to lay hands on Jesus and arrest Him but recognized His popularity with all the people. They watched Jesus, keeping Him under constant surveillance. They hounded Him with spies that would follow His every movement and monitor His every spoken word and message.
They used political intrigue as well as religious interrogation. Jesus matched them word for word, action for action, question for question. What they never understood was the fact that Jesus knew them from the inside out. He knew their motives. He knew their hearts. In His own way, Jesus challenged them in order to call them to repentance.
Jesus even loved Pharisees but the Pharisees were not interested in His love or in their own repentance.