A Sermon for the Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost
The Rev. Pat Gillespie

Isaiah 5:1-7
Psalm 80
Philippians 3:14-21
Matthew 21:33-43

It sucks to be an angel.

So, you wonder, what can the preacher be talking about? There aren't any angels in these readings.

Well, not really. But "angel" means "messenger" and we certainly have some of those, even if they are called "slaves" rather than "angels." And for the messengers in our gospel reading it looks pretty bad – thrown out, beaten, even killed.

But of course the story is not about the messengers. In the church, we are supposed to be the tenants – those hard working guys the messengers came to collect from.

It's a hard place to be, to have done all that work and have strangers come and try to take it away. A vineyard was then, is now, and will always be great deal of work. Cultivated grapevines must be carefully pruned and trained to grow in a position that makes the grapes accessible to the people who hope to gather them. Wild grapes, on the other hand, are very difficult to harvest. Pests of all sorts, from the little foxes of the Song of Solomon to the big raccoons of central Minnesota, find the carefully cultivated vines delicious, and so they must be protected. It's a bit easier these days because the owner of a vineyard can invest in nifty plastic plant protectors. Still, then and now, a vineyard demands extensive preparation and constant vigilance.

Having someone come along and take the fruits of your labor is a real ripoff.

It feels kind of like having done a successful annual stewardship drive to balance the budget. Everybody works really hard on it. And then we get the note that our diocesan fair share was increased. Hey, this is our church, not theirs! OK, sure, let's get rid of that messenger fast. Crumple up that fair share note and toss it.

This is our vineyard. It's our accomplishment. Let's kill the heir, who never does any work anyway.

But God keeps sending these messengers, these angels, often in the most unexpected disguises. And that's what I'm afraid of. I'm afraid that we here tonight, those of us who try to live in or with the GLBT community, are not the tenants in the story, but the messengers.

We are the ones who are getting beaten up and thrown out by the church. That's not good news. It's certainly not good. It's not even news for most of us. It sucks to be an angel.

But it just may be that we are the ones sent to collect God's "fair share" from the church.. Just what might that fair share be? Isaiah tells us what God expects as the fruit of God's vineyard: God's expected fair share is justice and righteousness.

What GLBT Christians -- and those who stand with us -- are called by God to do at a certain point in our journey, when we are strong enough, is to speak the truth in love. We are asked to go to the church, the tenants of God's vineyard, and ask for what is due – justice and righteousness.

We are often beaten and thrown out. This is the prophet's path following God's Word. And it is our salvation and the salvation of the church. For if the church does not learn to treat others with fairness and love, then the church, including us, risks losing everything. But if the church does give thanks to the owner of all by offering their "fair share" of justice and righteousness, chances are pretty good that all of us will be blessed.

This story about the vineyard is, after all, a love song.

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