Matthew 21: 23-32
Offered to the First Presbyterian Church of Franklin, NJ on September 27, 2026
Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA
OK. So right at the beginning of today’s gospel reading, the chief priests and elders of the people charge right up to Jesus and demand to know of him “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?”
Let’s stop for a moment right here. If you haven’t been following Matthew’s Gospel these past weeks, let’s stop to refocus our memories it.
This portion of Matthew’s Gospel is telling about the day after Jesus had entered Jerusalem in triumph. That is the day after what we call Palm Sunday. Jesus has entered the city to a cheering crowd who were yelling aloud, “Hosanna to the son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”
Now let’s look carefully at what that means.
“Hosanna” translates to “save us”.
Calling Jesus, “the son of David” is assigning to him not only a kingly title but a Messianic title, as well. “Hosanna, to the son of David” The people were calling Jesus as the Messiah to assume his rightful place as heir to the house of David, and as God’s Messiah raise an army and free the people from Roman subjectivity. They were praising Jesus as a military king entering the city on the fold of a donkey to liberate it from Roman domination.
Matthew says that when Jesus entered the city, it was thrown into turmoil.
That was the first thing that precedes today’s Gospel. The next was that Jesus entered the Temple and in a fit of rage overthrows the tables of the money changers and the vendors selling animals approved for sacrifice.
Jesus drove them out of the Temple yelling, “My house shall be called a house of prayer; but you make it a den of robbers.” “My house” referring to his Father’s house. Jesus is outraged that the chief priests and elders have turned it into a business selling franchises to vendors exchanging money and selling sacrificial animals. These very vulgar and offensive activities were taking place within the walls of the Temple. Jesus rightly defended the sanctity of God’s holy and sacred house in the most violent display of his ministry.
And then once he had driven away all of that inequity and dishonesty, once he had cleared away the defilement of his Father’s house, he sat down teaching the people and curing the blind and the lame.
Matthew tells us the chief priests and the scribes watched him in amazement. Children were gathering around Jesus praising him saying, “Hosanna to the son of David.” They were stunned by what was happening. They were besides themselves unsure of what they should or could do about Jesus.
At the end of the day, Jesus left the city, went out to the village of Bethany and spent the night there.
So now in today’s passage, he returns to the city from Bethany and enters the Temple. And as we have heard today, the elders of the people and the chief priests immediately go up to him to demand to know “By what authority are you doing these things, and … and who gave you this authority?”
By what authority do you enter the city as a king on the folds of a donkey allowing the crowds to call you the son of David, by what authority do you overthrow the tables of the money changers and vendors who [by the way] we [the authorities of the Temple] have approved of, and by authority do you take over the Temple and sit here teaching and curing people just days before the Passover disrupting all of the atonement sacrifices of the people that must be made?
This is the thing. The chief priests, the Pharisees and Sadducees and the elders of the people, were the controlling authorities in the Temple and Jerusalem but … but only as long as they maintained the peace. The Romans allowed their religious festivals and these enormous gatherings of the people in the city only if these gatherings remained peaceful. If things got out of hand, if there were demonstrations like Jesus’ Palm Sunday entry into the city; if there unruly confrontations like the one Jesus caused in the Temple, then the Roman garrison would enter the city and take control. That meant a military confrontation. The chief priests, the Pharisees and the elders of the people had a lot at stake and a lot to lose.
Do you get a picture of the dynamic that is at play here?
But this is only half of the story. Jesus has a lot at stake here, too. He could answer their questions. He could make an outright claim that he was God’s Anointed One. He could have done that and claimed all the authority he needed as the son of David and rightful king of Israel. He could have done that. But that would have sent God’s plan for salvation spiraling off in the wrong direction.
If he had made those claims of authority one of two things might happen. Either the people would have rushed to crown him as their earthly king and begun an uprising against the Roman authority or the chief priests and elders would have arrested him immediately putting the Cross ahead of God’s schedule. Jesus still needed more time with his disciples and still more quiet time with God to prepare for what was to come.
You see either way, Jesus couldn’t allow either of these possibilities to happen. He couldn’t because the timing was not yet right. He was not the Messiah that the people wanted him to be, and he still needed time to get that idea across, especially to his disciples. God’s plan had been put into motion, but Jesus could not allow it to be rushed. Jesus was not ready. God’s plan was not supposed to roll out in that way.
So, Jesus turns the tables on the chief priests and elders yet again. He says to them, “I will ask you one question, if you tell me the answer, then I will tell you by what authority I do these things.” OK. That seems fair. We answer a question and then we get him to incriminate himself and then we have him arrested for inciting a rebellion. It seems simple enough. What could go wrong?
Here is Jesus’ question, “Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?”
Oh, no! What? How do they answer that question? They argue between themselves. “If we say that it was from heaven, then he will ask why did you not believe him? If we say from human origin, then the crowds will attack us for they considered John a great prophet.” Their conclusion – the safe answer, they thought, “We do not know.”
Jesus’ answer, perhaps with sadness in his eyes because these priests and elders were refusing to acknowledge John’s authenticity and his message to repent and make straight the way of the Lord.
Jesus’ answer, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.”
Now the confrontation could have ended there but Jesus goes one step further to expose their hypocrisy. Jesus poses to them this question. And remember everyone is watching – the disciples and the people.
“What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’ ‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go.”
“Which of the two did the father’s will?”
“The first,” they answered.
Jesus said to them, (now comes the hammer) “Truly I tell you, these tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but these tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.”
Could you imagine their outrage now? Jesus has just pronounced to these holier than thou elders, Pharisees, and chief priests who are all dressed in the sacred robes that denoted their rank and authority that those hated tax collectors, and the defiled prostitutes would enter the kingdom of God ahead of them.
Why? Because despite of their sinful lives and livelihood these two highly disrespected and disreputable People of the Land had heard John’s message and repented and turned back to God. But you, the highly respected People of the Law, had heard John’s message and choose not to believe.
We need to also place this parable of the two sons alongside that of the wicked tenants. You recall the one where the tenants of the vineyard refused to pay the rents due the landlord and when he sent his son to collect them, they beat and killed him. They refused to acknowledge the Lordship of the vineyard owner. This frames Jesus’ view of how these chief priests and elders had corrupted their roles as the religious leaders of Israel. They were refusing to acknowledge the voice of God spoken to them by John and by Jesus.
So right here, Jesus makes it clear who of God’s lost sheep the Good Shepherd is called to seek out and return to the God’s fold. These lost ones (the tax collectors and prostitutes) have heard the voice of their Shepherd and have returned to the safety of his care. These are the lost sheep of God’s fold that he had been sent to rescue and provide salvation. That was John’s message and you rejected it. You are refusing to hear the voice of God speaking to you. You are rejecting me. You are rejecting God’s Kingdom.
Holy (expletive deleted)!
If the elders and chief priests weren’t angry before, they sure were now. For all their sanctimonious displays, for all their rituals and superficial sacrifices, for all the smoke and mirrors that they use to bamboozle the people, Jesus sees right through them and berates them placing the tax collectors and prostitutes before them at the gates of God’s Kingdom.
Now I said before that Jesus could not allow God’s plan to be rushed. Well, I think that now he has lit a match to a powder keg igniting the events that would lead to the Cross just two days hence.
We can see two lessons from this encounter that Jesus has with the elders and priests.
The first is that there is a difference between Words and Actions. In the parable, the first son symbolizes the tax collectors and prostitutes who had reject God’s word initially but who ultimately with their actions repented and returned to hear the voice of God. The second son represents the religious leaders of Israel who profess their obedience, but who failed to act it out in their lives. Jesus clearly says that obedience is measured by actions not professions.
The second lesson is that repentant sinners will enter the Kingdom of God before the religious elite who made only showy displays of superficial obedience. Those sinners believed John’s message of repentance and that leads to righteousness. The religious leaders saw and heard John’s message of repentance but refused to believe it. That led to a denial of God’s Word and a sin of a more heinous nature.
There you have it. The lines were drawn. Not just between Jesus and the religious leaders but between those whose actions reveal their true hearts and those who prefer a showy exterior that conceals a heart both cold and hardened refusing to hear the voice of God.
My friends, this is the question that Jesus asks of you. Where is your heart?
When the Father asks you to go, do you say, “I will go”, but then blow God off thinking no one sees.
Or do you hear the voice of the Shepherd calling you and repent your sinfulness and submit to the will of the Father.
My friends, your actions matter. The faith in your hearts must be seen through your actions. Profession is one thing. Faith in action is what makes God’s righteousness alive in the world. That is the work in the vineyard that we are called to do.
