reduces you
from the highest to the lowest rank of disciples, and from the first to
the last in the final award of those who serve the Lord.

In one of its aspects the lesson of this parable is parallel with that
which is taught by the experience of the penitent thief. Both greatly
magnify the patience and long-suffering of God: they record and
proclaim, each in its own way, that there is hope at the eleventh hour.
But in such a case, a perverse carnal mind frequently turns the grace of
God into lasciviousness. Because the mercy of our Redeemer is stretched
to the furthest verge of safety to leave room for the outcast to enter,
when on the darkening evening of the day of grace he flees at last from
the wrath to come; souls cleaving to the dust, take the liberty of
stretching their expectations a little further than Christ stretched his
offer, and find the door shut, when they come too late. Ah, when the
tender Saviour of sinners, by his parable, and the experience of the
thief, gives you encouragement to come, although you are late; beware
lest you take from his words wrested an encouragement to be late in
coming.

GROUP--THE TWO SONS, THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN, AND THE MARRIAGE OF THE
KING'S SON.

MATT. xxi. 28; xxii. 14

The natural history of a parable is like the (probable) natural history
of a pearl. Something alien and irritating has alighted upon life, and
forthwith a covering of pure and precious matter is thrown over it.
After this manner, indeed, as we have already noted, a greater than the
parable came. In this way redemption began, and grew. Sin entered Eden
and fastened upon that image of God which had appeared on earth in the
person of primeval man; forthwith holy promises from heaven began to
cluster round the sin-spot. As age succeeded age these promises
distilled like dew and crystallized around the original nucleus, until
redemption was completed in the sacrifice of Christ and the ministry of
the Spirit: that glorious gospel on which we now fondly look, gathered
round the fall. The sin of man, though not the cause of God's salvation,
became its occasion and determined its form.

The particular lessons which Jesus taught in the course of his ministry,
followed in this respect the analogy of his redeeming work as a whole;
in most cases his instructions were called forth and fashioned by hard,
bold outstanding sins. Some of the brightest jewels which shine in the
life of Christ are the pure pear