The Gospel for this Sunday is the Parable of the Two Sons, Matthew 21:28–32. Parables have a way of awakening us to unacknowledged aspects of our identity. This parable brilliantly exposes the tensions of human life between saying and doing, appearance and reality, intention and realization.

Jesus is in conflict with some of the religious leaders after cleansing the temple. They questioned his authority, and Jesus has challenged them concerning the authority of John the Baptist. Thus, this parable starts with an arresting question that provides space for freedom of response but demands an answer: “What do you think?”

There are two sons. The first says he will not go to the vineyard to work, but later changes his mind and goes. The second says he will go, but does not. “Which of the two did the will of his father?”

Our greatest enemy is our illusion about ourselves, and we are blessed when we are faced with reality so that we can repent and change. The religious leaders recognize the right answer and, in doing so, bring judgment upon themselves.

They are caught, and they know it. Rather than repent like the tax collectors and prostitutes, they seek to arrest Jesus. At any moment, they could have repented. An easy and correct application for us is to examine our own lives and see where pride, envy, comparison, jealousy, laziness, etc., have blocked us.

But I want to look at the issue of repentance, a central theme of this parable. It means to turn around, like the first son who initially refused but later went to the vineyard. There is a word that captures this moment of sorrow: compunction—sorrow for sin.

It is a grace, and often that grace is accompanied by tears. We can be embarrassed by our sin or wish we had never done it. But sorrow is personal. God brought water out of a rock, so pierce my heart that I might weep for my sins. The weeping is not one of embarrassment, self-condemnation, or dwelling on how bad I am, but of being overwhelmed by God’s mercy.

The Lord says, “I am offering you life and mercy.” This is the Lord allowing us to see our sins through the eyes of Jesus. The gift of tears is not simply that we are forgiven, but that we are changed and transformed.

Compunction is a way of describing what takes place. The word carries the sense of being pierced or punctured—like piercing a boil and getting it all out. We weep because we are overwhelmed by mercy. This lifelong process humbles us in such a way that it affects how we look at ourselves, the Lord, and others.

Questions to consider:

• Do you weep for your sins, or are you just embarrassed that you got caught?

• How can you experience His mercy in a way that transforms you?

• Which son’s story is most like your own?

• What are some biblical examples? Consider King David in Psalms 6 and 51 after his sin with Bathsheba; the penitent woman in Luke 7; Peter’s denial in Matthew 26; Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, in Jeremiah 9:1; and Nehemiah weeping after hearing that the walls of Jerusalem were broken down and the people were in distress.

• What about the memory of death—meditating on the brevity of life as a way to cut through worldly distractions and trivial anxieties?

There is so much more to say about this spiritual reality and the transformation it brings. We’ll explore it further this Sunday.

Come and See,

+Philip