No business can survive if it always makes a loss. If employees steal the assets and are violent to their boss's agents, the company is in meltdown.  Jesus told such a story - but with an agricultural rather than city flavour – in Mark 12:1-12.   An Investor creates a vineyard, hires tenant farmers to look after the business and produce a profit.  When the Owner sent His agents to check that the vineyard is being well managed, and bring back samples of the crop, the tenants violently got rid of them.  Clearly the situation is untenable, and any right-hearing listener would think, 'Surely the Owner must punish these wicked men!'  

Jesus used this parable to describe Israel, whose stewardship of God's land and people had been despicable.  Most of the 40 kings after David had gone 'off-message', and God's prophets (who delivered His message to bring the kings and nation back to honouring the covenant) had been abused or eliminated.  What hope could there possibly be for the nation?  The Abrahamic covenant, promising the land to his descendants and blessing for the nations (Genesis 12:1-3), had been repeatedly violated.  So what hope is there for anybody in the world?  

Poignantly, Jesus describes the prophets' ill-treatment: seized, beaten, struck on the head, treated shamefully, killed.  Those words mirror the prophecy of Christ's death in Isaiah 53:1-6 accurately portraying what would happen to Him during the week after He spoke those words.  It is also a window into the future persecution of the church (John 15:20-21).  The word 'many' in "He sent many others; some of them they beat, others they killed", speaks of God giving many opportunities to repent and of the implacable hatred of godless power-holders (although they claimed to be religious) against all who presented truth from God.  Those who campaigned for Jesus to be killed knew He was talking about them (Mark 12:12).  But even though Jesus put the spotlight of shame onto them, they were trapped by evil (Proverbs 11:6) and refused to repent ... like Judas Iscariot.  

Evil, welcomed and harboured, breeds like a pathogenic virus.  It takes over the soul of its host to spread its effect like Judas who became incapable of stopping his betrayal of Jesus.  The amazing truth of the gospel is that God even uses people's hatred to show His love and achieve His purposes.  He does not dominate His kingdom by force but woos His citizens by sacrificial love.  It is God's chosen method to win the hearts of sinners and convert them into saints.  If you know that love, what a privilege!  If you do not ... it would be foolish not to respond with repentance and submission to God who loves you personally and has given you another opportunity (www.crosscheck.org.uk).