1. One day, Jesus was teaching in the temple and telling the good news. So the chief priests, the teachers, and the nation's leaders
2. asked him, “What right do you have to do these things? Who gave you this authority?”
3. Jesus replied, “I want to ask you a question.
4. Who gave John the right to baptize? Was it God in heaven or merely some human being?”
5. They talked this over and said to each other, “We can't say that God gave John this right. Jesus will ask us why we didn't believe John.
6. And we can't say that it was merely some human who gave John the right to baptize. The crowd will stone us to death, because they think John was a prophet.”
7. So they told Jesus, “We don't know who gave John the right to baptize.”
8. Jesus replied, “Then I won't tell you who gave me the right to do what I do.”
9. Jesus told the people this story:A man once planted a vineyard and let it. Then he left the country for a long time.
10. When it was time to harvest the crop, he sent a servant to ask the tenants for his share of the grapes. But they beat up the servant and sent him away without anything.
11. So the owner sent another servant. The tenants also beat him up. They insulted him terribly and sent him away without a thing.
12. The owner sent a third servant. He was also beaten terribly and thrown out of the vineyard.
13. The owner then said to himself, “What am I going to do? I know what. I'll send my son, the one I love so much. They will surely respect him!”
14. When the tenants saw the owner's son, they said to one another, “Some day he will own the vineyard. Let's kill him! Then we can have it all for ourselves.”
15. So they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.Jesus asked, “What do you think the owner of the vineyard will do?