26TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME: FROM MY YES TO HIS YES: THE TWO SONS AND THE SON
Both Philippians 2 and Matthew 21 reveal the distance between what appears on the outside and what is actually happening in the heart. The key may indeed be Paul's phrase in the second reading of this weekend: “Have in you the same attitude that is also in Christ Jesus.” Hence, the readings contrast attitudes that point to the nature of the human heart.
While the parable gives us two imperfect sons, Philippians gives us the true Son. The first son in the gospel says, “I will not,” but afterward changes his mind and goes. The second says, “Yes, sir,” but does not go. Then Paul presents Jesus, the Son whose interior disposition and exterior action are completely united. Jesus does not merely say yes to the Father; his whole life becomes the yes. The problem is not simply what the sons in the parable said; it is the heart behind the words.
Jesus asks, “Which of the two did his father’s will?” Importantly, Jesus does not ask, “Which son spoke more respectfully?” If we judged only by words, the second son would look better. He says the right thing: “Yes, sir.” The first son apparently sounds rebellious. But eventually their actions reveal their hearts. Any parent would understand there is a problem with both responses. You do not want to start with an objection that upsets your parents before consenting to obey them, and you do not want to give them a promise that yields negative results and crashes their expectations.
That is particularly powerful because Jesus addresses the chief priests and elders. Their religious language says yes to God, but Jesus challenges whether that verbal and institutional yes has become conversion. By contrast, tax collectors and prostitutes, people whose lives had seemingly said no, were responding to John and changing direction.
Recall this scenario in Luke 7:39-43: When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner.” Jesus answered him, “Simon, I have something to tell you.” “Tell me, teacher,” he said. “Two people owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he forgave the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more?” Simon replied, “I suppose the one who had the bigger debt forgiven.”
So perhaps the deeper contrast is not simply obedience versus disobedience, but: appearance versus conversion. This image brings the Pauline epistle beautifully into the picture: “Have in you the same attitude…” Paul is doing more than merely addressing behavior in this text. He does not simply say, “Do what Jesus did.” Rather, he says in effect, let the mind, disposition, or attitude of Christ become yours. Let Christ’s life inspire your hearts to be like his.
The extraordinary movement tells the story of this demand: Christ does not grasp. Christ empties himself. Christ takes the form of a servant. Christ humbles himself. Christ becomes obedient. Christ goes all the way to the cross. Paul describes this in the powerful Greek idea, “emptied himself” (ekenōsen). Christ does a kenosis, does not cling to status, privilege, control, or self-interest. Christ Jesus completely pours out himself.
This self-giving attitude exposes what is happening inside both sons and perhaps inside us. Therefore, the question becomes more unsettling than “Do I obey God?” Let’s put it this way: What kind of heart do I bring to God? The gospels convey similar messages about our inner dispositions: the parable of the grumbling laborers of last Sunday, the flashy cup that is filthy inside, Peter’s assessment of forgiveness. The heart is the center of every Christian action and drives our inner disposition.
It may not be wrong to say that there may be three sons in this Sunday's readings. There is the son who says no but eventually goes. There is the son who says yes but never goes. And then there is the big Son who says yes and becomes obedient even unto death. The first son represents the possibility of conversion. The second represents hypocrisy, the danger of religious appearance without conversion. And that third Son changes how we understand the other two. Christianity is not primarily about becoming people who have learned to say the correct religious things. It is about gradually acquiring the mind of Christ.
And this speaks powerfully to our relationship with God today. We can say “yes” to God sacramentally, liturgically, doctrinally, and verbally while protecting areas of life where God is not permitted to enter. Yes, in church, wicked to neighbor. Yes, in church, hateful at home. Yes, in church, racist in action. Yes, in church, mean at work. Yes, in church, abusive to spouses. Yes, in church, fake in politics. We say, “Thy will be done,” and then cling desperately to our own will. We say, “Forgive us as we forgive,” while refusing reconciliation. We say, “Lord, Lord,” while resisting the vineyard to which the Lord sends us.
But the first son gives enormous hope. A bad first response does not have to become the final response. Even though this response initially offends his father, something happens within him. Matthew says he changed his mind. His movement toward the vineyard begins with an interior change. God is not imprisoned by our yesterday. He desires that we repent and live. Someone may have spent years saying no to God and still become a disciple. Someone may have made terrible choices and still turn toward the vineyard. Conversely, someone may have spent years saying all the correct things about God while never surrendering the heart.
Christ is indeed using those two sons to expose the human heart—but not merely to condemn it. He is inviting us to see the need for a change of heart. And Philippians tells us what that changed heart should increasingly look like: less grasping, less self-protection, less appearance and pretense, less “my will,” and more of the mind of Christ. God is not looking merely for the “yes” on our lips; he desires the “yes” that eventually reaches the vineyard.
And Christ is the fullest revelation of that yes—the Son whose heart, words, and actions become one continuous act of surrender to the Father. That yes flows from a humble heart and Philippians compellingly shows the reward: “God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
Let’s embrace Christ’s heart by asking God to move us from saying yes → to becoming God’s yes.
Readings: 1st- Ezk. 18:25-28; 2nd- Phil. 2:1-11; Gospel- Matt. 21:28-32
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