Setting: Passion week, in the Temple, immediately after the chief priests and elders challenge Jesus, "By what authority are you doing these things?", and he answers with the counter-question about John's baptism (Matthew 21:23-27). This is the first of three "vineyard" judgment parables aimed at the leaders: Two Sons → [Wicked Husbandmen] → Wedding Feast (Matthew 22:1-14). Citation: Matthew 21:28-32
The parable
"A man had two sons, and he came to the first, and said, 'Son, go work today in my vineyard.' He answered, 'I will not,' but afterward he changed his mind, and went. He came to the second, and said the same thing. He answered, 'I'm going, sir,' but he didn't go" (vv.28-30).
Jesus asks: "Which of the two did the will of his father?" They say, "The first." Then: "Most certainly I tell you that the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering into God's Kingdom before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you didn't believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him. When you saw it, you didn't even repent afterward, that you might believe him" (vv.31-32).
The point: deeds over declarations
The two sons embody two responses to God's call:
- The first son, an open "No" that turns into obedience: the tax collectors and prostitutes, society's notorious sinners, who refused the religious life but repented at John's preaching.
- The second son, a polite "Yes, sir" with no follow-through: the chief priests and elders, who professed devotion to God yet rejected John and Jesus.
What counts before the Father is "the will of the father" actually done, not the verbal answer. By the leaders' own verdict ("The first") they condemn themselves.
The parable is also a vindication of John the Baptist (v.32): the dividing-line was how each group responded to John's "way of righteousness." The leaders' refusal to repent "even afterward," after watching sinners transformed, is the sharper indictment.
A textual note
The manuscript tradition varies on the order of the sons (and in one strand, on which answer Jesus commends), producing three known forms. In every form the teaching is the same: the son who does the father's will, however he first answered, is the obedient one. The variant is noted here without letting it alter the point.
Theological framing (multiple views)
Mainstream reading, sincerity proven in action versus empty profession; repentance that issues in obedience is what God seeks (cf. Matthew 7:21, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven").
Salvation-history reading, the first son = outsiders/sinners (and, by extension in early Christian reading, the Gentiles) who come in; the second son = the religious establishment that says yes but stays out.
Reformation emphasis, highlights repentance and faith (responding to John, then Jesus) as the hinge, not religious status or words.
All readings agree: the surprising, scandalous claim is that confessed sinners who repent precede self-assured insiders into the Kingdom.