The Chosen Season 5 Episode 3: Bible Study & Discussion Guide (Exploring The Chosen with Small Groups & Youth)
- Kevin Keating
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
Updated: 17 hours ago
Episode 3 of The Chosen Season 5 will pick up where Episode 2 left off: with Jesus confronting the High Priest, Caiaphas, and the other religious leaders in the outer courts after cleansing the Temple. The Bible Study and discussion questions below will help you discuss and explore Season 5, Episode 3 with your community. Want a little additional background? Also be sure to check out my Bible study and discussion guide for The Chosen Season 5 Episode 1, as well as my recap, review, and analysis of Season 5 Episode 1, Episode 2, Episode 3, Episode 4, Episode 5, as well as my discussion of Jesus’ confrontation with the religious leaders of Jerusalem in The Chosen & Scripture podcast series.
Before Watching The Chosen Season 5 Episode 3: Review Questions
As usual, I’d encourage you to do a quick review before launching into your discussion of The Chosen Season 5 Episode 3:
In Episode 1, what does Jesus see in his vision?
In Episode 2, why was Jesus cleansing the Temple? What were some of the problems that we were exposed to?
What have we learned about the motivations of the High Priest, Caiaphas, and some of the challenges that he faces?
What have we learned about some of the different religious factions in Jerusalem? How do they differ from one another? And why do they all still oppose Jesus?
Before Watching The Chosen Season 5 Episode 3: Bible Study & Discussion Questions
As I noted in my introduction, it looks like Episode 3 will focus on Jesus’ confrontations with the religious leaders inside the Temple. These events take up a pretty significant portion of the three synoptic Gospels (Matthew 21:23-23:39, Mark 11:27-12:44, Luke 20:1-47). For today’s discussion, we’ll focus on just a few of the exchanges between Jesus and the religious authorities:
And he began to speak to them in parables. “A man planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a pit for the winepress and built a tower, and leased it to tenants and went into another country. When the season came, he sent a servant to the tenants to get from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. And they took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. Again he sent to them another servant, and they struck him on the head and treated him shamefully. And he sent another, and him they killed. And so with many others: some they beat, and some they killed. He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ And they took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others. Have you not read this Scripture: “‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?”
And they were seeking to arrest him but feared the people, for they perceived that he had told the parable against them. So they left him and went away. And they sent to him some of the Pharisees and some of the Herodians, to trap him in his talk. (Mark 12:1-13, ESV)
After reading, you could point out:
It was common for rich land owners to lease out their vineyards to tenants and then regularly send servants to collect rent. But it’s unlikely that the tenants of the vineyard could have become heirs by killing the son of the owner. The tenants’ plan is meant to be ridiculous.
Jesus’ Parable of the Vineyard appears to be inspired by the Song of the Vineyard (Isaiah 5). Isaiah imagines a man clearing a fertile hill, planting lush vines, building fortifications, and then waiting for fruit. Instead of producing cultivated grapes, however, the vineyard produces disgusting wild grapes. In response, the owner of the vineyard warns that he will tear down the walls of his vineyard and let it be devoured. This is a picture of how God has cleared the fertile land of Canaan, planted his people in the midst of it, and protected it from enemies, only to be rewarded by poor spiritual fruit. In response, God removed his protection from Judah and allowed foreign Kingdoms to devour it.
Now ask your group:
In Jesus’ parable, who are the tenants of the vineyard and the servants that the owner sends to them? In what ways do we see God’s servants been abused, mistreated, and killed in the Old Testament?
Imagine sending servants to collect your due, only to have them be abused and even killed. How does God respond to this abuse? What does it show you about the nature of God?
What does the response of the tenants to the servants and the Son show us about human nature and how we treat God’s gifts?
How does the owner respond to the murder of his Son? How does this correspond to the event that Jesus foresaw in Episode 1?
Who is the stone and who are the builders that reject it?
The stone the builders reject becomes the cornerstone for a new Temple, the Church (e.g. 1 Peter 2). What does it mean for the church to be God’s new Temple?
How should we be personally encouraged by the idea that we are part of God’s new Temple?
How should we be challenged by the idea that we are part of God’s new Temple?
Why were Jesus’ opponents so enraged by this exchange?
After Watching The Chosen Season 5 Episode 3: Bible Study & Discussion Questions
After watching an episode of The Chosen, I typically ask people a couple basic questions:
What stuck out to you about the episode? What did you connect with the most?
Did you have any questions? Was anything unclear?
I plan on crafting a more specific set of discussion questions after I’ve had a chance to watch all of The Chosen Season 5. But if you’re discussing Episode 3 after watching it in theaters, I think these more open-ended questions should suffice for now.
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