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What Matt. 21:23-32 Teaches About Integrity In An Election

What Matt. 21:23-32 Teaches About Integrity In An Election

Last updated on: September 24, 2026 at 7:43 am by Leah D. Schade

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What Matt. 21:23-32 Teaches About Integrity In An Election 2026-09-24T07:43:46-04:00 Leah D. Schade

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Jesus’s parable in Matt. 21:23-32 teaches Christians to test candidates in an election by their actions, not empty promises. A Sept. 27 lectionary reflection on integrity and leadership.

Guidance for Christian discernment in election

In Matt. 21:23-32, Jesus has an important teaching for Christians voting on candidates in an election. Photo by Sora Shimazaki on Pexels

The Political Calculation

You’ve seen this happen when someone asks a politician a direct question. Instead of answering, they calculate. You can almost see their mental gears turning, and it’s a strange thing to watch.

If I say this, they’ll say that. If I say that, this group gets angry. What will play well to my base? What can I get away with saying?

We recognize this internal calculation with politicians. But we don’t expect to see it from religious leaders.

Yet that’s exactly what happens in Matthew 21:23-32, the gospel appointed in the Revised Common Lectionary for Sept. 27, 2026. That Sunday will mark 37 days until the midterm election on Nov. 3. So, this is a chance to think critically about what Jesus’s teachings mean for Christians who will soon be voting.

I recently worked with a group of clergy in western Pennsylvania using a “dialogical lens” on this passage. We noted that Jesus’s exchange with religious leaders and his parable about integrity can teach us important lessons during an election. Let’s dig in.

The Authority Trap

In this scene, Jesus has just entered the temple after the palm processional into Jerusalem. He’s already overturned the moneychangers’ tables, disrupting the corrupt economic system that feeds on people’s faith and fear. So, everyone is on edge, and the religious leaders are incensed.

The chief priests and elders confront him: “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?” It seems to be a legit question on its face. But Jesus is onto them. He knows that if he claims divine authority directly, they’ll accuse him of blasphemy. So he evades the trap they’re setting by answering with his own question.

“Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?”

Um . . . (cue the huddle and frantic whispers).

“If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say to us, ‘Why, then, did you not believe him?’ But if we say, ‘Of human origin,’ we are afraid of the crowd, for all regard John as a prophet.”

Matthew shows us their thinking, in real time, as they confer among themselves like a room full of political strategists.

These are not faithful leaders who are asking, “What is true?” They want to figure out, “What can we get away with saying?” They are checking the polls, testing “likes” on social media, running the algorithms, and hedging their bets.

They know that Jesus has maneuvered them into a double bind precisely because their operating question was never about truth or integrity, but a means to an end. They wanted a gotcha moment. But Jesus beat them at their own game. When they realized they couldn’t win on the chessboard of audience management, they conceded: “We do not know.”

Holding a Mirror Up to Our Election Season

Five weeks before the election, this exchange starts to look uncomfortably familiar.

These religious leaders behave exactly like politicians. They base their words on anticipated reactions, not deeply held values and convictions. The crowd likely hit their “thumbs down” emojis as they watched this exchange.

But Jesus doesn’t let the checkmate become the point. He turns it into a teachable moment for them – and for us—by telling a parable.

Say What You Mean, Mean What You Say

A father asks his first son to go work in the vineyard. The son says, “I will not” — but then changes his mind and goes anyway. The father asks the second son the same thing. That son says, “I go, sir” — but doesn’t go.

Jesus asks the religious leaders which son did the father’s will, and even they can see the obvious answer. It was the first one, whose actions – not his words – aligned with what was asked of him. In the end, he did the right thing.

Then comes the line that must have made everyone – the crowd, the disciples, and the religious leaders — gasp in astonishment.

“Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you.”

Ahead of You, Not Instead of You

Note, Jesus does not say instead of you — he says ahead of you.

Jesus isn’t standing at the airline ticket counter calling up first class and telling everyone else they’re not getting on the plane. No – everyone gets on the plane. But he’s calling up Group 9 first, the ones relegated to the back of the plane whose seats are next to the toilets.

This is what makes the religious elite so angry. It’s not that they aren’t allowed to come into God’s Kingdom but that they don’t get to be first in line. They don’t get to exercise their privilege, rely on their wealth, or muscle their way to the front of the gate.

The people the religious establishment had written off as permanently disqualified, without any way back into respectability, are the ones who actually changed course when John called them to repentance. Meanwhile, the people who talked the most about righteousness, who occupied the seats of religious authority, delayed and hedged.

Careful, Your Hypocrisy is Showing

There’s a deeper layer here worth naming plainly: hypocrisy.

The religious leaders confronting Jesus are themselves entangled with the Roman occupation. They are comfortable colluding with the imperial power, yet they have the audacity to condemn tax collectors for collaborating with Rome from a less respectable seat. The religious elite get to look righteous only because they assign the role of villain to someone else.

The powerful feel clean and righteous because they have turned the tax collectors and the women Matthew calls “prostitutes” into convenient scapegoats. But when Jesus stands up for them and alongside them, he calls out the double standard of the leaders. That’s when the mask of respectability peels away.

Those with the most power to judge are often the ones most invested in never being examined themselves. Calling out that double standard is not a side note to this text — it’s key to understanding the underlying power dynamics that are coming to a head.

Because here’s the thing. Jesus isn’t interested in supporting structures of inequality. He’s interested in revealing who is telling the truth with their actions.

Implications for Elections

That is why this text matters for Christians voting in this election. We are being flooded with promises – big talk from the sons in the parable who make promises they never intend to keep. One of the biggest promises is of a $5,000 payment to American households, floated as a reward tied to how the midterm elections turn out politically. The intention of that promise is exactly what Jesus warns us about in this text.

Big talk, offered to a crowd whose approval is being courted and detached from any demonstrated pattern of follow-through, is the manipulative lie Jesus teaches us to recognize. Christians should call this out and reject candidates and leaders who use these tactics.

This is not a call to tell people whom to vote for. It’s a call to change what we’re listening for.

Walk the Talk, Don’t Just Talk the Walk

Jesus is remarkably uninterested in what people say they will do. Instead he cares about whether they actually do it. That is a fair test to apply to everyone asking for our trust this fall — candidates, incumbents, and institutions.

This applies to religious leaders and churches as well. Because scripture doesn’t let clergy and congregations off the hook here. If anything, the text raises the bar for those of us with authority and a platform. Jesus’s parable and warning are for people who claim to speak for God but act otherwise, especially those who accuse others of the very things they themselves are doing. We need to identify these tricks and turn away from boisterous, empty rhetoric. Integrity is not optional for leadership; it is the whole test of it.

Any Good News?

So, is there any good news in this text? Definitely!

The good news is that the tax collectors and the prostitutes – and those who are targeted by political and religious elites today – are not condemned to permanent exclusion. Jesus flips the script: integrity and acts of righteousness matter more than the categories powerful people use to rank everyone else. He does not ration out access to God’s kingdom according to wealth, status, or the loudest, most outrageous talk.

Instead, Jesus stands at the ticket counter and announces that the line does not begin with those who have the most power. It forms behind the ones who actually do the will of God. That is genuinely good news for people who have been told, by religious and political leaders alike, that they will always be last. Or that they can’t even get on the plane.

If This Doesn’t Sound Like Good News to You, Check Yourself

Admittedly, this will unsettle those of us who are used to going first. We may have to sit with that discomfort as we board the plane in Group 9, heading for the cramped seats next to the toilets. And we will have to learn what this discomfort is teaching us.

So here are some questions worth asking this next month, whether you’re in the pulpit this election season or in the pew.

Election Questions for Christians

When have we said yes but did not follow through?

When have we said no but changed our minds and did the right thing in the end?

What have we condemned in others that is the exact thing for which we should be repenting ourselves?

Whose actions — not whose promises — actually look like the work God asks for?

Vote for Leaders with Integrity

This election season, when the big talk gets loud and the promises get even louder, we can train ourselves, as people of faith, to ask the only question Jesus seems to care about.

Do they only talk the talk? Or do they walk the walk?

Ask not, “What do they say?” but “What do they do?”

Discern which candidates demonstrate the highest integrity by their actions.

Then, vote accordingly.

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Rev. Dr. Leah D. Schade

The Rev. Dr. Leah D. Schade is a seminary professor, ordained minister, and co-founder of the Clergy Emergency League. Her opinions are her own.

Leah is the author of Preaching and Social Issues: Tools and Tactics for Empowering Your Prophetic Voice (Rowman & Littlefield, 2024), Preaching in the Purple Zone: Ministry in the Red-Blue Divide (Rowman & Littlefield, 2019) and Creation-Crisis Preaching: Ecology, Theology, and the Pulpit (Chalice Press, 2015). She is the co-editor of Rooted and Rising: Voices of Courage in a Time of Climate Crisis (Rowman & Littlefield, 2019). Her book, Introduction to Preaching: Scripture, Theology, and Sermon Preparation, was co-authored with Jerry L. Sumney and Emily Askew (Rowman & Littlefield, 2023).

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Matt. 21:23-32

About Leah D. Schade

The Rev. Dr. Leah D. Schade is the Associate Professor of Preaching and Worship at Lexington Theological Seminary in Kentucky and is ordained in the ELCA. Dr. Schade does not speak for LTS or the ELCA; her opinions are her own. The Rev. Dr. Leah D. Schade is the Associate Professor of Preaching and Worship at Lexington Theological Seminary in Kentucky. An ordained Lutheran minister (ELCA) for twenty-five years, Leah earned both her MDiv and PhD degrees from the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia (now United Lutheran Seminary). She has pastored congregations in suburban, urban, and rural contexts. She has authored or co-edited seven books: Preaching and Social Issues: Tools and Tactics for Empowering Your Prophetic Voice (Alban Books, Rowman & Littlefield, 2024); Introduction to Preaching: Scripture, Theology, and Sermon Preparation (Rowman & Littlefield, 2023); Apocalypse When?: A Guide to Interpreting and Preaching Apocalyptic Texts (Wipf & Stock, 2020); Preaching in the Purple Zone: Ministry in the Red-Blue Divide (Alban Books/Rowman & Littlefield, 2019); Rooted and Rising: Voices of Courage in a Time of Climate Crisis (Rowman & Littlefield, 2019); For the Beauty of the Earth: A Lenten Devotional (Chalice Press, 2019); Creation-Crisis Preaching: Ecology, Theology, and the Pulpit (Chalice Press, 2015). She is also the EcoPreacher blogger for Patheos. Rev. Dr. Leah D. Schade, author of Preaching and Social Issues Leah has served as an anti-fracking and climate activist, community organizer, and advocate for environmental justice issues. She is currently the grant director for the $1.25 million project “Compelling Preaching for a Climate-Changed World” at LTS in partnership with The BTS Center and Creation Justice Ministries. She also partners with ecoAmerica’s Blessed Tomorrow, and the Interfaith Center for Sustainable Development, with whom she writes EcoPreacher 1-2-3 for busy pastors wanting to address environmental issues in their sermons. She also served as President of the Academy of Homiletics in 2024. She has been a featured speaker for the Festival of Homiletics, leads workshops and retreats, and keynotes events throughout the country. She was the director of a Wabash grant exploring the use of deliberative dialogue in congregations and theological education is also conducting a longitudinal research study about ministry, preaching, and social issues that has surveyed more than 4,000 clergy and 1,000 laity since 2017. Leah received the Kentucky Council of Churches award in 2019. She is also co-founder of the Clergy Emergency League, a network of 3,300 pastors throughout the U.S. who provide support, accountability, resources, and networking for clergy to prophetically minister in their congregations and the public square in this time of political upheaval, social unrest, and partisan division. You can read more about the author here.

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