Read
Matthew
20
If you have lived in California, you
have seen something similar to the scene described in the parable. People looking for work gather in a known
place to see who would hire them. Today,
many of these people are undocumented or illegal or whatever term
applies to them not being able to compete in the established workforce, but
they are looking for work.
The men in the parable were looking
for work and they knew where to gather.
Not everyone gathered here. If
you worked in a bank, you probably had a traditional job. Yes, somebody got banker’s hours even in the
first century. The bank owner would like to know who was working for him and
not have to wonder day-to-day who would be handling the money.
Some people had their own
businesses. Fishermen needed a boat,
probably a family asset. They might hire
someone from time to time, but mostly these were family businesses.
Some people had undesirable jobs. The tanner—the person who handled the skins
of dead animals—had a job that few would line up for—it made you something of
an outcast.
The people who couldn’t work
begged. The lame, the blind, and others
who were disabled in some way sat along the side of the road and begged for
mercy in the form of money.
So, what kind of work was available to
this pool of potential employees?
Agriculture was the main source of employment for day laborers. The landowner might hire a foreman or
someone with a specialty on a long-term basis, but the daily grunt work would
be done by men who were hired for the day.
Seed time and harvest were surely
surge employment periods. There might be
a smaller demand for labor at other times for pruning or cultivation of some
sort. In any case, men knew where to
gather in hopes of getting a day’s work.
Some days were surely better than others. You had better not come home at noon because
you didn’t get hired in the morning.
If you didn’t get a job that morning,
waiting to see if someone would hire you for the rest of the day was your job.
So, Jesus described the kingdom of
heaven with people waiting to get a day’s work.
Some were hired at day break.
These were likely your go-getters. If you are not 15 minutes early then
you are late. The land owner picked up a
crew at daybreak and promised to pay them a denarius—standard pay for a day’s
work—and off they went.
About nine in the morning, the
landowner went back and found more workers willing to work for the rest of the
day. The landowner said he would pay
them what was right.
We see a similar routine about noon
and then 3 pm. Finally, about an hour
before quitting time, the landowner hired anyone else who had not yet been
hired.
Quitting time came around and the
landowner told his foreman to pay the men, beginning with those hired
last. Those who worked only a few hours
or even a single hour received a denarius.
Those hired first changed their expectations thinking that they would
receive more.
They too were given a denarius. This did not seem fair to them and they
voiced their grievances. How could the
landowner give the men that only worked an hour the same as those who worked
all day and endured the heat of the day.
This was not fair!
The landowner answered one worker
directly. I am not being unfair to
you. You agreed to work for a denarius.
Here is your pay. Hit the road and take
your grumbling with you.
The landowner made a very general
statement that gets us closer to the heart of the matter. Can’t I do what I want with my own money?
Now we get even closer to the heart of
this parable. Are
you envious because I am generous?
Are you envious because I am generous?
The parable ends with a statement that
is beginning to sound more and more familiar.
“So the last will be first, and the
first will be last.”
In the unpublished Part II of the
parable, nobody shows up the next day at sunrise for work. You won’t find Part II in Matthew. You have to go to the book of Second
Opinions. The parable is not a model for
labor in the first century or the twenty-first century.
It is a window into the kingdom of
heaven. It gives us eyes to see some things
that are of import at the end of the age.
We won’t make this allegorical, but let’s
consider the denarius as eternal life. It
was what the disciples hoped for and it also is what we seek in this age.
But surely the landowner was
unfair. Remember, last Sunday I asked
you to stop using temporal metrics to measure eternal things.
The metrics of this world involve
comparison. Comparison often leads to coveting.
Coveting puts our eyes on earthly
treasure instead of eternal rewards.
We think, “I have been a Christian all
of my adult life, and even some as a child, and this yahoo who spent his life
doing little or nothing professes his faith a week before he dies and he gets
the same thing I do. That can’t be fair.
That can’t be fair!
Now there may be rewards once we enter
the age to come. Eye
has not seen and ear has not heard what the Lord, God has in store for
us. Just receiving life is a big deal!
After telling the disciples that it is
really difficult for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven, he assured them
that those who had given up family and possessions for him would receive a hundred-fold
what they gave up.
So, it seems there are rewards beyond
life eternal, but the promise to those who profess
Jesus is Lord is life, life
abundant, and life
eternal. The promise
is life.
If you want to have more in the life
to come, stop complaining about what benefits others are
receiving now, and serve others more than
ever.
If you want to have more in this life
now, stop complaining about what benefits others are receiving now, and serve
others more than ever.
If you want something beyond life
eternal, take your wealth or status or privilege and put it to use for the glory
of God.
Stop looking at what others have and
then desiring it—coveting it—and see what you have and put it to work for the
glory of God. Hone in on your
relationship with God. Enjoy the gifts
that he picked out just for you.
The heart of this parable is are
you jealous because I am generous?
Are we jealous, are envious, do we
covet what others have received in God’s generosity?
If we had worked all day and got paid
exactly what we agreed was fair, we should be thankful. We should not covet what others received or
what they had to do to receive it.
Now, as a citizen of the good ole USA,
you may or may not like government handouts, unions, wage requirements, or a
dozen other things that first-century landowners and laborers did not have to
comply with. That’s your right.
As a citizen of the kingdom of heaven,
thanksgiving
rules. Coveting has no place. Generosity is the standard.
As a citizen of the kingdom of heaven,
we are thankful
that we did not get what we deserved but
the mercy and favor of God instead.
At the onset of the age to come, we
will be thankful
for the life given to us in the blood
of Jesus. Our thankfulness will have
no limits or qualifications. We are and
will be thankful for the generosity of God.
As we continue in this age, our
coveting needs to give way to our generosity.
We need to have eyes to see that God has blessed us abundantly so we too
may be generous.
Who are we to judge
another man’s servant? Who are we to
judge
our Master?
If we find ourselves jealous of how
another has been blessed, then we have taken
our eyes off of Jesus and are focusing on the storm.
If we think that we have been treated
unfairly, ask if God has not been faithful to his promises. Where did these other expectations come from?
There is a saying in many sports that
involve a ball of some sort. It’s get
your eyes off the scoreboard and on the ball.
Let’s take this parable and put it
into action for our lives.
Get your eyes off
of what everyone else has so as not to covet.
Have eyes to see
the generosity of our Lord.
Take on the
spirit of generosity in our own lives.
Let’s reduce that to something we can
remember.
Stop coveting.
Know the Lord is
generous.
Become generous
ourselves.
Now let’s think of this in terms of what
we set upon the New Year to accomplish: Pursue
the
things of God.
Love
mercy.
Be
rich towards God.
Be generous. Stop
coveting. Be generous.
Amen.
