Matthew 20 - Part 1

 

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.

 

Right-Side Up in and Upside-Down World

Read John 13:1-17

Having read the Bible several times with somewhat different perspectives over the years, I often have thought; man, I am glad I did get called by God to do that.  Abraham and Isaac on Mount Moriah surely tops my list.

Moses listening to a burning bush would have been tough.  This voice called I Am told me to go back to where I am wanted for murder, that’s tough to swallow.  Moses wasn’t too keen on the idea himself, but I am glad it was him and not me.

Balaam had to get his instructions from a donkey.  So God spoke to you through a burning bush?  Nope, he had my donkey talk to me.  Yeah, OK,

No way, I could have done Noah’s job.  He used Gopher Wood as instructed by God, but I always get the basic rule mixed up and measure once and cut twice and have to go for more wood.  I would not have been a good fit for the whole ark business.

Here is a position that I think I might have qualified for once upon a time—editor for the Christmas Story.  The editor position is not in the Bible, but I could have done it.  Really, how did some of this stuff get past the editors?

Let’s start with this whole babe in a manger scene.  That’s no way for the King of kings to enter the world.

No room at the inn, really?  That reservation would have been made before Adam lost a rib.  They can just keep that room empty until needed.

If there is a foal of a donkey waiting for Jesus to ride into Jerusalem three decades or so later, they could have held a room at the Inn.  I don’t mean Motel 6.  We’re talking Embassy Suites.  It comes with a full, to order breakfast, quite the happy hour in the evening, and suites—not rooms—suites!

But what do we get?  A kid that’s born in a barn or a cave.  At least they knew to edit out the first couple years of dirty diapers, but bring the one and only Son of God into the world in such a mean estate.  Who let’s that get by the first draft?

Try working the first divine dirty diaper into the lectionary readings every third year.  That’s when you go on cruise and get a pulpit supply.

And then this is this whole fleeing to Egypt bit.  What gives?  I am thinking a couple legions of angels get garrison duty.  That’s good duty for them.  It’s absolute security for the Son of God.   If Herod wants to mess with them he can just be known as Herod the wasn’t around very long.

The shepherds and Magi might not have like the full body search and getting X-rayed and wanded five times to finally get to the waiting area to see the one who was Lord at his birth, but hey, we eventually learned to handle TSA procedures, and we are a spoiled generation.  The shepherds could have handled it.

And who scored this story?  Silent Night, really?  I’m thinking Ride of the Valkyries!

Richard Wagner or the Little Drummer Boy?  Puh rump pa pum pum.  C’mon people, this is the King of kings!

If the careless editing only stopped with the Christmas story, I could live with that.  But it continues.  We get this whole last will be first and first will be last theme that Jesus delivers for about 3 years.

What gives?  He is the King of kings.  How about establishing a formal hierarchy here?  We put Jesus at the top and…

And why is he eating with sinners and tax collectors and talking to women that shouldn’t be getting anywhere near him even if he was just a common rabbi?

This whole story of God with Us seems upside down.  And then we come to a meal not too long before Jesus will return to the Father. 

He has done his time.  He surely rates a couple medals for having stepped out of heaven and lived the human life.  He obviously gets the Good Conduct Medal.  Throw in one for fasting, parables, and walking on water.

Jesus can go home to Dad with some fruit salad on his uniform.  He has done some stuff.  But, he is not just catching the next flight home.  He will be betrayed and sacrificed as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world and he knows it.

So, what does he do?  No, he doesn’t turn more water in to wine, though I would have no problem if he did.  C’mon, think of what lies ahead of him.

Jesus takes off his outer garment, wraps a towel around his waist, gets a bowl of water and starts washing the feet of his disciples.  He doesn’t leave them with wet feet.  He dries them on the towel that’s wrapped around him.

Apparently, none of the 12 are saying anything about this.  Yes, Judas was still among them.  He didn’t leave until later.

So, Jesus comes to Peter, and Peter says—mind you this is in traditional Okie with much license and not in the classical Greek or even Aramaic—Peter says, “That dog don’t hunt, Lord.  Ain’t no way you are doing what the lowliest servant would normally do.”

Jesus answers, “OK, then you are not going have anything to do with what I am all about.”

Peter replies, “OK then, I’ll take the full body wash, spa package, and pedicure.  Give me the works!”

Jesus knows that they don’t get it.  Peter is just the spokesman for the dumbfounded disciples.  “What just happened?”

Jesus at least gives the disciples some encouragement by saying that they will understand what’s happening at some point in their future, but for the moment, these men are just stunned.

These dozen men have heard Jesus say that he must die but they witnessed him ride into Jerusalem to shouts and cheers.  Jesus has rebuked the religious leaders. He has chastised those doing business in the temple as if it were a common market place.

Maybe, this man whom they witnessed walk on water and raise the dead was about to take his rightful place on the throne and take his place at the top of this world.

That is exactly what he did, but the world was upside down and did not know it.

He said—

·       You call me Teacher

·       You call me Lord

·       You are right on the money

I am your Teacher and your Lord, and I just washed your feet.  I just performed the job of the lowest servant.  Now, you have an example.  You have a model for what to do when I am gone.

You have a model for guiding this world to a right-side up position when it does not even know it is upside down.  In one more chapter, Jesus tells his disciples that because they follow him—even though he will be with the Father—they will do greater things than even he did.

At this very moment, he reminds them that a servant is not greater than his master.  The messenger is not greater than the one who sent him. 

Jesus is telling these men, and he is telling us, that the reward for following Jesus is not a bigger tent or a fatter paycheck—though there is nothing wrong with either unless they become your gods—but their reward for following him is greater service. 

We don’t see a lot of feet washing from the apostles in Acts or in the course of the New Testament letters.  This was not a religious ritual to be instituted in place of songs for children or reading the Apostles’ Creed. 

Jesus demonstrated to 12 men that their understanding of the world was upside down.  He showed them that the patterns of the world still had too high a place in their thinking.

Think to Paul’s words which came a few decades later.  Do not conform to the patterns of this world any longer.  Any longer denotes that the models and paradigms and patterns of the world already had their hooks in people.  People understood the world through the upside-down lens of the world.

Jesus would not send these disciples into the world to offer a plan B or option C.  He would not send them with a you need to hedge your bet spiel. 

Jesus sent his closest followers into the world—equipped with the Holy Spirit so they could make sense of what had been a mostly cloudy experience over the past 3 years—to bring grace and truth to the world. 

Grace came from God himself, was God himself, and walked with these men over a few hundred miles teaching and healing and proclaiming good news for the captives, until it was time to shed his blood on the cross.

The story did not end at the cross but the power of sin and death to separate us from the love of God did.  The story continues with resurrection and life and life eternal.

It is a story that we carry to this upside-down world today.  It is a story of love and faith and hope but how will we tell it.

Will we try to make it fit into the world’s model?  Will we try to make it less offensive to those who don’t believe in God or who think one god is as good as another?

Will we try to tell this story without disturbing the patterns that rule this world?  We really do want to keep our status in this world, don’t we?  We don’t want to be looked upon as if we were the lowliest servant around, do we?

Can’t we pay at least a little allegiance to the god of this world, so we blend in just a little?

Jesus alone saw the dichotomy of upright disciples in an upside-down world.  He gave them a stunning example of how out of sync this world had become with God the Father when he became what the world would regard as the lowliest servant and he washed their feet. 

These disciples—at least 11 of them—with the help of the Holy Spirit, would soon have these right-side up eyes to see as well.  But, do we?

How do we take this 2000-year-old example and put it to work in this out of control century?

Let’s start with truth.  We are talking Truth with a big T and truth with a little t.  We must always—not occasionally—be people of truth.  We speak it in love but love does not dilute the truth. 

Let’s not be dumfounded as Pilate was and have to ask, “What is truth?”

Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.  The truth is that God loves us so much that through Jesus, he made a way for us to be right with him.  We can live in this world as right-side up people.

God did not send his Son into this world to condemn the world but to save it through him.  

The truth is that through him, in him, following him, believing in him we have eyes to see exactly how we are to live in the truth—right-side up in this upside-down world.

Let’s not forget love.  Paul coined the phrase speaking the truth in love in a very narrow context, but the phrase is nearly universal in application.  We bring the truth of Jesus Christ to people out of love.  It’s not out of duty or obligation or desire for greater rewards.

It is love that propels us to bring good news of the Truth to people who think we are upside-down. 

It is love that shapes our heart like that of our heavenly Father’s—a heart that desires none to perish. 

Love does not dilute the truth.  Love doesn’t even make the truth taste better all the time.  Love causes us to bring the truth to the blind once more, when the world condemns us for it.

Let’s speak the truth, live the truth, and bring the truth to the world but always in love.

There are many other areas—faith, hope, patience, kindness, peace, and more.  Many of these we will discuss in 2018.  But there is one more area that I would like you to consider as you enter this new year.  Consider inclusion.  Consider communion.  Consider that someone cannot know the fullness of life that we know from the outside looking in.

I have said this year after year, but this year, I charge us to live this as followers of Christ Jesus.  Abundant life in this modern century centers around inclusion in the body of Christ.

Jesus didn’t just pick a dozen guys walking down the road and pulled them over for a foot wash.  He didn’t send Judas out to round up some people with dirty feet, and tell him to take care of his other business while he was out.

This lesson was for those who already had been cleaned.  They just needed their feet washed.  They didn’t need a whole bath.  Their salvation was in Jesus and it was secure, even before Jesus went to the cross.  Jesus noted to his Father in heaven that he saved all that were given him, except for the one that had to bring about the sacrifice that was to come.

But Jesus needed to give these men eyes to see right-side up in an upside-down world.  He washed their feet as the lowliest of servants would.  He knew that with the Spirit’s help, they would see the world as it was and as the Father in heaven designed it to be, and know the difference between the two.

We do a lot to bring people into the body of Christ.  We really do.  A response to serve the Lord seems rare these days when we minister to the disconnected and the lost.

Think of the waitress at a restaurant that you visit only occasionally.  She takes your order, gets it right, checks on you regularly, remembers what you asked for, and takes very good care of you.  You give her a decent tip. 

One minute after you pay your bill, she can’t remember what half the people at her table ordered.  She is focused on her other customers and those just now walking in the door.  It makes her a good waitress.  She can deal with her customers until they are out the door and then it’s on to what’s next.

Many of the people that we help with bills, food, baskets, gifts at Christmas who are not really an active part of the body of Christ, stop trying to connect with us once the bill is paid or the gifts are in hand.  We might see a single visit at a worship service, but then it will be another 10 months before they surface again.

Like the waitress, it’s on to what’s next.

Sometimes paying a bill, buying Christmas gifts, loading up a family with food, and other acts of benevolence work against us with those who are not really connected.  For those active in the body of Christ, all of these things are blessings.

So we come to a New Year.  For many it is a time to catch our breath from Christmas.  Some are still wired waiting on the outcome of the football playoffs.  Many have resolutions.  Many have resolved not to do resolutions any more.  It’s a new year set before us.

In this year, I challenge us all as the body of Christ to bring the truth and love to the world and to bring the disconnected home.

Without the distraction of a food basket or Christmas ham, lead people to the truth.

Without the obsession over Christmas gifts, invite people that you know need to come home back into the fellowship.

With all the love you can muster, speak the truth to those who remain content apart from the body of Christ.  You have been given eyes to see the world right-side up.  Will you leave people that you know—some you call friends—subscribing to the patterns of the world.

Jesus washed the feet of his disciples to give them an example.  His actions were extreme.  He was and is Lord.  What was he doing washing feet like a lowly servant?

If Jesus was so extreme and provocative and bold to show his disciples how upside-down their world was, how can we be timid in our discipleship?  

How can we be reserved in our evangelism?

The New Year is upon us.  What will we do?

You may reject or receive what I challenge you to do, but you cannot say that you didn’t know.

Take truth and love into the world from day 1 of this new year.  Without promise of anything of this world—food, money, gifts—call people home.  Invite them to know the truth and know love and know what it is to live right-side up in this upside-down world.

Amen!

Parable: The Landowner

Read Matthew 20:1-16

In the early 1960’s we lived on Tyler Street in Mangum, Oklahoma.  It was in a small, wood-framed white house on the corner.  Across the street was a large, brick house.  The bus would stop in front of our house on school mornings and the kids across the street would ride the bus to school.

I was not allowed to ride the bus.  Believe it or not, it was not because of something that I did.  It was because our house was in the city limits and the house across the street was not.  It was actually closer to the school but not in the city limits.  The family across the street had plenty of money.  We had enough but nothing extra. 

Here is another believe it or not.  We only had one car and my father left early in the morning for work.  So every school day, I watched the kids across the street get on the bus and a few minutes later, my mother put me into a taxi bound for school.  It didn’t make a lot of sense to me, but I didn’t have to worry about the family budget.  I’m sure my parents were not happy about the absurdity of the situation.

Eventually, we moved 5 miles east of town and I rode the bus too, but the situation on Tyler street never seemed fair.  We quietly went on with our lives until the situation had changed.

Today, you can hardly breathe in public without someone being offended or crying “unfair!”  Somebody has something better than me and I want it—no, I deserve it as well!

The baseball player signs a contract for a measly five million dollars a year.  The team was taking a chance on an unproven talent.  Then he has a break out year.  Now, he is holding out for more money.  The five million a year seemed like a good deal when he put his name on the paper, but now it doesn’t seem fair to him.

Why would five million not be enough?  Really, with some strict budgeting, you would only have to eat Ramen once or twice a week, or never.

It’s not enough, because somebody else just got ten million dollars a year.  Now, five million seems like you’re working for peanuts.  Let’s not forget that you get to play a kids game and get paid for it.  Today, my salary numbers would be low for anyone who thinks they can play ball.

A long time ago, Moses came down the mountain will a list of ten really important commandments.  When you get to the end of the list there is one that says, “Thou shalt not covet.”  It is followed by a laundry list of everything that you neighbor has.

As we consider today’s society, the last might just be the first as far as broken commandments go.  That’s speculative and beyond measurement.  You can’t really break just one commandment. Usually, you have broken one of the first two if you break any of the others. 

Thou shalt not covet has surely been among the top most offended commands, at least in this country.

What is it about us that desires something, not because we need it, but because someone else has it?  Our car runs well but it is not as pretty and nice as the new models and surely doesn’t have all of the features. 

The girls who check me in at the dealership when I go to get the oil changed on my truck always ask me the same thing.  Are you going to drive this until it falls apart?

My answer is always the same.  That’s the plan.  I know that my answer doesn’t fit the model of this world, especially this nation where there is always something to covet.

Jesus has been painting a picture of the Kingdom of Heaven.  It’s sort of like a paint by numbers.  Fill in number 2 with blue.  Some go at the top and others at the edges.  Next, fill in number 5 with yellow.  There are few of these in the center and one or two in a corner.  The other numbers and colors will eventually make a fine picture that will hang in the Louvre or on the family refrigerator.

And so, little by little, we have been given a picture of the Kingdom of Heaven through a variety of parables.  We know that there is a kingdom in which we may live now.  It is composed of disciples.  These disciples share the light and love and good news of our Lord.

It is a kingdom that is meant to grow not only around us but within us as well.  It is a kingdom that for this age exists in the midst of sin and evil and death.  One day those will be gone, but in this time the kingdom and things opposed to the kingdom share the same real estate.

For those who have eyes to see, it is a kingdom worth giving up all we have to be a part of it.  It’s like finding buried treasure.

This kingdom has a single currency.  It is mercy.  Mercy is the currency of the realm.

Jesus had been teaching in parables, with direct instructions, and with some other figurative methods.  The theme that we see time and again is that the last will be first and the first will be last.  It is an interesting provocation that being first in this world does not grant you commensurate status in eternity.

Jesus had an encounter with a rich young man who thought he was doing well as far as following the commandments went, at least until his talk with Jesus.  Jesus told him to sell everything, give the proceeds to the poor, and then come and follow him and he would be complete—perfect if you will.  This young man went away sad because he was rich in this world.

Jesus makes the point to his followers that it is very hard for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.  When the kingdom of the world seems to offer everything that you want, it is so hard to believe that a kingdom where you are not first and not the center of all things could really be better.

Jesus reached for hyperbole again, saying that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

This got the disciples to wondering if they were part of a hopeless cause.  Do the best that you can and be lost anyway.  They asked Jesus just who could be saved.

He told them that anyone who wanted to get right with God on their own was out of luck.  That was a bridge too far.  It was a pipe dream.  That surely took the wind out of their sails.

But with God—with God—all things are possible.

Peter, knowing that the disciples did not fall into the same tax bracket as the rich young man who went away sad, asked Jesus, “What about us?  We gave up everything to follow you.”

Paul would later say that eye has not seen and ear has not heard what the Lord has in store for those who love him, but Jesus gave these few men a glimpse.  In addition to live eternal, they would have authority and be given hundreds of times what they gave up.  At the renewal of all things—when perfection comes in earnest—their reward will be so great that they truly cannot imagine it now.

So we come to this next parable about the Kingdom of Heaven being like a landowner.  About 6 a.m. he went to the place when men hung out to get hired and hired a bunch to work in his vineyard.  The rate was one denarius a day.  How much is that?  It was a fair rate for a full day’s work at that time.  These are not white collar jobs.  The landowner was hiring laborers.

The landowner came back about 9 a.m. and hired some more, offering to pay whatever was fair.  He came back and hired more with the same offer at noon and 3 p.m.  He even came back an hour before quitting time and hired some more workers.  No mention of pay was made.  The land owner just said to go work in his vineyard.

It was five o’clock somewhere—in fact it was five o’clock there—but these men we not headed to happy hour.  They were still hoping to be hired and they were.

When the work day was done, the landowner told the foreman to pay the workers beginning with those who were hired last.  I would think these last workers were surprised and likely very delighted at what they received—a full day’s pay.

Once word of what happened filtered to the back of the line, expectations went wild.  If those who only worked an hour received a full day’s pay, what will we get?

The answer was that they received a full day’s pay as well—exactly the amount for which they agreed to work.  But they were not happy.  Others received the same amount for less work.  Some didn’t even have to work in the heat of the day.  This was unfair!

Some of the offended workers wanted answers from the landowner.  He gave them questions instead.

• Isn’t this the amount to which you agreed?
• Can I not do what I want with my money?
• Are you envious because I am generous?

Those questions are a bundle of answers in themselves—choices, sovereignty, generosity.   How can you be upset when you get exactly what you bargained for?  Would you want someone else telling you what to do with your money?  What does it say about us when we get upset over someone’s generosity?

Let’s go back to coveting.  Coveting steals being content with what we have.  Now, if we don’t’ have enough to meet our needs, we don’t covet.  We work.  We earn more.  Coveting seldom strikes when we are working to meet our needs. 

Coveting strikes when we have enough to meet our needs.  We are working for our daily wage but suddenly or over time, it just doesn’t seem to be enough.  We see somebody getting more or more for less effort and we want in on it.

In our commercialized society today, especially in America, we see newer, faster, shinier and our coveting nature kicks in.  The more that we think about what others have, the less content we are with what we have.

Make no mistake, God wants to bless us with what we need and something extra to bless others.  With few exceptions, we are not called to be poor or live in poverty.  If we follow Jesus and seek God’s kingdom with all of our very being, God will grant us things out of his generosity that the godless think they must have.

But coveting gets us off course in our race of faith.  It weighs us down.  We have been to this place many times.  If it gets in our way or is weighing us down in our discipleship, we must cast it off.

This is a parable about the Kingdom of Heaven.  There is a message for disciples striving to live in that kingdom now, but what is it that we should discern?

How about there is no coveting in the kingdom?  We have what we have based on the generosity of the Lord.  Can the sovereign Lord not give to each of us as he desires?

We are talking about living in this kingdom now with sin and evil and death still hovering about us.  We are talking about living in this kingdom now when the world beckons you to cry “unfair” at every chance you get.

We are talking about living in a kingdom in this age where we must surrender our own expectations to the way of the Lord.  We must stop believing that what the world has to offer is somehow better than what the Lord has provided.

There is one more subtle complaint from the workers.  It doesn’t deal with work or pay though both of these factors elicit the complaint.  What is this additional complaint?

You have made them equal to us.

We are better than those people.  We’ve earned what we have.  We are better.

In the paradigm of the world, the workers are exactly correct.  They are on the mark.  We live in a status oriented world.  In some countries the distinction is more distinct, but make no mistake the world regards some people as better than others.

But such a model does not hold up in a kingdom constructed from grace.  Being better than another disciple in a kingdom where all have fallen short, yet have received forgiveness and mercy is foreign to the foundation of the yoke of our Master.

Who will sit at the right and left of our Master is for the Father to grant, not for us to earn.

By way of a short rabbit trail, consider this parable in the context of the Hebrew believers wanting the Gentile believers to be circumcised and follow at least some of the Law of Moses.  The Gentiles didn’t show up at 6 a.m. and have to work through the heat of the day; yet, here they are entering the Kingdom of Heaven just like God’s own people.  It’s food for thought.

The parable is about the Kingdom of Heaven being like a landowner who:

·     Goes out at all hours of the day to find men for his purpose.

·     Promises those he hires to give them what is right.

·     Is generous with what he has.

Will we let our greed get in the way of God’s generosity?  Will we covet something that we don’t actually need just because somebody else seems to be getting a better deal.

Where in all of the laws and commandments is the one that says, we should compare ourselves against others or what others have?

Where in the rules for righteous living is the directive for comparative metrics?

Do we desire eyes to see as the Lord would have us to see or are we forever on the lookout for what else is out there that I might want?

When will we be ready to set aside our covetous nature?  The answer to this one is simple.  We are ready to set it aside when we truly desire to live in the Kingdom of Heaven now.  If we really want to live in this kingdom now, we must check our covetous baggage at the door.

Consider the circumstances of this parable in the kingdom of the world.  People hired at 6 a.m., 9 a.m., 12 p.m., 3 p.m., and 5 p.m. and all paid the same wage at quitting time, which comes at 6 p.m. gets you what?

In the kingdom of the world, nobody is going to show up looking for work until 5 p.m.  The landowner will never get his crops in.  Grapes will rot in the vineyard while workers will want twice the pay for their one hour’s work.

The parable models the Kingdom of Heaven, where sovereignty and generosity go hand-in-hand.  In the previous parable, we noted that mercy ruled in the Kingdom of Heaven.  Given mercy by God, we are to practice mercy with others.

While not specified in this parable; we should consider a similar application of generosity.  We are the beneficiaries of God’s generosity.  Should we not practice generosity with others as well?

What a kingdom this is where both mercy and generosity are the order of the day.  Who would want to live anywhere else?

Amen.