Give us ears to hear and hearts to listen. Amen.
The
Gospel story today is often called the Labourers in the Vineyard. It begins and
revolves around two kinds of people. The first is a landowner or, more
specifically, the owner of a vineyard. As is true today, if you own a vineyard,
you’re probably doing pretty well in life. The other characters are the day
laborers, and they live at pretty much the other end of the economic ladder. Day
laborers are people who don’t have a regular job. People who go into the town
each morning hoping they’ll find work so they can feed their family. They’re
not beggars, they’re not destitute, but they pretty much live right on the edge
of poverty.
When
the parable starts, the owner of a vineyard needs some help. It’s likely
harvest time and the work is plentiful, so he goes into town at dawn to hire
some additional workers, agreeing with them on a wage of one denarius for a 12-hour
day, about the amount it takes to feed a family for a day. As the day goes on,
it turns out that the landowner needs more help, so he goes out again at 9 in
the morning and tells some more laborers that if they work, he’ll pay them what
is right. No amount is named, just a promise that he will do right by them. He
goes out again at noon, and once more at 3 in the afternoon, and finally one
last time at 5 p.m., which is kind of a head-scratcher, because there’s only
one hour left in the twelve-hour workday. But he hires them too and sends them
into the vineyard.
At
6 in the evening, he tells his manager to settle accounts, and the folks who
came last and worked only one hour are paid first. When they show up, they are
likely astounded that they received a full day’s wage. You heard that right. They’ve
worked just one hour – about 8 ½ % of the workday, but they’re getting a 100%
of a full day’s wage. Which means they’re likely not just surprised but
probably overjoyed. Maybe the only people happier than those hired at the last
hour are those hired at the first. Think about it. They worked twelve hours and
just saw the guys who only worked one hour get a full day’s wage. So, it’s not
hard to imagine that they’re expecting to get more, maybe a lot more. But when
they show up to be paid, they also get a single denarius. That doesn’t seem
fair. I mean, they worked for twelve hours, enduring, as they understandably
grumble, the scorch of the sun all day long. They feel they deserve more.
It’s
all too easy for us to dismiss these laborers as ungrateful or selfish or, to
borrow a biblical phrase, hard of heart. But their reaction is pretty much what
most of us would have felt had we been in their shoes. What happens to them
simply does not add up and so doesn’t seem fair. Never mind it’s what was
contracted – if those who worked an hour received a day’s wage, then those who
worked so much longer deserve more. Right?
In an act of generosity, the owner of the vineyard
throws aside normal practices for payment. Rather, he gives the laborers what
is “right.” While it seems terribly wrong to the diligent folks who have worked
all day, it is right in the owner’s eyes that everyone goes home with enough
pay to buy food for their families. But these workers want fairness; who can
blame them. They feel cheated because they calculated their wages in accord
with what the manger paid the latecomers. The manager responds that he has
acted not with fairness in mind but rather with love expressed through
generosity.
If
you’re someone who works in the financial industry, this parable goes against
pretty much every business practice. But we can’t get bogged down in the
economics of this story. If we do, we will miss the whole point. The parable
was not told to teach about money; it was told to teach about grace. Let’s take
a look back at the verses that come right before today’s gospel reading:
“Then Peter said
in reply, “Look, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we
have?” Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, at the renewal of all things,
when the Son of Man is seated on the throne of his glory, you who have followed
me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And
everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife
or children or fields for my name’s sake will receive a hundredfold and will
inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be
first.”
Peter
is saying, “look Jesus, we were your first choice, we’ve been around since the
beginning, following you around, what do we get out of it?” and Jesus goes,
“Pete, stop worrying so much about who’s first and who’s last. In the end,
everyone gets into the Kingdom of God.”
There
is this belief that the longer you’ve been doing God’s work, the longer that
you’ve been following Christ, the bigger your reward should be in the
afterlife. And that the stronger your faith, the more you’ve earned your spot
in heaven. But the thing is, God is a terrible bookkeeper. God doesn’t keep a
tally of all the things you’ve done in your life, as if ticking your way to the
front of the line at Heaven’s Gates.
The
landowner in our story pays every laborer the same because that’s the way God
operates. God does not show partiality. God does not require payment for love. In
this parable, Matthew is reminding us of the wonder of God’s grace and that
God’s love for us, for everyone, is unconditional. Imagine a world in which
preferences are not shown to some, where all people are welcomed and treated
the same. Such a world could really become a priesthood of all believers. The God
we discover in Jesus is the God who looks at us in love and overlooks all those
places we fall short and chooses to treat us with unmerited grace, mercy, and
generosity.
We
are the latecomers to the vineyard, those who had no good reason to expect such
lavish generosity. Instead of worrying about getting what we deserve, we need
to see the world through the lens of the Kingdom of God. What would happen if
everyone got their “daily bread”? Who are we neglecting or pushing to the
margins, instead of making sure they are being see as equal and worthy?
The
labourers in this story thought they weren’t getting what they deserved even
though it was exactly what they agreed to. This is a good time to remind
ourselves of the overwhelming gospel message: Justice is getting what we
deserve. Mercy is not getting what we deserve. Grace is getting what we don’t
deserve.
We
don’t deserve God’s mercy. We didn’t earn God’s love. And yet, here we are.
Receiving our “daily bread” from God – peace, love, mercy, and grace. Perhaps
only those who think they don’t measure up are ready to receive God’s grace. To
have faith is to embrace this possibility and to discover grace as hope and
vindication for our lives. Even those coming to this faith late in life will
have a spot in heaven. They too will receive their “daily bread”.
And
that is good news indeed.
Amen
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