The text this morning is from the Gospel according to Matthew the 20th chapter:
“For the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and to them he said, ‘You go into the vineyard too, and whatever is right I will give you.’ So they went. Going out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour, he did the same. And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing. And he said to them, ‘Why do you stand here idle all day?’ They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ He said to them, ‘You go into the vineyard too.’ And when evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last, up to the first.’ And when those hired about the eleventh hour came, each of them received a denarius. Now when those hired first came, they thought they would receive more, but each of them also received a denarius. And on receiving it they grumbled at the master of the house, saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’ But he replied to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you and go. I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?’ So the last will be first, and the first last.”
Thus far the text.
My dear friends in Christ,
God isn’t fair. Life isn’t fair. It’s not fair that I never got to really see how a grandfather interacts with his grandchildren until my dad became one. Both my grandfathers died before I could get to know them. It’s not fair that my wife and I didn’t meet each other until we were 28. I really wish we had met each other sooner and could have started our lives together than much sooner. It’s not fair that some homes in the hurricanes were destroyed while neighbors’ homes stood. It’s not fair that your spouse died. It’s not fair that you lost your job. It’s not fair.
But, as I’ve learned from one of our teachers here at SPI, life isn’t fair, alleluia! It’s true. Life isn’t fair. God isn’t fair. But He is good; life is good. How can I possibly say that? Because it’s true.
Look at the parable for today. The master is God. The vineyard is the world. The laborers are Christians. And the day is the passage of time. So, when the master picks laborers to work in his vineyard, and he keeps picking them all day long, it is so that the work in the vineyard gets done. Now, first off, this is not a works righteousness thing. The reward at the end of the work is a day’s wage, or, if you will, salvation. However, we shouldn’t take this to mean that it’s some kind of earning salvation, a day’s wage, salvation, is what every laborer gets, no matter how much work gets done, because of the goodness of the master.
For us, we should know that every Christian will receive salvation, not because of their work but because our Lord is good and gracious. And when He promises, no matter when you are welcomed into the kingdom of God, that you will be saved, this is good and gracious will toward you. He has accomplished this on His own for you, through the life, death, and resurrection of His Son, Jesus Christ. This is salvation. You get the benefit of Christ’s death for the forgiveness of your sins because you have been invited by the Lord God. And so, here you are. You are a laborer in the vineyard of the Lord.
Now, this work that you have been invited to do, I can’t totally tell you what it is. I can tell you that it is what you do when you serve your God and your neighbor, especially your neighbor. Whatever it is that you do to serve your neighbor, that is what God has invited you to do. If you have kids, you’re a parent. If you have parishioners, you’re a pastor. If you have a spouse, you’re a husband or wife. If you have students, you’re a teacher. If you have clients, you’re a business person. You have neighbors depending upon who it is that you serve. And as you serve them according to your vocation, you are to give to them the reason for the joy that you have in Christ Jesus. You are to share your salvation with them that they might also receive it from the hand of Christ.
And what’s not fair, at least to our eyes, is that some of the people the Lord invites will barely seem to do anything, but the Lord invited them. Some will serve during a time when everything in the world is just fine and you had endure much, but the Lord invited them. Some will serve for a short amount of time and then receive their reward while you’ve worked yourself to the bone over the last 60 years, but the Lord invited them. Some will never seem to have a bad thing happen to them while you suffer all the more, but the Lord invited them.
You see, when we look at people and the world through the eyes of desire or rest or comfort, really, when we look at anything through the eyes of our self-made idolatries, we see disparity. We see inequality. We see that we get the short end of the stick while others get all the awesome stuff.
But the Lord doesn’t want us to look through our idols; He invites us to look through the eyes of faith. And through the eyes of faith, we see Jesus and Him only. We see that we are living in the Last Days. We see that time is running out. We see that we are unworthy sinners, yet redeemed by Jesus taking our place. We see that that which He would have us see, His grace and His mercy directed to you, individually. We see the work He would have us do and we go about it joyfully.
You see, when it looks like everything is unfair, remember that God isn’t playing favorites here. He is giving to each person whatever He has promised, and that is salvation. It is the same from one person to the next. It does not change. Salvation, the forgiveness of sins, the welcoming into the kingdom of God, the giving to you of all the righteousness of Christ, it is the same from one person to the next. All the other stuff that may come with life, that’s fine. It dictates that which we must do. It may not seem fair, but who are you to judge the gifts of God?
When we have plenty, we should help those who have little. When we have little, we trust that God will provide and thank Him for whatever may come our way without demanding of anyone more. When we have joy, we lift up those who sorrow. When we have sorrow, we do not disfigure our faces to tell the entire world, but think of the joy of the Lord that is coming when we see Him face-to-face. When we lose all we hold dear, we don’t put our hands out and demand people make up for it, but we receive all things, even the experience of the suffering, with gladness for it is a blessing from God to endure.
You see, we should be doing that which is opposite what the eyes of the world would expect. We work hard, we play hard, but most of all we believe hard. When we believe in the greatness of the Lord, especially in comparison to the depths of our sin, we are able to receive every good thing from His hand without question, without comparison. And when we do that, we will never have an issue with equity.
In reality, too, the Church is supposed to step up, to provide for those brothers and sisters who are lacking or suffering or grieving. It’s what we do. This is what Jesus means that the first shall be last and the last first. When you are suffering in some way, you are the last of all the Church to have the joy of the Lord, or at least it feels that way. Yet, through the service of the Church, you are elevated to the first position. You should be so well served that there is no question that the suffering leads to the goodness of God. Also there, when your joy is in full, when you have plenty, you should be motivated to give to and lift up others. In this way, all that would make you first, you give to those with the least. You become last for there is nothing left for you.
Yet, even the book of Acts gives us a picture of this, and no one wants for anything. Luke tells us there that the Church had all things in common, each being provided for according to their need. The widowed, the orphaned, those with nothing, those with everything, all needs were given through the goodness and charity of the Church.
This was not so that the people of the Church would win extra favor from God, but only because they had received such great mercy from God they could not help but love those who are around them. Is it hard for you to love others? Perhaps you are suffering from a dearth of understanding when it comes to God’s goodness toward you in Christ. Perhaps you should spend time seeing how gracious He has been toward you. Perhaps you need to get over yourself, get over what seems unfair, get over what you think is right, and just get back to serving, to confessing your sins, to receiving forgiveness.
You see, that’s really what this is all about. We cannot control our circumstances; that job belongs to the Lord. We can, as Christians, however, control our response. We can see that life isn’t fair, but we should also always trust that our God is good. He will provide for us what we need. If He has not given it to you directly, maybe He has through the Church. And if He hasn’t through the Church, perhaps you don’t need it. Regardless, we give thanks to God in Christ through all circumstances that we might find the goodness He has shown to us in His gracious invitation to His kingdom which has no end. You will indeed receive what Christ has promised you, forgiveness, life, and salvation. That is enough. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all human understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord! Amen.
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