October 4, 2020 Matthew 20 Sermon Grace-Vail Grace-Benson A boss is hiring, and you’re considering working for him. A key question always is: what’s the payment? What’s the wages? And is what you’re offering fair compared to what others who do the same job can make from other bosses? You’d be a fool not to ask before agreeing to work. You’d be a fool not to compare wages with others who do similar things. That’s why it’s so hard to come to the kingdom of heaven and have to learn a different way of doing things. Jesus had to work so hard to retrain his disciples to understand, fairness is not the only consideration when thinking of working for the master in the kingdom of heaven. And thankfully, Jesus is still willing to retrain us as well. In Matthew 19, a rich young man, well intentioned, well qualified, morally upstanding, ran up to Jesus, desperate to learn from him how to have eternal life from God. Jesus rejected him because he was not willing to give up riches to follow Jesus. His disciples were amazed and asked, how can anyone be saved? Jesus told them, “With man it's impossible, with God all things are possible.” Then Peter spoke up and asked, “Jesus, we have given up everything to follow you, what will we receive?” Jesus told him great reward would come in this life and the next. But he needed to make sure they didn’t misunderstand. They would not receive so much because their willingness to sacrifice had somehow qualified them for God to pay them back. Instead it was all grace, all gift. Jesus needed to teach them the extreme generosity of God which defies human definitions of fairness. God needs us to know he will do what he wants with his own currency, and that’s ok, in fact that’s best. To teach them and us, Jesus said, “the kingdom of heaven is like a master who owned a vineyard.” The master in the story is God. The vineyard is the created world. There is work he wants done; the growing, cultivating, harvesting fruit of people. Does God need any help in maintaining the universe? Does he really need workers to maintain the vineyard? This master can actually do all the work himself; but he chooses to include workers in the joy of cultivating good grapes, and harvesting them and turning the grapes into fine wine that can be enjoyed. He invites workers to participate in his good work, though he could do it all by himself. He wants people to have useful purposeful responsibilities, because he created not robots, but image bearers of himself. And he actually pays them. He could say, you will work for me for no payment. I made you and I will tell you what to do; but in order to cultivate independent agency in us, he pays us. I can remember times when my parents had me do jobs without pay. On the farm when I was young I fed the calves and did not get paid. But around age 10 my parents said they would pay me $2.00 every time I helped milk the cows. A job that took about an hour and a half. They didn;t have to pay me, they could’ve said, this is how you get your food and shelter; but they wanted to teach me responsibility with money. I think I spent most of it on sports cards, gum, and cd’s that I don’t have anymore; but I learned the value of working and getting paid and spending. Like a good parent, God doesn’t want lazy entitled children just expecting father to do everything and give everything. He made us to be active agents for good in this world. And though he doesn’t need to pay us he chooses to so that we become more responsible like him. Notice that this master is persistently out looking for more workers to hire. He is not sitting back waiting for workers to come to him, he’s not in an office evaluating resumes; he’s out actively engaging in conversation and hiring.
Even up to the last hour of the day; even up to the last moment of this world’s history, he is out there looking to bring people into his kingdom; looking to call them away from the flawed and defective and destructive kingdoms of this world to himself. That’s why human history continues to endure. God is on the lookout constantly for new workers. If a person is 5 or 15, just getting started in life, full of potential and hopes and dreams yet unrealized; God wants them in his vineyard. If a person is 80 or 100, and has never been close to him for the first 80 or 100 years of their life and they’re sick and dying but still barely alive; God wants them in his vineyard. At the first hour, the 11th hour, the 23rd hour and 59 minutes and 59 seconds; he is hiring. Some people aren’t working in the master’s vineyard. They’re just standing around in the marketplace. The master asked them, “Why aren’t you working?” “Because no one hired us,” was their reply. Some people are not in the kingdom of heaven because they didn’t know they could be. Think of one example, a person, Christian or not; who is just kind of aimlessly wandering through life; no real strong sense of direction or purpose. Just whatever seems enjoyable for the moment, that’s ok. Maybe they have others providing for many of their needs. Or another example of the people standing in the marketplace; someone who has been active, but in some other vineyard. Some other pursuit rather than working for the true God, they’ve been working for another version of God, or for another philosophy. And they get burned out. They quit that old vineyard. Where do they go from there? They go to the marketplace. When they are at the marketplace, they could be hired by anyone. They need someone to tell them; there’s a vineyard and a master that’s hiring, and he’s unlike any other master and any other vineyard. He’s not only fair, he’s gracious. He’s not only skilled, but he makes room for the skills of others to flourish. He’s not overbearing. He’s powerful, but being around him is empowering. You should go work for him. Some people don’t know that God is interested in them, not this God. Maybe a God who works on a reward-punishment system, but not a God of grace. Maybe a God who is disappointed in them and expects them to make it up to him; but not a God who unconditionally accepts them and desires them and welcomes them. They don't know. What they need is someone to tell them. When God hires people, he doesn’t hire the qualified, he qualifies the hired. These people were just standing around, and he found them. He went looking for them, not the other way around. God can use you to be the voice of the master. So encourage others, invite them. Go tell them, God is hiring. They just might respond favorably. There’s a place for everyone. Then also notice how the promised payment gets less specific as the day goes along. At first the master was very specific, I will pay you a set amount. Then a little later in the day, he said, I will pay you what is right, and then later, just, come and work for me. The later workers have to trust his fairness to pay them, they don’t even make a formal agreement, they work on trust that it will work out ok in the end. The end of the day came, and it was time to pay wages. The master called his workers together to give the payment. This could be thought of as a picture of judgment day. When all of life is over and you stand before your master, the judge, Jesus God himself and you find out what reward is yours for the life you’ve lived. This could also be applied to the life we have here as well. The day by day blessings God is able to pour into life even now.
First clue that something is different, he started with the last ones first. He gave a day's wage for a fraction of a day's work. He didn’t have to do this, he could have calculated the fraction of the hours they worked, figured out the appropriate calculation of money payment and given them that. But instead he from his riches gives them a full day's wage. What a generous giver. Everything is good until the comparison starts. When the workers who had worked all day got paid a day’s wage, they complained. Even though that’s exactly what they had agreed to and expected. At the start of the day their expectation was, work a day, get a denarii. At the end of the day that was their expectation. But in the short time between the payment given to the others and the payment given to them; they compared themselves to others; and their expectations shifted massively. That’s the power of comparison to ruin otherwise good gifts. They made a charge of injustice, even though they had gotten exactly what they had agreed to, and justice had been given them. The generosity of their master to others made justice seem like injustice; fairness seem like unfairness. When does this happen in our lives? My life by comparison to others who I perceive as having more than me, means that some injustice has happened to me. I have not been given what I perceive they have been given. We know this happens. You work hard to make a purchase, let's say a car; and you got a great car for a great price. And you drive it home to enjoy it, and you do enjoy it. But 5 minutes after you park it in the driveway; your neighbor drives in with a better car that he got for a better price. Instantly what you were excited about a moment before, you are now resentful because you feel like you could have got what your neighbor has. It’s instinctual. What’s the problem with this? The problem is, you are not your neighbor, you are you. Why can’t you be happy with that? The problem is, as you compare to others, you grow discontent with the life God has given you. What is the payment? We think the payment should be: the life I want. In actuality the payment is: the life you receive from God and that is lived with God. It’s like Cain. He had his own life, and it seems good in the basic details, he was a plant farmer, he made sacrifices to God. But its when the comparison to his brother Abel came that sin crouched like a predatory cat ready to produce murder in Cain’s heart and in his actions. Comparison can ignite the latent dry wood of sin in our hearts. Someone who you could have been otherwise happy for, when you compare yourself to them, hatred, bitterness, rage spring up. And not only against them, but even moreson against the master. “That’s not fair. You gave them more than you gave us. You have made them equal to us. We should be treated as greater than.” That’s a sense of fairness and justice gone overboard. What’s wrong with being envious because of the generosity of God? It robs you of the generosity. You cut yourself off from it at that moment and put yourself on a track where your disgruntled-ness could cause you to foolishly say, “I’m done with this master and this vineyard. It’s so unfair. I’m going somewhere else where I’m appreciated and compensated. I want a works based, payment based relationship.” How deadly foolish that would be, and all because of the envy of comparison. So watch out. Those workers mention bearing the burning heat of the day. Is it true that some have a more sheltered life of trying to follow God than others? Yes it is. Do some have to deal with more of the burning heat of this life than others? Yes. Do some end up doing more work in the kingdom of God?
More heavy lifting? Yes. Here at Vail people do heavy lifting and pushing and arranging in a trailer in the heat of the Arizona sun. If you do that regularly, don’t begrudge anyone who comes for worship and leaves after, God wants them here. God appreciates your willingness to serve. Watch out for grumbling. Or as a multi-cite; it’d be easy to compare: Tucson has a massive building, Sahuarita has a new building, we have set up each week. Beware of grumbling, it hurts our relationships with our brothers and sisters. The amount of grumbling you do against God is very tied to how much you think you’ve done for God, and with how much you’ve lost sight of all he has done for you. Solution: get your eyes off what you’ve done for him, and back onto what he’s done for you. Learn to work with the mindset of a late day hire, even if you are a total life follower of Jesus. Don’t be comparing payments with others, but simply enjoy having a master so generous, so inviting and desiring of you to work in his vineyard, regain some of the wonder of recognizing what a privilege it is to work for him at all, and to receive any kind of reward at all. Let that gratitude flood your senses so there is no room for discontent. What if life isn't about fairness as much as it is about generosity? What if life isn’t about calculated comparisons as much as contented enjoyment of what has been given you? What if life is more about looking at what God has placed in your hand instead of looking at what he’s putting in the hands of others? Enjoy the life he’s given you, right where you are, right who you are. It’s a good life, because it's one with him. It’s a good identity, because he says so. The reward of working together is first knowing, we have a place in the vineyard of the king, as laborers who he values. Notice what he calls these grumbling laborers. Friends. Not workers, not pack animals, get back to work and stop complaining. Friends. You are my friends. Let’s not let this relationship diverge into contractual agreements. We’re friends. And I have the right to do what I want with my own. Don’t be envious because of my generosity. That’s how God works. The last will be first and the first will be last. There are so many examples of this throughout history. God worked through Isaac not Ishmael; Jacob not Esau; David the 8th son; humble Mary to be the virgin mother. Why? Because he finds in such people the humbleness to rely more on him and less on self. The last know they need him, and so, they receive him; and in receiving him and having him they are vaulted to first, first in satisfaction, joy, meaning, purpose, wholeness, full being health. They have all they need because he is the supreme worth. So, consider someone in your life who you think has done less than you; but who it seems God has given the same payment, the same kind of satisfaction in life. Can you be happy for them, while still satisfied with your life? Can you be ok with the times that you bear the heat of the day for others; and they get the same payment from God as you? Can you be ok with your master being generous? To actually do it you need to know that of all the fellow workers who bore the heat of the day and didn’t receive equal payment for it; Jesus is the greatest example. He bore the heat of his father’s disapproval of sin; completely undeserved, and you get the benefit of his work, totally undeserved. He doesn’t just ask you to be last so that others can be first, he made himself last of the last, lowest of all, so that by his willingness to die a physical and spiritual death of human sin; you could be paid the wages of his eternal kind of life, his aliveness which he now gives to you in himself. So that by being last at the cross, but first at the empty tomb, he could make you who are humble now, glorious in his
kingdom later. Jesus is alive to give you what you don’t deserve, the wages of his perfect life. That’s the kind of God you have, that’s how he works. That’s the kingdom of heaven, and you’re in it.