Matthew 20.1-16

The Rev. Ashley Davis
Pentecost 19+, A
21 September 2008
Matthew 20.1-16

Ok kids, its story time with Jesus again. Not those nice little stories your parents told you before bed. Nope these are parables, they all have some deeply disturbing element to them. I mean they aren’t like camp fire stories that scare the crap out of you. But…they all make you think really hard about yourself and about God with the hopes of turning the world upside-down, but they don’t always illustrate some “logical” point. Maybe that’s why Jesus is my homeboy, screw logic.

So…our parable starts out with a nice simile…the kingdom of heaven is like a land owner. The kingdom of heaven here does not mean “going to heaven.” The kingdom of heaven is the kingdom of God. We see, as in many other place in Matthew, a head on collision of collider proportion with God’s world and our world, and a time to chose which world you live in here and now. So again, the kingdom of heaven is compared to a landowner. How the heck do you compare a sort of place or kind of living with a person?

Moving on, this landowner goes out early in the morning in the traditional way to find workers for the vineyard. He selects a few of the best looking workers. We would assume the strongest looking people with the most experience and skills. They make an oral agreement to work for him for a days wage or a denarius. This denarius a day would barely sustain a family. The landowner goes out again at 9 o’clock and gets more workers. He says simply that he will pay them, “whatever is right.” The question what is right is raised, but no answer is given. Amazingly, they trust his sense of justice and work for him without really knowing what they will get paid. This all happened again at 12 and 3 and 5. In the closing scenes, all the middle groups mysteriously vanish, and we are left to deal with only the first and the last. The foremen is told to pay the last ones first and then pay the rest. Apparently, it was intended that those chosen first would see what the others were paid? Of course, those who were hired first assume that fairness demands that they will receive more.

To Jesus’s original audience, as this scene began they could definitely identify with what was going on. Jesus didn’t say the kingdom of heaven is like a meeting of the Sanhedrin, he said the kingdom of heaven is like something that takes place every day as people try to get paid for working in a grape field. Everywhere people looked, there were freaking grape fields, not that I was there. He had them hooked, but as the story went on I am assuming his original audience became disconcerted. Why did the rich landowner go out again and again to the market place? Some translations call this guy a farmer. I don’t care what the Greek says, he is not a farmer, no farmer spends that much time not at the farm. He’s more add than sams with a paint brush. He isn’t picking anything but people. Why didn’t he send his manager to the market place? Why didn’t he get enough workers in the first couple of trips? The people who slept in still got a full days pay. I thought the early bird got the worm. The original audience had to have been outraged alongside those picked first, they too would have seen that equal pay for equal work was only fair.

What do we do with all this? How can we relate to this story? For some of us who stood by day workers in Gaithersburg, Maryland, as they tried to find jobs to feed their families, there is a definitely way in which we can relate to this story. Maybe you think back to playing kickball in school (ok I know I’m really old) and being chosen for teams. For any job or graduate school, we all stand in metaphorical lines waiting to be chosen. While some of us have had the experience of being around most of the day without being chosen, many more people in this room have been chosen first most of their lives. Whether it is because we have good genes, come from the right family, look the part, whatever. We can relate to wanting things to be fair too. We are taught from a very young age to play fair.

Will Willimon, bishop of the North Alabama conference, retold this parable in a way similar to this that maybe you all will be able to relate to even more. Let’s say each of you is in a difficult math class, but the teacher says she wants all of you to receive an a and your are like ha. You are given a particularly hard problem that you are supposed to work on all semester for you final grade. Half way through the semester, a few students, have been working this whole time pretty diligently on the problem. In saga one day, another student in the class walks up to you and says hey do you have that question I need to start on it. You are like, omg, I’ve been working on that for like two months now he will never make it. You give him the question anyway and are like good luck. You continue to work through the rest of the semester. The night before the test, another classmate calls you and asks for the questions, you just laugh at this poor girl and give her the question anyway. The next day you turn in your problem, and the teacher says great job, you get an a. You wait around to see what happens, the person who started in the middle of the semester gets an a too and then thanks the teacher for all the times she stayed after class to help him. The person who called you the night before the test comes up, and to your surprise gets an a as well and apologizes to the teacher for her roommate cursing her out in the middle of the night when she showed up at the dorm because they had never had a teacher come to their dorm room before to help with homework. Of course you are enraged, and tell the teacher that isn’t fair, I didn’t get any help. She says I told you I wanted everyone to get a’s, you didn’t need the help.

So now that you can relate, what are you supposed to get out of the enigma?

The Kingdom of heaven is like a landowner…If it can possible be and it must be Jesus says so, then the kingdom of heaven must be about bringing everyone into the vineyard. I know you are shocked but this parable is about inclusivity. Everyone gets to come in. Those who get up early and work hard, those who party hard and sleep through the alarm clock, those who seem to have no skills, who others would call lazy when maybe it is just that no one has hired them, who are still hanging around at 5 o’clock smoking cigarettes they can’t afford only because they don’t want to go home to explain to their significant other that they didn’t get work again today. The kingdom of heaven is a place where everyone is given what they need, not what they want, not what they think is fair in comparison to the person beside them, but what they need.

We talk a lot about helping to bring in the kingdom of heaven. We talk a lot about inclusivity. We still have a ways to go. We ought to be out of this building so much seeking other people to bring into the kingdom that people don’t think we are members of the Wesley at all. In bringing in the kingdom, we have to work to alleviate the needs of those in our community. Sure we attempt to build wheelchair ramps, but there are people right here among us who have needs that we have not ministered to. Some need a kind word, a hug, or just someone to listen to them.

So that we don’t get too down on ourselves, we are not God, we are merely participants in helping to bring about God’s kingdom. In the end, it really makes the most sense to see this landowner as God. This picture of God is one of a very hands on God, not sending someone else out, but God going out to find us. Each and everyone one of us (I mean there is still free will, some could have not come to the market place, some could have gone home). God is merciful and full of grace, making sure that each of us have not what we deserve but what we need.

Often times we are the first chosen, we work long and hard, and are resentful of the grace given to those who have not worked as hard as us. Was our being chosen first fair in the first place? Wasn’t there grace in that? More times than not we need to realize that we are all really more like the last chosen stragglers. We don’t really have the skills or the body type that people are looking for, maybe we have a ridiculous amount of hope. Or maybe we are just hanging out for all the wrong reasons. God still chooses us to be workers and sees to our daily needs.

The story of the good employer gives us a good picture of the resentment of grace given to others by those who have worked long and hard themselves. We need to begin to realize that our whole lives are a gracious gift from God. Our work is our thankful response to our creator’s wonderful love. It is our sideways competitive glance that is killing us. We reject grace as we try to justify ourselves. Let us remember God’s gracious acts in this time of communion and beyond. With thankful hearts let us work for God’s kingdom, making sure that all are without need. Amen.