You can normally catch my quick word every Tuesday morning, just after six, on New Zealand's Rhema.
I was in church a few Sunday’s ago when our paster, Jonathan Dove, preached on the parable of the workers, a reference to the Kingdom of God. In this story, found in Matthew 20, a bunch of different workers are employed in a vineyard, all starting at different times. Some start at 6am and work a long hard day, others start at 9am, noon, 3pm and 5pm. This might seem weird enough in itself, I mean, why hire someone just before knocking off time right? But it’s the end of the story which really gets people going. Here’s the parable from verse 8:
“When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’ “
The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’
“But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’”
-Matthew 20 v 8 - 15
As Jonathan mentioned in his sermon, this would be the same today as telling all NCEA level 3 students that everyone got 100%, no matter how much effort or merit they put in. It seems, well wrong.
Does this story make you think, “ that’s unfair!” Or make you wonder what all the effort in your Christian walk is for if you can just sign up at the end and get in? It used to for me. I mean, I knew it was about God’s grace, and I like God’s grace for ME, I just don’t know if it’s so fair for all those other people.
But it was around this time that Jonathan stopped my thinking in its tracks. Because, he reminded us, this story only seems unfair if we see ourselves as a 6am worker – someone who somehow did more to deserve God’s grace then anyone else. If we changed our mindset, thought of ourselves as the last workers to arrive, who probably had no time at all to, well, actually work!, we’d think this story was awesome.
And of course we ARE all 5pm workers. It doesn’t matter if you have been a Christian for 3 minutes or 30 years, living well for God is a wonderful, worthy thing, but it doesn’t earn you a place in God’s Kingdom. None of us, no matter how long our service for God, or how devout our practice, deserve to live with God forever. So when bitterness starts to sink in or grace seems unfair, remind yourself that you are a 5 o’clock worker. From there everything looks different.
Thats such an awesome perspective on the story. I'd never thought about how prideful we are to assume we're the 6o'clock workers!
ReplyDeleteThanks Libs! Something for me to ponder today :)