An Unfair God?
Matthew 20:1-16
Somewhere in the Charlie Brown cartoon canon, there is an episode where Lucy and Charlie are walking home from school. Lucy has a report card in her hand and she is clearly not pleased. She turns to Charlie, and, complains: "It isn’t fair Charlie Brown, it just isn’t fair! I studied for a whole week for my final math test and Sally only studied for two hours the night before the test and she got an A, but I only got a C. It just isn’t fair!"
There were no Charlie Brown cartoons in first century Palestine, of course. But the parable in today’s gospel lesson in Matthew 20 lesson makes the same point that Charles Schulz was making when he drew that particular episode of Charlie Brown. Indeed, Jesus makes several additional points in his parable, points which often upset long-time Christians, points which even can scandalize non-Christians who suppose Jesus Christ is supposed to be the kind of God who would comply scrupulously with the Federal Fair Labor Standards Act, particularly the sections dealing with wages.
Before applying the parable to our own lives, let me make some comments on details in the parable which will help us to see the point Jesus was making.
The setting of the parable is one that his disciples would easily have understood. For one thing, they would have recognized the vineyard in the parable as yet one more occasion in Jesus’ teaching when he was making a point about the nation Israel. Israel portrayed as a vineyard, and God as the vine keeper – this is very standard and well-known imagery from the Prophets of Israel.
Jesus’ disciples would also have been quite familiar with the labor market in those days. In fact, the labor market today for unskilled workers functions pretty much as Jesus describes it here – those who wish to work gather at a designated spot, and those who want to hire them come to the same place. There are negotiations between employer and employees, and the men who are hired are sent off to do the work, at the wages agreed upon.
In this case, the wage was a generous one. A denarius was the daily wage of a Roman soldier, and Roman soldiers were definitely NOT in the same category as unskilled agricultural workers. So, the landowner in the parable would be recognized by the disciples as offering a very generous wage for the work he desired.
Another detail that needs commentary here is the landowners repeated visits to the labor pool. Jesus says he comes back at 9:00 o’clock, noon, and 3:00 o’clock. In each case, he sent more workers to his vineyard, but in each case he simply says that he will pay them what is right. The fact that the workers go into the vineyard on these terms might suggest two things. It could indicate that the workers are really desperate for employment. Or, it could also indicate that the owner of the vineyard has a reputation for generosity. After all, hadn’t he already hired laborers at 6:00 A.M. for wages that were clearly above scale for that kind of work?
And, then, we come to the really odd thing: the landowner comes back to the market at 5:00 o’clock, and sends even more men to the vineyard, at a time when there is only an hour of work left in the workday! I think we can be confident that THESE workers are indeed desperate, if they’re still in the labor pool so late in the day. And, guess what? That high-paying landowner is the one who sends them off to his vineyard. What a stroke of good fortune that is! It’s only an hour’s worth of work, but they’re probably very hopeful that they’ll get far more now than they were expecting. Most of them had probably already given up hope of finding any kind of employment.
The biggest surprise, however, comes when it’s time to pay the wages. We know from first century accounts of labor management that the ordinary way to pay workers was first-come, first-paid. This landowner – already shown to be more than a little odd – pays off his workers in reverse order. The last workers are paid first, and the first workers are paid last. This reverse order of payment lets the first workers see what the last workers are paid, and to their astonishment, they see that the one-hour laborers are paid a denarius – the amount of pay for an entire day’s labor. Of course, the wheels begin to whir in their heads as they suppose they’re going to be paid a lot, lot more than they were expecting.
But, as the paymaster moves steadily toward them, they see that the 3:00 o’clock workers get the same wage: a denarius. And the half-day workers – the ones hired at noon – they, too, get a denarius. And, finally, it’s their turn, and they get a denarius. And they’re really frosted by now, and complain.
Of course, the landowner has them dead to rights. “Did we not agree on a denarius?” Well, of course, they had. There was no injustice here at all. What the early workers are really complaining about is the landowner’s generosity to the later workers. It’s his money, after all, and he can do with it as he pleases. Their complaint stems from their own evil eye. If the landowner wishes to pay all the workers the same, no matter how long they worked, he has every right to do so. No one is cheated; but many are blessed.
Now, what’s the point of this parable? The things we have just noted are among the many things one can profitably draw from Jesus parable, but he offers the parable as a parable of the Kingdom. He begins it by saying, “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard.” And, so, we must take Jesus’ overall point in this parable from this point of view.
Another clue to Jesus’ point here – and I think it is a decisive clue – is that enigmatic phrase at the end: “So the last will be first, and the first last.” That phrase appears at the end of the previous chapter of Matthew, Matthew 19, and it appears in the conversation between Jesus and his disciples after the Rich Young Ruler has gone away sad, because he is rich, and Jesus has asked him to sell all he has and to give it to the poor. This man is not only rich in material wealth, he appears to be rich in religious zeal, for he tells Jesus that he has kept the Commandments faithfully from his youth.
After the rich young ruler goes away, Jesus says something that astounds his disciples: ““Assuredly, I say to you that it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. 24 And again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”
This utterly flabbergasts the disciples, for they had the idea that material wealth was a certain sign of God’s favor. And, if those who are obviously the beneficiaries of God’s blessing have a hard time getting into heaven, then – well, “Who then can be saved?”
Peter goes further and points out to Jesus that they have all left everything to follow Christ. I don’t think Peter’s point is that the disciples have given up so much; rather it is that when they consider all they had given up for Christ, it wasn’t very much. Jesus had just told a wealthy man to give it all up, but the disciples? Compared to that rich man, what they had given up was nothing! So, could they expect anything by way of reward?
Jesus, of course, straightens out their thinking: In Matthew 19: “Assuredly I say to you, that in the regeneration, when the Son of Man sits on the throne of His glory, you who have followed Me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. 29 And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands, for My name’s sake, shall receive a hundredfold, and inherit eternal life. 30 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”
The rich young ruler is first – in wealth and in religious zeal; but he is last because he will have nothing in the Kingdom of God. On the other hand, the disciples are last – they are poor fishermen, a tax collector, a couple of mere lads, considered by the sophisticated inhabitants of Jerusalem to be hicks and hill-billies from Galilee. And, yet, it is these twelve who in the Kingdom will sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And, so: the rich young ruler on one hand, and the disciples on the other hand, are good examples of this very principle.
But, just to be sure they get the point, Jesus tells them a parable: 1 “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. …”
Because of how and why this parable of the landowner is used by Jesus, I think we must insist on two things:
First of all, this parable is NOT talking about individual rewards for faithful service, or for exemplary service. That idea also appears in Jesus teaching, in several of the parables on the stewards who are given resources and are rewarded according to how they have multiplied them.
Second, this parable, while not talking about rewards, as such, is definitely talking about the grace of eternal life. That is, in fact, what Jesus insists that all shall receive, IN ADDITION to a 100-fold recompense for what they have give up in order to follow Christ. There is a glory that comes to a man such as my father-in-law, for example, who was born into a Christian home, reared as a Christian, and labored faithfully in the service of Christ until the day he died at the age of 90. That very same glory was conferred on a man named Adolph Allen, who did not receive Christ as his savior until four weeks before he died at the age of 93.
A pastor named Jeffrey Straton preached Adolph Allen’s funeral, and I’d like to read a few lines from that funeral sermon. Pastor Straton paid a visit to Adolph Allen in a nursing home, and he describes that encounter like this:
“Two minutes into our discussion, Adolph Allen asked the question, “Is it fair for someone to live their whole life one way and then at the end of their life ask God to take them to heaven?” How would you answer that question?
“When I was a young pastor I tried very hard to explain its fairness in relationship to a loving God. I tried ever so hard to explain that God’s ways are not our ways. As a young pastor, I worked diligently to explain that God’s mind is not our mind and that we cannot fathom the depths of God’s perspective on the question, ‘Is it fair for someone to live their whole life one way and then in the final fleeting moments turn around and plead for mercy, and get it?’ …
“I used to try and do that. However, I found as a young pastor that 93 year old iron workers, while they may not know much about theology, they understand a lot about this world and a lot about life and a lot about what is fair and what is not. I have learned that 93 year old iron workers who are facing their last days on this earth and standing at the doorway of eternity have a earned a PHD in fairness. Those answers that I argued for the better part of twenty-two years don’t stand up under the scrutiny of ninety-three years of experience.
“You’ve heard the question. Those of you who knew Adolph can hear it in your ears right now. The strong, resolute yet raspy voice, halting mid-question as he labors to draw another bit of oxygen from the tube, ‘Is it fair for someone to live their whole life one way and then in the final fleeting moments turn around and plead for mercy, and get it?’
“ … In 93 years one learns to get to the point and ask an honest point blank question. In twenty-two years of ministry I have learned to answer in the same point-blank honest. When asked, ‘Is it fair for someone to live their whole life one way and then in the final fleeting moments turn around and plead for mercy, and get it?’ I answered, ‘No Adolph, it isn’t fair. But, Adolph luckily for you and me, God is not fair.’ “
And, pastor Straton went on to show how this is so from the parable that is our gospel lesson for today.
As most of you know, we have been praying for a few weeks now that God would be unfair with respect to the elderly mother of our sister Priscilla in Ohio. There’s really no better way to express it when we pray for God’s grace upon her, to soften decades of self-reliance, to open eyes that do not see, and ears that – at this point in her life – literally do not hear, to grant understanding to a heart that has never understood the gospel of God’s grace in Jesus Christ, so that in the closing days of her life – like those laborers called at 5:00 o’clock – she might receive a full payment of wages that she has not earned.
And, we make these prayers for two reasons. First of all, like those laborers in Jesus’ parable, we know God’s generosity, his goodness, his eagerness to send more and more workers into this vineyard, even at the very last hour.
Second, every one of us here are beneficiaries of God’s unfairness. We who possess eternal life have done nothing to earn it. All that we have TRULY EARNED in Christ’s service we shall get back, often multiplied enormously; but, beyond that, we shall get what none of us has earned: what Paul calls an eternal weight of glory.
God grant that we may heed Christ’s teaching, that we not be greedy or charging Him with unfairness, for fairness is actually the last thing we really need from Him. May Christ’s generosity and grace grow ever more clear in our own understanding, so that we may not complain against him, but rather serve him without fear and in expectation of grace beyond anything we imagine.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
