Getting Paid with Jesus

Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost

September 24, 2017

Matthew 20:1–16

Getting Paid with Jesus

In the name of the Father and of the ☩ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Everywhere on earth good men expect: “First come, first served.” But it is not so in the Kingdom of Grace. Here the last will be first and the first last.

This seems awful. The innocent will be punished and the guilty will escape? But it is quite wonderful when we realize that the only Innocent One is Jesus Christ and we are all guilty.

In this Kingdom we who didn’t work get paid as though we did, and we are even invited to remain in the vineyard. On the other hand those who come and demand to be paid their fair wages, those who insist on justice, they get only what they deserve, and nothing more, and they are sent away.

¹²They said, ‘These men who were hired last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’ ¹³But he answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? ¹⁴Take your pay and go.

MATTHEW 20:12–14a NIV

Jesus’ “last-come-first” way is a scandal to good men because the Kingdom is not earned by the industrious or the good. It is given to the wasteful, to the lazy, to sinners. The only way to get in is through humility and repentance. It is to simply trust that vineyard owner will give us whatever is right. Those proud in their own goodness cannot obtain the Kingdom. Only those receive the Kingdom as a gift from the Lord’s generosity come in. That is the definition of grace. Grace is the undeserving last rewarded as first.

We can read this story and try to link up the workers to real people in our lives. The first workers can be lifelong Lutherans, the later ones are adult converts, and the last hired are deathbed conversions. But this would be a misreading of this story. The point is here, when the Master is explaining what had just happened:

‘Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? ¹⁴Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. ¹⁵Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’ ¹⁶So the last will be first, and the first will be last.

MATTHEW 20:13b–16 NIV

The response to the pay is the key. Unbelievers treat the denarius as though it was theirs’. Just like last week’s unmerciful servant who thought he just needed to time take back what was his own, these all-day workers wanted to be paid for their time. They think they belong to themselves. They think they have value independent from Christ Jesus. And receiving His gift would destroy their illusion of independence.

We are tempted into this illusion. When things don’t go our way in life, after we have been so good, we are tempted to grumble like the older brother in the Parable of the Lost Son. When the father rejoiced in the return of the sinful young son, the older brother fumed that he never got paid for all his obedience.

Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends.

LUKE 15:29 NIV

Like the prodigal father, the people of this world see our heavenly Father as unfair. And they’re right, but not in the way they think. God’s way is the way of grace and the cross. He makes the first last. All one of them: Jesus. And He “unfairly” makes the last first. All of us.

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve,

and to give His life as a ransom for many.

Mark 10:45