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
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