Matthew 20:1-16

The Grace of the Master

Septuagesima

February 12, 2017

Zion Lutheran Church T Nampa, ID

There’s an often heard complaint concerning many in our culture now, that of entitlement.  People who think that they are owed something, whether it be riches or fame or happiness. This is nothing new, it has always been so.  Even during the Exodus, God’s people complained that they deserved better. They wanted freedom, so God delivered them from Egypt. They wanted food, and so God gave them quail and manna. They wanted drink, so God gave them water. And all along the way they complained that it wasn’t good enough, that they wanted more and better and they wanted it right now. Like children, what they really needed was discipline and self-control, patience, endurance to run the long race ahead of them.

But are any of us that different? We often treat God with the same sense of entitlement, as if God owes us something, everything, just because of who we are or what we’ve done. We are confident of the Lord’s grace, we know we are sinners, and we all too often we treat our repentance as fake humility meant to earn God’s favor. If we’re sorry, God will forgive.  But if we’re really sorry, God will really forgive and really bless!

And here’s the unexpected twist. God doesn’t give what is deserved, but He does give what is good and right in His eyes. This parable Jesus speaks in our Gospel reading is not about justice and fairness. It’s not meant to be used a social propaganda for equal wages.  It is true, those hired first worked all day in the heat but they have no right to complain as they are sent away with only what is theirs.  Rather, it is a warning, an example of true worship against idolatry of good works.  It’s a call to repentance for a sense of entitlement when it comes to God.  God does not owe you, or anyone, anything. For reasons of His own, He loves and welcomes you into His kingdom, not for free, but paid for with blood of Jesus. This is the Gospel in a nutshell: The Lord rewards those who don’t deserve it. He generous, merciful, and good despite your complaints.

Jesus simply wants to show us how things happen in the kingdom of heaven.  Making the first last and the last first. All of this is said to humble those who are something, so that they would trust in nothing but God’s pure goodness and mercy. On the other hand, so that those who are nothing will not despair, but also trust in God’s goodness and mercy.

The focus of the parable here is not on what the denarius is, or the different hours, but on the earning and acquiring the denarius. Those who were hired first thought they had received it by their own work and the last ones hired by the Lord’s goodness.  Those hired last did not seek it, but it came to them because they sought first the kingdom of God. Those hired last do not pay attention to the Lord’s goodness but look to their own merit, and think that it is owed to them and grumble about it. They are the same as the Old Testament people of God grumbling in the desert over food and water. The Gospel comes and equalizes everything so that those who have done many works have no more value than poor sinner.

God’s way is not a very good business model. Businesses cannot pay workers who do not work. But this is how God operates. The worst existence on earth, the most poverty stricken and suffering of this world is better than what we all deserve in hell.  Even the unbelievers benefit from God’s grace, for He certainly gives daily bread to everyone without our prayers, even to all evil people. Every good thing – sunshine and rain and water and food, coffee and donuts and puppies and quilts – it is all a gift from God that flows His grace and mercy. It is His grace, and He does with it as He wishes.

By God’s grace we have received an invitation to enter His vineyard. We must follow this call. But the call is for laborers, not for idlers.  We are called to work with others and for others. To stand idle in the marketplace is bad, but it is worse to be idle in the vineyard.  The call to enter is a call to work. The Christian lif0e is hard work in the heat of the day, a hard battle and a hard race. The work has its reward, the battle its victory, the race its triumph. It is the denarius of eternal life, the crown of victory at the resurrection. You have been led into the sacrificial life of the Church, with the Word and Sacraments standing at the center. Woe to you if your life doesn’t correspond to God’s will. For the last will be first and the first will be last.  Like the fathers in the wilderness, they too received a baptism and supernatural food, yet they died in the wilderness and did not see the Promised Land. (Fred Lindemann, The Sermon and It’s Propers, Vol. II, 22)

No one is so high, or will get so high, that he does not have to be afraid that he may become the very lowest. On the other hand, no one has fallen so deeply that he cannot hope to become the highest because all merit is abolished and only God’s goodness is praised. When He says the first shall be last He takes away our arrogance and forbids us to exalt ourselves above anyone, even if you were Abraham, Moses, David, Peter, or Paul. But when He says, “The last will be first,” He prevents all your despair and forbids you to cast yourself below any saint, even if you were Pilate, Herod, Sodom and Gomorrah (Luther).

Just as we have no reason to be arrogant, we have no reason to despair. The middle path is established and preserved by the Gospel. We can have confidence in our salvation based not on yourself or how hard you’ve worked, but in Jesus. This is the character of the Gospel: Grace is undeserved and unearned and even unexpected. We are not workers overpaid, but we are children of the master of the vineyard, heirs with Christ of an eternal kingdom, running the race toward the crown of everlasting life.