Bill Gates is credited with saying to a group of graduating seniors, “Life isn’t fair; get used to it.” And there is certainly some truth in that statement. What is your response to this parable? It doesn’t matter whether you even affirm that life isn’t fair-get used to it; it doesn’t seem right. You have the fellow who works for one hour and he gets as much as the fellow who has worked over ten hours. Where is the justice or the fairness in that? How can Jesus be telling us that the kingdom of heaven is like this? Is this what God is really like? Is ‘Life isn’t fair; get used to it’ one of the messages that Jesus is trying to teach us in this parable?
Fred Sieger of our Saturday 5:30 service likes to point out to me on a regular basis the truth of location, location, location—he is a real estate agent. He has shown me that even a shabby looking relatively small house can be worth over a million dollars if it is in the right location (for example, on Siesta Key overlooking the Gulf of Mexico). In the Bible it is the same principle, but we call it context, context, context. In the gospel reading today, Jesus is explaining something to his disciples by means of this parable. But to understand what it is that he is explaining we need to look at what has just happened. In the previous chapter, several minutes before Jesus tells this parable, a young wealthy fellow came to Jesus and asked him, “What good deed do I have to do in order to inherit or earn eternal life?” Give me one thing to do, one big thing. I’ll get it over with and then I won’t need to worry about religion for the rest of my life. I can live carefree because I will have taken care of what God wants of me. I will have finished my religious obligations.” Jesus answered in so many words, (I am paraphrasing) “It’s not like that, your whole life has to change; your heart has to change; your attitude towards others has to change; your attitude towards God has to change; you need to stop depending on your money—in fact, give all your money away and then come follow me; if you do then you will have an inheritance in heaven, you will inherit eternal life.”
That certainly wasn’t what the man was expecting to hear. This was too hard; it was way too hard—the man didn’t want to do that! He was willing to dedicate a bit of his life to God and religion—but Jesus wants the whole of his life! He could not give God all of his life. So he goes away; the Bible tells us he went away sadly. But then Peter, who has been standing there listening, points to himself and the other disciples and says, “Hey, what about us? What will we get? We left everything behind to follow you.”
We are still in the context of earning eternal life -Jesus is still answering that question the wealthy young man asked. He tells Peter and the rest of the disciples: everyone who left houses and family for Jesus’ sake will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last and the last will be first. Many who are first will be last and the last shall be first? The disciples must have looked very confused. So, to explain this saying, he tells the parable we heard today.
In the parable the wages offered to the workman are a denarius; a day’s wage. What does the denarius represent in this story? Remember, go back to the wealthy young man—he asked what good deed do I need to do? How can I earn eternal life? The denarius here represents eternal life. The Landowner is God. Working in the vineyard is following Jesus, doing God’s work in your life. Jesus tells the young man and then his disciples, it is not a single deed—it is your whole life—one has to give one’s whole life earn this wage. Some people begin early in their lives to follow Jesus. These are represented by those workers who the landowner got to work early in the day. Some people start later, that is, they are older. Some start at noonday—they are middle aged. Some start following Jesus in the afternoon of their lives and some don’t start until their lives are almost over. The point is they all worked until the end. They may have started at different times, but they worked until the end of the day. So the first point of the parable is that to earn eternal life will cost you the rest of your life. It is not a matter of one big deed. It is a matter of a change of life, turning to God and following Jesus. And now it is easy to see what Jesus meant here about the many who are first shall be last; some of the disciples who were following Jesus from the first, will not be the first into the eternal kingdom—as a matter of fact, the thief on the cross gets there before they do and so does Stephen the first Christian martyr.
But how we inherit eternal life is only part of the point of the parable. Another point is when do we start, when can we start? In this parable the workers who started early in the morning are angry at the landowner for giving the same wages to everyone. These are like the older brother in the parable of the prodigal son. He didn’t want the Father to take back the younger son after he had squandered his inheritance and time on worldly pursuits. Yet the younger brother changed his life and wanted to come back and serve the Father. And the Father accepted him. This is the message of Jesus to have faith in him, to change our lives and follow him because he is the way to life. This parable brings out that you can start now. The point is that it doesn’t really matter what you have been doing up till now or how much time you have wasted in your life until now. It doesn’t matter if you have been a person just looking out for number one; or if you have just tried to get along on your own not being particularly good or bad. If you have been dishonest in business or on your tax returns, if you have been an adulterer, that doesn’t matter. The message of the parable is not what you have done with your life so far. What matters is what will you do now? We don’t know how much time we have left in our lives. It may be that we are in the last part of our day, but that’s OK because we can still follow Jesus and receive eternal life.
But how we inherit eternal life, and when we start to follow Jesus still doesn’t tell the whole story of this parable does it? The other primary point is the generosity of the landowner. The kingdom of heaven is not founded upon fairness per se but on grace—that is, on God’s generosity. It is not a matter of ‘Life isn’t fair; get used to it.’ The fact is, we don’t want justice; we want, we need grace. We need God’s generosity! Just like the workers who started late received landowner’s generosity in the parable.
So at the end we have two examples from which to choose. There is the young man who decided not to follow Jesus or the disciples who gave up everything to follow him. It is not an easy choice; it is a hard choice. It is not a matter of doing one big good deed and then we can be done with the matter. It is not just a little bit of religion either. Sometimes we think that we can wander in and out of the vineyard—that is, think about God now and then and that’s OK. No, it is a life spent in following Jesus. So you see it is a big decision, a huge decision. What have you chosen?
