Reading 19
The workers hired last
The reading
Matthew 20:1-16
"For the Kingdom of Heaven is like a man who was the master of a household, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. When he had agreed with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard. He went out about the third hour, and saw others standing idle in the marketplace. He said to them, 'You also go into the vineyard, and whatever is right I will give you.' So they went their way. Again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did likewise. About the eleventh hour he went out, and found others standing idle. He said to them, 'Why do you stand here all day idle?' They said to him, 'Because no one has hired us.' He said to them, 'You also go into the vineyard, and you will receive whatever is right.'
"When evening had come, the lord of the vineyard said to his manager, 'Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning from the last to the first.' When those who were hired at about the eleventh hour came, they each received a denarius. When the first came, they supposed that they would receive more; and they likewise each received a denarius. When they received it, they murmured against the master of the household, saying, 'These last have spent one hour, and you have made them equal to us, who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat!' But he answered one of them, 'Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Didn't you agree with me for a denarius? Take that which is yours, and go your way. It is my desire to give to this last just as much as to you. Isn't it lawful for me to do what I want to with what I own? Or is your eye evil, because I am good?' So the last will be first, and the first last. For many are called, but few are chosen."
The companions
Psalm 145:8-9
The LORD is gracious, merciful, slow to anger, and of great loving kindness. The LORD is good to all. His tender mercies are over all his works.
Jonah 3:10-4:11 (selected)
God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way. God relented of the disaster which he said he would do to them, and he didn't do it. But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry. He prayed to the LORD, and said, "Please, LORD, wasn't this what I said when I was still in my own country? For I knew that you are a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and you relent of doing harm." The LORD said, "Is it right for you to be angry?" [...] The LORD said, "You have been concerned for the vine, for which you have not labored, neither made it grow, which came up in a night, and perished in a night. Shouldn't I be concerned for Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred twenty thousand persons who can't discern between their right hand and their left hand, and also much livestock?"
A word for the week
Someone once got the same reward as you for a fraction of the work, and you felt it, that hot flush of it is not fair. The new hire who makes what you make after twenty years. The sibling who coasted and got the same inheritance. It is among the most human reactions there is, and Jesus walks straight into it with a parable designed to offend your sense of fairness, and then to show you something better than fairness.
A landowner goes out at dawn to hire workers for his vineyard, and agrees with them on a day's wage, a denarius, a fair rate. Fine. Then he goes out again at nine, and hires more; and at noon, and at three, and even at five in the afternoon, with only an hour of daylight left, he finds people still standing idle and sends them in too. Come evening, he pays them, and here is the scandal: he starts with the ones hired last, and gives them a full day's wage, a whole denarius, for one hour of work. So the ones hired first, watching this, naturally assume they will get more. And they get exactly what they agreed to. One denarius. The same.
And they are furious, and honestly, you feel it with them. These last ones worked one hour, they say, and you have made them equal to us who bore the whole day and the scorching heat. It sounds like a reasonable complaint. It sounds like justice. And the landowner's answer is the hinge of the whole parable. Friend, he says, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what is yours and go. I choose to give to this last man the same as to you. Is it not lawful for me to do what I want with what is mine? Or is your eye evil because I am generous?
Hold that last question a moment, because it exposes something in us. The first workers were not actually underpaid; they got exactly the fair wage they agreed to and would have been happy with, right up until they saw someone else get the same for less. Their joy was not stolen by the landowner. It was stolen by comparison. Grace given to someone else made them bitter about a deal they had gladly accepted. And that is the disease this parable diagnoses: the resentment that curdles in us when God is generous to people we think deserve it less.
Because that is what it is really about. It is not a lesson in labor economics; it is a picture of the kingdom, where the deathbed convert and the lifelong saint receive the same astonishing gift, full welcome, full sonship, the same denarius of grace. And something in the dutiful heart hates that. The older brother of the prodigal hated it. The all-day workers hate it. We hate it, when we are honest, because we have been quietly keeping score, expecting our long service to earn us more than the latecomers get.
But here is the mercy in it, and it is enormous: grace is not fair, and thank God, because none of us actually wants what is fair. If God paid us strictly what we had earned, we would all be in trouble. The good news is that the landowner is not fair; he is generous, wildly, offensively generous, and the same generosity that welcomes the last-hour worker is the generosity you are standing in yourself. The only thing that can spoil it is watching the wage of others instead of the gift in your own hand.
At the table
Whose "undeserved" blessing have you resented, keeping score of your own longer service? What would change if you looked at the gift in your own hand instead of the wage in someone else's?
Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (public domain). The divine name is rendered "the LORD" in the companions.