3"About the third hour he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. 4He told them, 'You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.' 5So they went.
"He went out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour and did the same thing. 6About the eleventh hour he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, 'Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?'
7" 'Because no one has hired us,' they answered.
"He said to them, 'You also go and work in my vineyard.'
8"When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, 'Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.'
9"The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received a denarius. 10So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. 11When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. 12'These men who were hired last worked only one hour,' they said, 'and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.'
13"But 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. 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?'
16"So the last will be first, and the first will be last."
Matthew 20:1-16
in my early memory of these verses, my reaction was similar to that of the workers who were hired first... it didn't seem just that those who labored only one hour should receive the same pay that was promised those who worked 12 hours!
in verse 15, the landowner says pretty much that he can bless whom he chooses to bless... then he adds, "are you envious because I am generous?" and that question put my jealous heart in it's shameful place!
what a privilege to be called to labor for harvest of the master... at any hour... it is a gift of Grace! it is joy enough to be counted among the workers.
1 comment:
i think our sense of God's grace becomes all the greater when we put ourselves in the place of the workers hired at the eleventh hour. we do virtually nothing yet get the same denarius as the other workers. to add insult to injury, we get paid first. our salvation is like that. we who are the least deserving have been "made equal to them who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day".
God's grace is like that. the thief on the cross enters into paradise, surely at the "eleventh" hour, being "made equal to" the many many saints and martyrs who have gone before and after, bearing "the burden of the work and the heat of the day". the saint who has labored and strived all his life for God's kingdom is no more deserving of God's salvation than the very worst of sinners. this parable starts making some sense when we come to understand this.
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