Monday, September 15, 2008

Today’s text

Matthew 20:1-15

'Now the kingdom of Heaven is like a landowner going out at daybreak to hire workers for his vineyard. He made an agreement with the workers for one denarius a day and sent them to his vineyard. Going out at about the third hour he saw others standing idle in the market place and said to them, "You go to my vineyard too and I will give you a fair wage." So they went. At about the sixth hour and again at about the ninth hour, he went out and did the same. Then at about the eleventh hour he went out and found more men standing around, and he said to them, "Why have you been standing here idle all day?" "Because no one has hired us," they answered. He said to them, "You go into my vineyard too." In the evening, the owner of the vineyard said to his bailiff, "Call the workers and pay them their wages, starting with the last arrivals and ending with the first." So those who were hired at about the eleventh hour came forward and received one denarius each. When the first came, they expected to get more, but they too received one denarius each. They took it, but grumbled at the landowner saying, "The men who came last have done only one hour, and you have treated them the same as us, though we have done a heavy day's work in all the heat." He answered one of them and said, "My friend, I am not being unjust to you; did we not agree on one denarius? Take your earnings and go. I choose to pay the lastcomer as much as I pay you. Have I no right to do what I like with my own? Why should you be envious because I am generous?"

Reflection

You obviously never had to deal with labor laws, Jesus, or an office full of bean counters. And we all count beans one way or another.

Few things raise our hackles so much as the co-worker who glides into the office hours after others have been at their work--and then leaves with the rest at the close of the day. Their lackadaisical tack toward their tasks is salt in the wound of our labor.

I know, Jesus: This parable appears to have in mind those Gentile believers who came late to the kingdom and its work, long after the Jews and the first believers had struggled in the heat of the day. So maybe this has nothing to do with the irritating and irresponsible work habits of our colleagues.

Maybe it’s this simple: We are welcomed into full participation in labors and joys of your kingdom no matter when and where we enter it.

Maybe the point is that you don’t judge the way we do. Maybe your unjust story shakes us from the bean counting ways we normally think.

Maybe we are intended to think less about ourselves and more about you--and the joy you seem to get from drawing more and more souls into your work of life. Maybe you want us to share that joy.

Maybe you take equal delight in the work of the guy who cleans the floor as you do in the bishop, the professor or the orator who moves many hearts on Sunday.

Maybe. I won’t pretend to have real understanding, except of one thing: You are a generosity beyond what my heart and mind can comprehend. And for that I am most thankful.

Pr. David L. Miller