Is God Fair?
This morning I will be reading the Parable of the Laborers in
the Vineyard. Let me put it into context. Before this Peter tells Jesus
that we, the disciples, have left everything and followed him, what is our
reward? Jesus tells him that they will all sit on 12 thrones, but know
that many that are first will be last, and the last first. After this
parable, the mother of James and John comes to Jesus and seeks his grant
that her sons will sit on either side of him in his kingdom. Jesus tells
her it is not his to grant and she does not know what she is asking. He
concludes that whoever would be great among you will be a servant of all.
Throughout history people have either loved or hated this parable I am
about to read that is in response to our sense of entitlement and life
being fair. You decide what you feel.
Read Matthew 20:1-16
I love
electricity, don’t you? Yeah! I had no TV and no computer for five days;
and I had to go begging to get my cell phone charged. Who still doesn’t
have power? Who had power nearly the whole past week? Raise your hands.
Now what do you guys without power feel about these folks who didn’t
suffer at all while you did? Perhaps you feel just a little envious? Did
they deserve such good fortune over you? Of course, you would never say
that aloud. Not like those grumblers in this parable. Life is not fair.
There
was a really long line of cars at the Chevron gas station for several days
this week. I haven’t seen that since the gas shortages of the middle 70s.
Were any of you in a line like this for gas or ice? Raise your hand if you
were. I saw Chevron blocking off all entrances to their pumps but one so
that nobody could get in line ahead of others who had been waiting. No
“Johnny-come-lately” could cut in that long line. If you had been waiting
for 30 minutes for gas and someone just drove up and got to a pump ahead
of you, I bet you would have been some kind of mad, right? It would not
have been fair! You would feel anger and rage just like these laborers in
this parable we read. Somebody got something ahead of you when they did
not deserve it. Life is not fair.
And
you know what is even worse? It is when someone gets something really good
for nothing. What do you feel when you think about welfare cheats? What do
you feel when a derelict who has not done an honest day of work wins $10
million in a state lottery? What do you feel when a co-worker who has been
on the job just a few months receives your hoped-for promotion when you
have put in years of service? There is a rush of anger when others who
have not worked as hard as you have received such rewards and good things
happened to them. Life is not fair.
It is
not fair that you have to stay at home all the time with your sick spouse
while your friends take exotic trips. It is not fair when your retirement
investments are devastated in this terrible stock market. It is not fair,
says the 16-year old, when her friends get to stay out until midnight and
she has to be in by 10.30. Life is not fair, but at least our God is fair.
Uh oh.
Do you
think God is fair? We keep score…does God keep score? If we keep score
because we think somehow we have to earn our way into receiving God’s
grace, then we must think that God keeps score, too. When we live with the
belief that we will someday stand before God’s throne and He will have a
checklist in front of him, how will we compare with others? When score
keeping is the means of a relationship with God, then we will always
resent those who God appears to bless more than us.
Let’s
look at what Jesus says about God’s perspective in this parable. The
vineyard owner went out early in the morning to a street corner to hire
some day laborers for a denarius (a small Roman coin and subsistence
wage). They said to themselves, “Hooray for us” and gladly took the wage,
never looking back at their fellowmen who were not chosen and never
questioning their good luck. Oddly enough this owner went back to this
street corner and hired others at 9, Noon, 3, and 5 in the late afternoon
and promised them a fair wage. Then he paid them with the LIFO method –
Last In and First Out so that the early workers could see that the late
workers were paid a denarius for doing so little work. They grumbled, “It
is not fair!” The vineyard owner addressed their ire by stating that he
paid them what he had promised and did not break their contract with them.
Why are you so angry? “Are you envious because I am generous?”
Which
group of workers do you identify with – the first ones hired or the last
ones hired? Choose! Now why do you stand where you do? Where you stand in
this line determines how you feel. If one of the first hired you feel
resentment; if one of the last hired you feel joy. The irony is that we
don’t mind when we get something that we don’t deserve, but we do when
others receive such a gift.
Jesus
is not talking about a fair God but about a generous God. Put in front of
you a fair God who keeps score like we do where we have to earn our way
and a generous God who gives us his mercy and grace. Of course, we want a
generous God because we just can’t be sure about where we would stand with
a God who judges us in a tit-for-tat manner.
When
we focus on rewards for ourselves is where we get confused about God. I
know the Bible speaks frequently about eternal life as a reward, and I
know that many Christian churches make your personal salvation from hell
the central issue of faith. But this is where things go wrong when we
concentrate on our own reward. Our eyes are focused on ourselves, and that
is precisely where God says we are not to focus them. Jesus wants us to
focus on others and to serve them just as he serves others. A disciple is
not greater than his master.
Remember the parable about the sheep and the goats where the sheep were
not aware they were doing anything deserving of a reward, and the goats
said that they would have done good if they had known that there was a
reward attached to it? The sheep were rewarded because they did not love
others for the sake of the reward.
So let
me spell this out clearly, and I want you to say it over and over again
throughout the week to yourselves. We do not earn God’s love. We do not
earn God’s love. We do not earn God’s love. We respond to God’s love. And
that’s that! When we allow God love to come to us, we begin to live in
His grace. The love of God opens up our eyes and hands and hearts enabling
us to love others. There is no more score keeping or comparison. We do not
give and live for others in expectation of a reward but live in gratitude
to God’s grace. Gratitude is our attitude. We can keep score and live in
envy and anger at others, or we can live joyfully in the love we receive
and engage life with the spirit of generosity. Joyful and abundant living
is the will of our Father in heaven.
Jesus
wants us to understand his Father and see from His perspective. God loves
us – the early, the middle and the latecomers. That is the bottom line.
There is not one single thing we can do to merit God’s favor. We are all
sinners and fall short of the glory of God. We have no claim on God. In
God’s time we all arrive at 5 o’clock in the afternoon and not early
morning. So we can stop keeping score and being angry, resentful or
envious of others. We can respond with joy to God’s mercy and grace. We
cannot get more grace then others because we have received all the grace
we need. There is more than enough for all.
We do
not need to look anymore for a fair God. Just be thankful for the generous
God we have.
