Life in Unfair – Praise God.

 

You can watch the video of this sermon on Youtube here. It will premier at 8pm AEST on October 6^th.

Introduction

A few weeks ago we looked at how Jesus warns the rich about how hard it is for them to get into heaven. It is not because being rich is a sin or wrong. It is because we can become enamoured with our wealth and it can make it harder for us to see Jesus.

We also recently had a guest speaker come to us and talk about ministry that he and his team do in Thailand. And we got to see the difference between how many of the Mong people of Thailand live today and how we live.  We got to see true poverty. Some of us have seen it up front and personally because we have visited countries like that, or have done ministry with the homeless.

Here in Australia, most of us are often tossing up how much should we spend on a holiday, or whether we should get the new iPhone or Android. Or should we get that new jacket, upgrade the car, or is our old computer still good enough to do what we want it to do and so many other first world problems. We do this while there are people who are praying it does not rain because their tin shed has developed a new leak, and they have nowhere for their chickens to sleep tonight.

In other words, this world is not entirely fair, is it? It really is not fair.

How often do we hear our kids shout out, “that is not fair!” How often do you think, “life isn’t fair!” When you are passed over for promotion. Or your car breaks again. Or your marriage starts to struggle. From small things to large things we often focus on how life is not fair. And the truth is that it isn’t fair.

This cry in us that life is not fair comes from a twin source: It comes from that inherent desire for justice that we all have gotten from our creator. We are created to desire justice. But it also comes from our inability to accept that this world is not the world where everything is made right.

Jesus speaks into this with his parable this morning. He knows that his teaching is causing opposition with the Pharisees and other Jewish leaders. He has just challenged them on their views on marriage and so many other things. Let’s see how Jesus addresses this issue.

Who Owns The Land? Whenever we read the parables of Jesus we tend to do one of two things, 1) we immediately seek to apply them individually to us and think about who we might be in the parable, or 2) we try to allegorize them and see who each of the characters represent. But we should take a step back from doing either of these things first, and we should ask this question, who did Jesus tell this parable to and why? If we do this we will handle them more responsibly. So, who did Jesus tell this parable to?

The first option is it could be the Pharisees, in Matthew 21 not long after this we read, “45 When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he was speaking about them. 46 And although they were seeking to arrest him, they feared the crowds, because they held him to be a prophet” (Matt. 21:45-46).

When the Pharisees hear Jesus’ parables they immediately recognize that he is challenging them. They correctly understood what Jesus was saying.

But this parable of the labourers in the vineyard comes a few verses after Jesus has said this, Matthew 19:23, “23 And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven.”

So, is Jesus talking to the Pharisees here, or the disciples? If you read the context in Matthew 19 you will see that Jesus has entered Judea, that he has the disciples with him, and a whole crowd is there. Then the Pharisees come up and challenge him. Then the disciples ask him some questions. Then some children come up to him. Then the rich man comes up to him, then Jesus addresses the disciples again, and then he tells this parable.

So, I would argue that Jesus told this parable to the disciples, but he wanted the Pharisees to hear it. He is building up to a powerful confrontation with the Pharisees that is going to culminate with him confronting them very directly in the next few chapters, but here he is doing it by encouraging the disciples while warning the Pharisees.

What is he warning them about? He is warning them about who really owns the land, Matthew 20:1, “1 For the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard.” Or as the NKJV puts is, “a landowner.”

The kingdom of heaven is like a man who owns a vineyard, and he wants to employ some people to steward that vineyard. We know from scripture, that the vineyard of God is a picture of Israel. Isaiah sings a parable of the vineyard in Isaiah 5, and in that song he sings these words, “7 For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, And the men of Judah are His pleasant plant. He looked for justice, but behold, oppression; For righteousness, but behold, a cry for help” (Isa. 5:7, NKJV). Jesus is using ancient biblical imagery to talk about his kingdom, his people, his land.

So, what Jesus is doing here is reminding both the Pharisees and the disciples that he owns the land. He is the master, he is the landowner not them. Israel never owned the land, the Pharisees especially need to hear this message. They had come to see themselves as the rightful owners of God’s land, they thought it was owed to them by God. But this had never been God’s intention. God’s intention was only ever for them to be stewards, “23 The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine. For you are strangers and sojourners with me. 24 And in all the country you possess, you shall allow a redemption of the land” (Lev. 25:23-24).

When God told Abraham that his seed would inherit the land and hold it forever, he meant Jesus, and those who trust in him. Jesus is here to claim what is rightfully his.

The landowner here even makes an agreement with them for their stewardship of the land, symbolized here by the wages he offers them, “2 After agreeing with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard.” It is clear here that Jesus is seeking to challenge the Pharisees, and as we go through the next few chapters you will see that escalate. But he is also seeking to encourage the disciples here.

They have given up everything to follow Jesus, Matthew 19:28-30,

“28 Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. 29 And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life. 30 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”

Right now the disciples appear to be at the bottom of the kingdom of God, Israel. The leaders of Israel shun them and see them as untrained buffoons. They follow a guy who has nowhere to lay his head and who is opposed by the religious leaders at every point. A man claiming to be king who has no crown, no throne, and no army. And the vineyard is currently being tended by others.

But this is all going to reverse.

We Are Not Owed Anything (vv. 3-16) – Part of the way Jesus challenges the Pharisees and encourages the disciples is by reminding them and us that we are owed nothing,

“3 And going out about the third hour he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, 4 and to them he said, ‘You go into the vineyard too, and whatever is right I will give you.’ 5 So they went. Going out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour, he did the same. 6 And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing. And he said to them, ‘Why do you stand here idle all day?’ 7 They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ He said to them, ‘You go into the vineyard too.’ 8 And when evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last, up to the first.’ 9 And when those hired about the eleventh hour came, each of them received a denarius. 10 Now when those hired first came, they thought they would receive more, but each of them also received a denarius. 11 And on receiving it they grumbled at the master of the house, 12 saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’ 13 But he replied to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? 14 Take what belongs to you and go. I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you. 15 Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?’ 16 So the last will be first, and the first last.”

There is a lot going on in this passage, but it all centres around one message: the owner of the vineyard does as he sees fit.

Come back to chapter 19 with me, I have only touched on this passage briefly, some of you may have thought I intended to gloss over it, but this verse is integral to what Jesus is doing here, and in the coming chapters. Here Jesus says,

“28 Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. 29 And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life. 30 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”

I mentioned this way back earlier in the series on Matthew. But why does Jesus pick 12 Apostles? The answer is obvious, he is a fan of hot cross buns, they always come in 12 packs, right? No, the answer is because he is the God of Israel and he has come to shake his up kingdom up and recorrect Israel and put her back on the correct course.

12 Apostles are chosen, because they represent the fullness of God’s congregation, or Church, the 12 tribes. These 12 Apostles will be chief stewards in the people of God. Things are being reversed. That is what Jesus’ parable is reiterating.

Remember, God made a covenant with the Hebrews at Sinai, “2 After agreeing with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard.” He made an agreement with the Israelites when they came out of Egypt to tend to the vineyard, to steward the land of Israel. They were his hired workers.

But the Israelites forgot two things: 1) they forgot that God wanted them to bring others into the vineyard, 2) that it was always God’s land and not theirs, and their stewardship was conditional on faithfulness.

The fact that God wanted to make foreigners citizens of Israel was right there from the start. Firstly, Abraham was a Babylonian. Tamar the mother of most of Judah’s descendants was a Canaanite. Joseph’s wife was an Egyptian, and the foundation of Israel had mixed heritage too: Exodus 12:37-39,

“37 And the people of Israel journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children. 38 A mixed multitude also went up with them, and very much livestock, both flocks and herds. 39 And they baked unleavened cakes of the dough that they had brought out of Egypt, for it was not leavened, because they were thrust out of Egypt and could not wait, nor had they prepared any provisions for themselves.”

Israel was founded from “a mixed multitude”. Many people forget this.

The heart our God has for bringing more and more people from all over into his kingdom is seen clearly in this parable. God’s heart is a welcoming and generous heart,

“3 And going out about the third hour he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, 4 and to them he said, ‘You go into the vineyard too, and whatever is right I will give you.’ 5 So they went. Going out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour, he did the same. 6 And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing. And he said to them, ‘Why do you stand here idle all day?’ 7 They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ He said to them, ‘You go into the vineyard too.’”

What is God doing here? He is welcoming more and more people into Israel, granting them access to the kingdom of God. One of the biggest mistakes Israel ever made is forgetting that their nation was not created for them to just have it, the land was not given to them to just hold. It was always God’s intention for them to be a vehicle of his grace to this world.

They were supposed to attract people to the goodness and blessings of God. Instead, they became insular, closed off, standoffish, haughty, evil. This is seen in their response to God’s grace to others,

“8 And when evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last, up to the first.’ 9 And when those hired about the eleventh hour came, each of them received a denarius. 10 Now when those hired first came, they thought they would receive more, but each of them also received a denarius. 11 And on receiving it they grumbled at the master of the house, 12 saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’”

The master, our Lord, gives each labourer a denarius. The first group agreed to the terms, and they got their agreed upon reward, “2 After agreeing with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard.” But then they see the generosity of the master to the other workers and they are upset, “11 And on receiving it they grumbled at the master of the house,…” This isn’t fair, they cry!

And when you think about it, their response is entirely rational. If you agree to work for $500 a day, and along comes all these other workers who do way less and also get $500, you would feel ripped off too. Even though you got exactly what you agreed to work for.  

But the truth is none of us are owed anything by God. None of us are owed citizenship in the people of God. But God offers it to all who would accept it anyway.

Generosity – This is because generosity is the heart of the master of the land, generosity,

“13 But he replied to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? 14 Take what belongs to you and go. I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you. 15 Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?’ 16 So the last will be first, and the first last.”

The context for this parable is very similar to the Parable of the Prodigal son, the Pharisees are getting angry. We see in Luke 15:1 this, “1 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. 2 And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them.”

The Pharisees here in the parable of the vineyard are just like the older brother in the prodigal son parable. They see Jesus going around and opening up the kingdom of God to everyone and anyone and they don’t like it.

But Jesus is going to do even more than that, he is going to promote his disciples to the throne room of Israel, remember, he is going to make them the judges of all Israel. He is going to completely reverse everything.

This is what he means by the fact that that “the last will be the first, and the first will be the last…” He repeats this statement twice, once at the start of the parable and once at the end. Jesus is telling the leaders of Israel that a reversal is coming, those they did not think were worthy will be raised to the highest honours in Israel. But he is also encouraging the disciples that they have made the right choice. Though they are last they will be first.

And here is the kicker, it is not because the disciples are better people, or greater, or even more righteous. In fact, I would be willing to bet some of the Pharisees were what we would think of as good people, great people, noble people, based people, upright people.

Many of them were the kind of people you wanted leading your church, being elders, teaching your kids, getting elected to parliament and more. Even Jesus implies at times they had a high standard of righteousness.

But this is not what counts in the kingdom of heaven, what counts is the grace of God, “14 Take what belongs to you and go. I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you. 15 Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?’”

God can do what he wants. What were the Pharisees owed in the kingdom of God? Nothing? What were the Jews or Israelites owed? Nothing. What were the disciples owed? Nothing. What are we owed? Nothing.

None of us are owed anything from God, and we fall into error when we think we are.

If the greatest honour we ever receive is being the least in the kingdom of heaven, a mere shoe cleaner at the door of the King’s house, then we have already received more than we ever deserved and should praise God eternally for the gift. Psalm 84:10, “10 For a day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness.”

This is what the Pharisees and Jews did not understand, that the disciples were beginning to understand.

Paul taught the same thing.

We Don’t Want What We Deserve (vv. 17-19) – We often talk about getting our own, getting what is fair, getting what we deserve. But this world is broken, we are corrupted by sin, we should be thankful we do not get what we deserve, because if we did there is only one place we deserve to go, hell. But you know who else did not get what he deserved, Jesus. We go on to read in Matthew 20,

“17 And as Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside, and on the way he said to them, 18 “See, we are going up to Jerusalem. And the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death 19 and deliver him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified, and he will be raised on the third day.”

Why did Jesus know that it was in Jerusalem that he would die? Of course, you can say it is because he is God the Son, and God knows all things. I think this is a fair answer. But I think we can be a little more specific, because the Bible tells us more than that, it is more specifically because God knows the heart of the man, and the heart of the religious structure in Jerusalem was evil.

I don’t want to get into a big discussion here about how God’s power and sovereignty interacts with human choice and free will. That will take us down a big tangent. I simply want to note this: God did not have to control the actions of the Jewish leaders to know exactly what they would do. He knew their hearts, and he knew the unrepentant evil within them. When evil is confronted with good, it lashes out. When evil has the power to do as it wants it will crush good. Every time.

This world is ruled by evil. It dominates in so many areas. In some areas more than others. Even in the hearts of mankind it reigns in many. When dark evil sees a bright light like Jesus all it wants to do is smash it so it will stop hurting its eyes.

The light in Jesus was clear. You can see how the various people in Israel responded to him. There is even a scene where a crowd of soldiers recoils in fear from Jesus when he proclaims, “I am he.” (John 18:6). How the wicked were going to respond to him was guaranteed. The evil in them guaranteed it.

But he didn’t deserve that.   

And the only way we can avoid getting what we deserve, is because Jesus did not get what he deserved,

“18 See, we are going up to Jerusalem. And the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death 19 and deliver him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified, and he will be raised on the third day.”

If you want to think about what you deserve, look at the cross. That is what you deserve, that is what I deserve, what we all deserve. The wages of sin are death, punishment and judgement. That is what we deserve. 

He didn’t deserve that. He is the only one who did not deserve that. But evil reared itself to seek to destroy him, and in doing so he took the punishment for our sins, he took the wrath we deserve. When the devil attack Jesus he could only succeed because it was his and the Father’s plan anyway.  

All you have to do now to escape that wrath is repent, or turn from your sins, and trust in him.

Application – So how do we apply this sermon today?

Remember, God owes no man anything. No man. When God made a covenant with Abraham, he both made the oath, and fulfilled the promise in Christ. This is the kind of God we have. He is beholden to no man, and when he needs a man to fulfill salvation, he takes that role on himself.

Remember, to show the same grace to others that God has shown to you. Imagine if God was as demanding with you as you can sometimes be with those you love, those who have hurt you, those who owe you something. He who has forgiven much will forgive much. Never forget what you have been forgiven.

Never allow yourself to be insular and cut off from the world. The Israelites made that error and it sent them on the wrong path.

Don’t look with envy at those you think God has been more generous with. What you see in this life is not how things are going to end up. Those who appear to be first will be last, those who are last will be first.

Remember, if you want to get everything you deserve you only need to do one thing, reject Jesus. And then you will get what is coming to you in the next life. Or, you can accept the generosity of the Father and the Son, who even though they owe us nothing, offer us all full citizenship in the people of God, and the salvation that comes with that. The choice is yours. Let’s pray.