Sunday, March 5, 2023

Posted on Mar 03 2023

Matthew 20:1-16 Parable of the Generous Landowner
Bible Background: This parable (usually identified as “The Laborers in the Vineyard”) comes just before Jesus’ 3rd prediction of his suffering and death in Matthew. It is only found in Matthew. Like many parables, it upsets our expectations!

Digging Deeper: 1. “The Kingdom of heaven is like….” This intro alerts us to expect a different kind of teaching and truth. Where God’s will and God’s priorities are front and center, things are very different from the usual ways of the world.

2. This parable raises many questions: Why does the landowner go out 5x’s during the day to hire workers? Is s/he that desperate for workers? Or does s/he know that all these laborers need work and reward?

3. Only the first crew hired agrees to work for “the usual daily wage”. The 2nd group is told “I will pay you what is right.” This Greek word is the word for “righteousness,” for what makes for right relationships, right dealings with God and others. It’s an important biblical word and concept!

4. At the end of the day, why doesn’t the owner pay those hired 1st, first? And those hired last, last? It sets up the sense of unfairness and grumbling, and leads to the summary statement “So the last shall be first, and the first shall be last!” What are we to make of that?

5. Of course, this is no way to run a business; or the next day-what workers are going to labor all day, when they might labor for 1 hour for a day’s wage? But this is not a story of how to run a business. It’s a story of how the Kingdom of heaven works! So what might we conclude?
+In the parable, each worker needed a day’s wage to provide for self and family.
+The landowner is generous in making sure each person gets what they need.
+The landowner wants everyone to experience the dignity that work can confer?
+There may be many who can offer service in God’s kingdom who are waiting to be asked?

6. Scholars wonder if, by the time Matthew is writing his gospel, that there’s some conflict between those who had been Jesus-followers all along, and those who are “Johnny-come-latelys”. Just as, life-long Christians might be a little skeptical or jealous of those “death-bed conversions”, where someone might confess their faith in Christ at the very end of life-not having lived a life of faith. It is unnerving sometimes, to think that God’s grace is just as available to that person, as to the one who was faithful throughout life.

7. IF the landowner’s heart and behavior are something like God’s-what would you take from this parable? What’s more important? That all people get treated fairly? Or that all people get what they need? Is God’s grace ‘fair’? Or is it in some ways so much better than that?