Over the summer, I got in the habit of watching a now-discontinued game show called Crosswords during my lunch hour. In this game show, the show began with two contestants, who would ring in to solve the clues. Whoever got it right would gain a certain amount for their podium, and whoever got it wrong would lose that amount. About 1/3 of the way into the show were introduced the so-called “spoilers”. This was a row of three more contestants who, if the main two were unable to answer or incorrect with their answers, would be able to answer and assume one of the front podiums. One of the most frustrating things about this game show, and a factor which, I am sure, contributed to its early demise after only one season, is that it was possible for a player to do absolutely nothing all game, answer one word correctly at the end, and win the game. Unlike most game shows where there has to be consistent effort or performance in order to achieve the goal, this one seemed to be grossly unfair in how it rewarded its contestants—some very good contestants were shut out, and some very poor ones won. It seemed to be unfair. Granted, the players knew the rules before they started, and after a while, the viewers at home did, as well, but it still left an off-taste in one’s mouth from time to time. A person could basically do nothing and still end up with thousands of dollars in cash and prizes, whereas the people who had answered question after question right could be denied the victory they had worked toward the whole game.
It seemed to me that this game show was really quite a good illustration of how God’s wisdom and grace works vis-a-vis what you or I may see or hear. It is beyond offensive to us when we hear God’s Word denote who are the good ones and who are the evil ones, at times. For God doesn’t judge by human scales, he doesn’t apportion things according to human concepts of fairness or moral rectitude. Instead, He does things His own way.
Granted, you and I don’t live in a big game of Crosswords, where your podium can be taken away from you with one wrong answer. That’s not how God operates. If anything, the unfairness of God comes in the other way—God is just way too gracious for our sense of fairness, a lot of the time. That’s the point of Jesus’ parable for today.
I’d like to retell the parable for you at this time: A landowner has a vineyard, and it’s harvest season. The grapes are ready for the picking, and he needs labourers. This time of year back home, this is an easy parable to visualize, except you’d substitute an apple orchard for the vineyard. Literally hundreds of labourers would come up from Mexico and Jamaica to the area where my mom and dad live to work for the month or month and a half of harvest season, because they knew that if they worked hard, they’d make enough money to help them live in decent comfort the rest of the year at home. So picture you have a common area in town where all the workers who are available come together, and this landowner goes down first thing in the morning, grabs the most able-bodied workers he can find, and agrees to pay them a decent day’s wages. That’s what the value of a denarius was, then. A decent day’s wages. Not $30 an hour or anything like that, but a decent day’s wages. Nothing to sneeze at, and all they really needed.
The workers, who otherwise would have nothing to do, are more than agreeable to take this as a day’s pay. It gives them something to do and a decent amount of compensation. It’s a nice day for working, after all.
The landowner knows that he needs to get the harvest off today. While drinking his coffee over breakfast, he’s heard the weather forecast for tomorrow and there’s potential damage to his crop if he doesn’t get all the grapes harvested today. So he goes out again at 9 a.m. and hires a number more workers to go out and work on the harvest. He promises that he’ll be fair to them. And so, because they’ve already been sitting waiting for work for three hours, they go. 9 hours pay is better than no pay at all.
It gets toward lunch time, and checking the progress of the harvest, the landowner can see that he’s grossly underestimated the yield of his vineyard. He knows that he needs more people to work in his vineyard, so he goes back down to the marketplace at noon and, again at three in the afternoon. He hires a bunch more folks, promising to pay them fairly, and then checks on the progress. Now he can see they’re getting there, but there’s just not quite enough people to make sure it’s all harvested before the bad weather rolls in.
It’s getting toward evening, there’s just about an hour or so left before sundown, and the landowner goes one last time down to the marketplace, and finds a few more people lazing about. “Why are you still here, not doing anything?” he asks them. “Nobody hired us,” they reply. “Consider yourselves hired! Be at my vineyard in 5 minutes.”
So they head off to the vineyard, and, not really expecting much of anything at all, they go to work for an hour. The sun sets, and the vineyard owner is pleased to see that the harvest is complete, as the storm clouds slowly roll in over the horizon. Time to give out the pay for the day.
He starts with the ones that he has just hired. It’s a good harvest, and he’s feeling generous. It wasn’t the workers’ fault that nobody had hired them until the eleventh hour. “You, the guys who just started at five, come first. Then the three-o-clock guys. Then you, the nooners, then the 9am guys, finally, the ones I hired first thing in the morning. No shoving or jostling. It’s a great harvest. You’ll all get your pay.”
He hands out the pay envelopes to each person who started at 5 pm. One denarius. They were pleased as punch, and they started telling the rest of the guys in the line what they had got, as they walked back toward home. The three pm workers opened their pay packets. One denarius. They were pleased, too. Then the nooners. One denarius. Then the 9 am workers. One denarius. Then the ones who had worked through the full day. One denarius.
The guys who had started at 6 am were steaming mad. “What gives? You said it was a great harvest, and we’ve been slaving at it all day. You gave the new guys one denarius, and all we get is one denarius? Show us some fairness!”
“Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you and go. I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?”
You see, it’s not really a parable about a vineyard, or about how business owners should treat their employees (although it is good and important to note that this owner paid a decent, living wage to his employees, not just a minimum that allowed him to maximize his own profit margin).
It’s a parable about how God works in His kingdom. The “today” is this life. The harvest of souls is always a today thing. It doesn’t do for the people of God to sit on their hands and think that there’s always tomorrow to care about Christ, there’s always tomorrow to tell the good news of Jesus. No, it’s a today thing. This isn’t saying that if you’re a Christian, you have to be out beating down doors every day. This isn’t saying that you should feel guilty if you’re not planning a move to the deepest regions of Africa or Asia to bring Christ to those who have not yet heard. What it is saying is that every Christian, according to their own station in life, has a calling to proclaim Christ and thus work toward the harvest wherever they happen to be. A mother and father with their children, a worker in their workplace, a student at school, a friend amongst friends, and so on. Not belligerently, but as the situations arise, making use of the opportunities you have to give reason for the hope that is in you.
The Lord calls some at the very beginning of the day. Our church reflects this by teaching and proclaiming the value of infant baptism, that through the water and the Word of promise, God here creates faith and starts the little child on their way of faith.
Some are called early into the day. Young children, kids around confirmation age, who start getting interested in Jesus for the first time, who hear the Word of the Lord and rejoice in their Saviour and start to follow Him.
Some are called a little later in the day. Maybe around college age, or when you have your first child, or when a close relative or friend dies, and suddenly the Holy Spirit works through the Word of God spoken by a friend, and Christ awakens faith in you. Or you are at a funeral, and you realize that Jesus is your only hope.
Some are called only at the end of the day. One hears of death-row conversions of criminals, or think of someone who spends their whole life in the quest of the almighty dollar, who realizes when the stock exchange crashes and the Canada Revenue Agency comes calling and their kids can hardly wait for dear old mom or dad to die so they can divide the spoils how empty this life is. They drift into the church they have always gone to but this time their ears are open, and they hear for the first time of their sin and their Saviour, and with a new heart given them by their Lord Jesus, they believe and work for him for whatever little time they may have left.
And no doubt in Jesus’ own day, you could see these various groups as being the true Jewish people, called to be God’s own from birth, and various others joining under the promises of God, until you get the Gentiles who hear and believe in Jesus at the 11th hour of this world’s existence. The end is in sight!
Whichever way you may parse it, the key is that the master—the landowner—God the Father, is the one who calls and chooses and claims people to work for Him. He is the one who generously lavishes out the same living wage on all who follow Him—the wage of eternal life itself. As such, there is no room for begrudging others the same salvation which you or I have simply because they may come to it later in life, or because they don’t seem to be ‘good people’. Instead, there is that great urgency to bring the Word of salvation to all, so that all may come and be part of the great harvest feast at the end of the world. As the prophet Isaiah says in our Old Testament reading for today, “Seek the LORD while he may be found; call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the LORD, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:6-9)
God does things His own way, and now, when His word is spoken, when His voice is heard, now is the time when He is near. He calls all to repentance of our sinful ways and desires, calls each of us to daily pick up the cross and follow Him. Return to the Lord, and He will pardon you. Repent of your seeking out earthly goals and earthly ways, and follow Jesus only. For He is the one who saves you by His death on the cross, He is the one whose plan for you leads straight to eternal life. There is no other way to life than through Jesus only.
Work hard in His vineyard, then, knowing that eternal life is yours, not from your work, but because of His calling. Keep in His Word, in His grace, now and always! Amen.
Last updated September 2008 by the webmaster.