25^th September 2011

Rev Dr Max Champion at St John's UCA Mt Waverley Sunday 18 September 2011

Lessons -- Isaiah 55:6-11; Matthew 20:1-15

'Do you begrudge my generosity?' (Matthew 20:15b RSV)

'It's not fair!' How often we hear this complaint from children; how common it is from adults too as we endlessly compare our 'situation'
unfavourably with the 'success' of others in every sphere of life -- education, work, sport, family, church and suchlike. 'It's not fair!'

The Parable of the Labourers in the Vineyard certainly is not fair to the early workers. They do a twelve-hour shift but are paid the same as those who work just one hour. Naturally, they grumble about the boss's unfairness to them. Surely this is a case for the Fair Work Tribunal!

The parable is scandalous -- unlike this similar Jewish parable (AD 325):

'A king hired a great number of labourers. Two hours after work began, he inspected them and saw that one man was more skilful and industrious than the others. He took him by the hand and walked up and down with him until evening. When the labourers came to receive their wages, he received the same amount as the others. Then they grumbled and said, "We have worked the whole day, against this man's two hours, and yet you have paid him the full day's wages." The king replied, "I have not wronged you; this labourer has done more in two hours than you have done in the whole day."'
(J Jeremias, Rediscovering the Parables, p110.)

If you were a lazy worker you would grumble at this parable. But you would have to admit that it is fair to reward workers in this way. Equal pay for equal work! That is what we would like Jesus' parable to say. But it does not! As always, we must listen for what we do not expect -- or like!

The point is 'that equal pay is given for unequal work . . . Who would not be outraged if someone else received the same pay for doing one-twelfth of the work?' (W Clarnette, Take and Read: The Year of Matthew, p57.) Both the Chamber of Commerce and the Trade Union movement would complain loudly about the unfairness of this arrangement. It undermines social cohesion and economic activity which depend on mutually acceptable principles of fairness. There is no way around it. The boss does not treat the workers fairly. The parable is about the 'injustice of God'! (W Clarnette, p58.)

It challenges the popular idea that social and economic equality is the primary purpose of our life in community. Therefore it shocks many Christians and Church leaders who think that the most important thing about Jesus is that he was a prophet of social justice, an advocate of 'equality for all'.

Stanley Hauerwas puts it like this: 'If there is anything Christians agree about today it is that our faith is one that does justice. You cannot be a Christian without a concern for the poor, the oppressed, the down-trodden -
- generally those who suffer from gross inequities, both within and between societies. . . . [This is well and good but] it is not [thought to be] enough to try to meet the needs of the poor and oppressed [which we must do]. We are told that justice demands that we must reshape and restructure society so that the structural injustices are eradicated forever.' (After Christendom? p45.)

Certainly we are not to treat people unfairly. God has created and redeemed us with a dignity that must not be demeaned. God blesses those who 'hunger and thirst after righteousness' (Matthew 5:6) or are 'persecuted in a just cause' (5:10). Christians must stand up for vulnerable people who are mistreated. That is not negotiable!

So, what is this parable about? It tells us that God's invitation to be part of the community of faith is extended to all, with complete disregard for the calculations that long-time we make about who is more deserving in God's sight.

Our ideas of fairness simply do not allow for the generosity of God. 'My thoughts are not your thoughts and my ways are not your ways,' says the Lord (Isaiah 55:8) of his mercy toward undeserving Israel, often portrayed as God's vineyard in the Old Testament. In Jesus' parable, God's open- hearted generosity is shown in the boss who goes out again and again to invite the late-comers to work in the vineyard. There is no suggestion that they are lazy 'dole bludgers'. They are simply waiting to be asked (v7).

The parable is not about industrial relations. Economic activity would collapse if the principles set out here were to be implemented. No -- it is about the nature of the Church's calling: whether people of faith see the magnificence of God's grace.

This is a parable about God's mercy to outsiders. The early workers are respectable, religious folk who have been members of the community of faith for generations. The late-comers are disreputable, irreligious folk whom Jesus had invited into his company throughout his ministry.

The God whose purposes for all have been revealed to the Hebrews and embodied in Jesus Christ goes out again and again to invite outsiders to participate in the Kingdom of Heaven (v1) -- God's vineyard. They are called to work beside those who have been called into the community of grace long ago -- to be equal partners in the work of the Gospel.

The parable tells us that, in the community of faith / Kingdom of God / God's vineyard, there is something more important than fairness. It is not that God is 'unjust', but that God's mercy and calling are utterly beyond our calculations of what is fair. There is no place in the Christian community for us to decide who is more deserving, more righteous or harder working and longer serving. Our life-together in the Church should be marked by the recognition that all of us are equally children of grace.

How rare it is for Christians to think of ourselves in this way. How often we calculate our worth by comparing ourselves favourably with others. How seldom we rejoice in welcoming or inviting outsiders into the community of grace.

Sadly, it is more common for us to be preoccupied with what we deserve for our service than to be delighted and astounded by the generosity of God.
Life-time members of the Church are often blind to the fact that God calls all of us -- early workers and late-comers alike -- into the community of grace. We often fail to see that we too, like sinful late-comers, have done nothing to deserve the welcoming grace of God. All of us are privileged to be called children of grace!

Is that how you see your membership in the Church? Do you see yourself as a child of grace? Do you pride yourself on being a long-term worker, comparing yourself favourably against others? Do you grumble at the unfairness of God in welcoming immoral or irreligious people and treating them with equal dignity? Do you wonder what the point is in being a good and faithful servant if bad and faithless people who accept the invitation get the same reward?

Why do many Christians who have given their lives 'to the Church' think that Jesus' parables are unfair? Why do they identify with the elder brother in the parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32)? Why are they sympathetic with the early workers in this parable? Could it be that, for all the hours of preparation that we have put into preaching, pastoral care, music, Sunday School teaching, property maintenance, finance and suchlike over a lifetime, we have missed the point of the Gospel?

All our church work and good deeds count for nothing if we have been deaf to the Gospel! Our work in the community of faith / Kingdom of God / vineyard should be a joyful response to the sheer grace of God. If we realised that we are called 'not because of any goodness of our own' but to declare his glory among the nations, then we would be delighted that irreligious and immoral latecomers too are welcomed into the Body of Christ.

Then our life-together would be marked by a deep sense of joy and gratitude, knowing that our life-together is a privilege that we have not earned and for which we have not volunteered. If we were to see things in this light, then we would be free to accept one another as 'equally undeserving beneficiaries of God's unexpected grace'.

The parable ends with a question: 'Do you begrudge my generosity?' We do not know whether the grumbling stopped. The response is deliberately left open so as to address the Church in every generation. We must decide where we stand: with those who are concerned about what is fair to them or with those who are so delighted at being invited into the Kingdom that they welcome others and freely and gladly do the works of mercy and justice without thought of what is fair to them.

-----------------

Rev Dr Max Champion is minister in the St John's Uniting Church, Mt Waverley, Victoria, Australia. Dr Champion is Chair of the Assembly of Confessing Congregations within the UCA.