Last First, First Last
Transcript Search
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Like every passage in the Bible, in today’s Gospel reading, context is king. The first word in our reading is “for” because Jesus intends this parable to explain what he’s said moments ago. In fact, our English Bibles put a chapter break here, but Jesus is still continuing his discourse from the end of chapter 19. At the end of that chapter, Jesus is asked by a wealthy young man, “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?”
And behold, a man came up to him, saying, “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?”
We all know this story, and we know that it ends with Jesus telling the young man to sell all that he has and to give it to the poor. But...
When the young man heard this he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
Jesus then tells the disciples that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of heaven, and the disciples are astonished, and ask, “Who then can be saved?”
When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?”
They ask this question because of how they understand God’s blessing to work in the world, i.e., those whom God favors, he blesses with material wealth. So, if it is as impossible for a divinely blessed, rich person to enter the kingdom of heaven as it is to fit a camel through the eye of a needle, then who possibly could be saved? Now, to be clear, Jesus presumably is referring not to all those who are wealthy but specifically to those who love their money more than him, like the rich young man.
Jesus then responds to their amazement by saying that with man it is impossible, but with God, all things are possible, and if this was our text for this Sunday, I’d probably be preaching for 15 minutes about God as the initiator of human salvation and waxing eloquently about how the first move is always from God to us and never the other way around, but I’ll save that for a different Sunday.
Peter seems to seize on this moment. He just heard Jesus tell the rich young man to sell all that he had and give it to the poor and then he would have treasure in heaven. So, if Jesus values poverty, in particular, poverty by choice for the benefit of others, then Peter thinks to himself, “What about us? We must have all kinds of riches heading our way.” So he says to Jesus in verse 27:
Then Peter said in reply, “See, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we have?”
Jesus replies:
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.
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.
Peter is probably rubbing his hands. Maybe it won’t be right now, but Jesus just said that he is going to be rich when it really matters. And then Jesus says one more thing.
But many who are first will be last, and the last first.
Our parable this morning is intend to explain this last verse. It explains why Jesus, as Peter and the others are already counting in their heads the hundredfold blessing their going to receive, says, “But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”
I won’t rehearse this morning’s parable in detail since we all heard it minutes ago, and it’s printed on the insert in your bulletin. Suffice it to say that the master of a house hires laborers at different times of the day to work in his vineyard. When it comes time to pay the workers, the master of the house tells his foreman to pay first those whom he had hired last. Those hired last, even though they hadn’t worked the full day, receive a full day’s payment. Those who had worked the full day, seeing what those who had only worked part of the day had received, expect to receive even more. They too receive a full day’s payment. They, are like Peter, looking around at others, like the rich young man who had walked away from Jesus, and they too are already counting the extra blessing they are going to receive. As we might expect, those who had worked the full day complain, but Jesus replies,
But he replied to one of them, ‘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?’
And then, referring back to the last verse of the previous chapter, he says,
So the last will be first, and the first last.”
There are a few points I want to make regarding this parable and its context.
We are not the arbiters of God’s grace.
We are not the arbiters of God’s grace.
First, we are not the arbiters of God’s grace. Some people are called into the church from a very early age. My children were baptized as infants. Some people do not repent and turn to Christ until their death bed. Some people seem to us like good people, the kind of people we would expect to be recipients of God’s grace, while some people might seem to us to be the wrong kind of people, and while we might never say it out loud, internally we might wonder if they’re the right kind of people to receive God’s grace. Thanks be to God we don’t make these decisions about other or ourselves. God’s grace is for all people, and he is free to dispense it as he pleases without input from you or me. We don’t earn it. We don’t control it. We have no say in who receives it. God is the one who decides who receives his grace and when they receive it.
God’s grace is divinely equitable.
God’s grace is divinely equitable.
Second, God’s grace is divinely equitable. That is to say, we might not think the way God dispenses is grace is fair, but it’s not up to us. The master in this parable treats everyone the same. The reward, which includes in context at least entrance into the kingdom of God, is not based on how long one has worked for God, how much one has sacrificed, or how much one things he or she deserves. Everyone in the story gets the same reward for their work regardless of how much work they’ve done. We might question from our human perspective the fairness of a employer who pays everyone the same regardless of how much they work, but the fairness of God’s grace is not measured by our standards but by his.
Therefore, we are not to serve with rewards as our ultimate goal.
Therefore, we are not to serve with rewards as our ultimate goal.
Third, and as a result of the first two points, therefore, we are not to serve with rewards as our ultimate goal. This is a little tricky, but place yourself in the shoes of the vineyard workers for a moment. Why were they grumbling at the end of the day? They were grumbling because they expected to receive more. The issue wasn’t with the master of the house setting wrong expectations. The issue wasn’t that other people had been blessed beyond what was, by our reckoning, appropriate for the amount of work they had done. The problem was, as I would say it was with the case of Peter, their own expectations about what God to do for them because of their hard work.
Then Peter said in reply, “See, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we have?”
The call to follow Jesus, as we see in the immediately following scenes, is the call to serve others, even to the point of death. In what follows, Jesus predicts his own death for the third time, and then the mother of James and John come to him, presumably at their behest, and asks for her sons to sit at his right and left hand in his kingdom. You see, the disciples all throughout the beginning of this chapter and the end of the last one are concerned about what they’re going to get, about what their reward is going to be. That’s not what Jesus wants them to be doing. The reason this is tricky is because that’s not what Jesus wants them to be doing. Jesus does not want them focused on how many treasures they are storing up in heaven, that, in case it’s not obvious, is simply another form of the struggle the rich young man had. That doesn’t mean there aren’t rewards waiting out there for them just beyond the horizon. Jesus clearly says there are. But, we are not the arbiters of God’s grace, and despite what we make think, his grace is divinely equitable. When all things are sorted on the last day, we may very well be surprised when see that the last by our reckoning were first by God’s, and vice versa. So don’t focus on what you’re going to get. Instead, focus on serving. Focus on being as faithful to the task God has given you as you possibly can, and trust that God will work it out in the end. And no matter what, as Jesus says, do not begrudge his generosity.
Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?’
That generosity is our only hope.
Amen.