God's Grace

From the Bible, we're gonna read from Matthew chapter 20, verses 1 to 16. And this is a parable, and I just wanna lead us this morning through this parable and mine it and dig into it and see what God has to say to us from this little, little parable. Well, it's a longer parable. Matthew chapter 20, verses 1 to 16. For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire men to work in his vineyard.

He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard. About the third hour, he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, you also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right. So they went. He went out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour and did the same thing.

About the eleventh hour, he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, why have you been standing here all day doing nothing? Because no one has hired us, they answered. He said to them, you also go and work in my vineyard. When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.

The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received the denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more, but each of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. These men who were hired last worked only one hour, they said, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day. But he answered one of them, friend, I'm not being unfair to you.

Didn't you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?

So the last will be first, and the first will be last. I think one of the ways we can look at parables, and that I want us to look at this parable this morning, is to look at some of the characters who are involved in the parable. And this isn't how we should interpret all parables. It is an always useful method, but sometimes it's helpful to sort of unpack, you know, what God is really trying to say to us with this quite strange parable when you think about it. And so I want us to look at some of the characters, and there's really only, I guess, two characters, or one is an individual and the other is a group that I want us to look at.

The first character that we meet in this little parable is a farmer, a vineyard owner. He goes out, as we read, early in the morning. He goes out at 09:00, and he gets some workers to work in his vineyard. He goes out three hours later at 12:00 to this marketplace, and this was common in ancient times where if you wanted work for the day, you'd rock up to this place where all the workers stand, and then hopefully someone comes and says, I've got a job for you, and they take you away and you work. That's how it works.

So he goes out again at 12:00. He finds more people there. He takes them and they work. He does it again at 03:00 in the afternoon, and then he does it again at 05:00 in the afternoon. And when pay time comes, at the end of the day, as we've read, he says, I'm gonna pay all of you the same amount of money.

Those of you who work for the one hour from five to six, and those of you who work the whole day, I'm gonna pay you exactly the same amount of money. And we need to understand, first of all, about this parable that this is not. Jesus is not making a point about sound economics or about how to run a business or about labour practices. I mean, let's be honest, this guy will be burnt if this lesson is a lesson about, you know, how to be a business owner necessarily, and people have done that. You know, far left wing groups have hijacked this parable and said, yeah, well, look.

It's really workers have a right, you know, to be reimbursed and to own the money and the resources. They were entitled to that. It doesn't matter, I guess, how long they've worked or not. It's for workers' rights. Far right leaning groups have hijacked this parable and said, look towards the end, it's the owner, the master who has the right to decide what he wants to do with his own money, and sort of spun the parable to suit their purposes. And at the end of the day, this has nothing to do with economics, nothing to do with politics. Jesus tells the parable, really, to push us to the question, especially on the point of this character. Why did he do it?

Why did this landowner engage in this insane activity of paying someone a full day's wages for one hour and so forth? What's the point? And I want to quote a scholar here, a guy named Montgomery Boyce. I'll get my first slide cracking. Montgomery Boyce, this guy writes the answer.

He answers the question: did this landowner, this farmer, why did he do this? He says this: was it not because he knew they, this is the workers, needed the denarius? When we read the story carefully, we notice that not a word of criticism is spoken against those who were not hired in the morning. When the master came and asked them, why have you been standing here all day doing nothing? They replied, because no one hired us.

Apparently, they had been willing to work. They were eager to work, and undoubtedly they needed the work, but they had not been hired. Where do you think that the owner hired them not for what he could get out of them in a few hours, but because they needed the work and because he paid them the full denarius for the same reason? The owner was not thinking of profit. He was thinking of people, and he was using his abundant means to help them.

Wow. Do you know what this guy is saying? Is it this business owner couldn't stand the thought of going to this marketplace and seeing unemployed poor people who have hungry children and wives and families to feed at home and knowing that on that day, the day might pass and they have earned nothing. And out of compassion, moved by compassion, He gives them work. He helps them.

He supports them. And of course, it doesn't take much, I think, to jump from parable to real life. You know, as we listen to the stories of people who know this master, it's Jesus, don't we often hear of how people were in this marketplace, a hopeless place, desperate, with no help? Maybe this morning, you're one of those workers in that marketplace. Maybe yours is a physical marketplace where you're out of work, and you don't know where the sustenance and provision for your family may come from in the future.

There is great uncertainty. Maybe you're in a spiritual marketplace this morning. You're unsure of what God is, that what's the meaning of life, that death, what's true, what's not. Maybe you're in an emotional marketplace or a relational marketplace where you're in such despair over broken relationships and things in your life that are not going as they were meant to. You feel hopeless, desperate.

You know, if you are in that place, I think on this point, we need to get out of this parable that we have a master. His name is Jesus, and He's filled with compassion. You need to know that He cares for you more than He cares for anything else. We can reflect on the greatest story of our world, which really is a marketplace. And think on Christmas that we have just celebrated, the story of where the master of this marketplace came to us, came into our world.

And through that, came into your world and said, I want to help you. I want to come to you. I want to show you my compassion, my love, my care, my grace to you. So I'll remind you this morning, if you are in that, I guess, a temporary situational marketplace, turn to the master. Have faith in this loving, kind, and generous master who wants to come into that place where you are, and wants to help you, and wants to lead you out of there.

He can do it because He has already done the bigger job of dying for us on the cross as we celebrated on Christmas. And that's the first thing that I just want us to reflect on. First point, really. I have there, we are. Maybe you got there, we are.

God loves to give to people who are in hurt and in need. We see that in this little, little parable, this owner who loves to give, who is compassionate, who is kind, who is generous. And then we move on, maybe to the second group of people: the early workers, those who started early in the morning. You know, we read about them.

So when those came, this is sort of the point where the day's work's been done and now pay time comes. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner and said, these men who were hired last worked only one hour, they said, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day. This is a confronting question for us.

The question is: did these workers have a right to demand the full pay? I mean, or to demand more pay at least. They have a right? I was at the Christian Reformed Churches of Australia's national youth convention last year in January, and there was an interesting little scenario that actually made me think of this little parable. We had a group of boys from a church, it was Redlands, who paid as you go to convention. You get the choice for your accommodation to either pay for camping or you can be in a dormitory or you can be put in a cabin with your own en suite bathroom.

And so we had a group of boys who paid for camping, but as the conference sort of unfolded, we needed more parking space down the oval, and so tent space needed to be reduced, and we had empty spaces in the dormitory accommodation. And so we said to these guys, well, you know, there's seven of you. There's a dormitory here of six beds. Do you want, do you guys want a free upgrade to come into the dormitories? And it was a good move because it was in Tasmania.

It was quite cold. It was raining. The weather was miserable. But I remember that at some stage during the week, one of the guys came to us, and he was the guy who had to sleep on the ground. Because there were seven of them, there were only six beds.

And so he had to sleep on the ground on a mattress. And he said, oh, he really sort of started complaining. He said, oh, I think this is really unfair, you know. The rest all get to sleep on beds, and I have to sleep on this little mattress in this tiny spot here. I think this is unfair.

I need you guys as the organisers to arrange a bed for me. And it took me to this parable, and I thought, does he have a right actually to demand that he paid to be camping? He's supposed to be down on the grass in the wet and the mud. Who are you really to come and ask for an upgrade to a bed from the floor where you're at least dry in your little dormitory? These workers, do they have a right to demand more pay, more privilege?

And then we need to reflect on this, I guess, spiritually as well. I think this is where the parable wants to take us. Ultimately, do we have the right to demand anything of God, of this master? And I think the Gospel cuts so sharply here for us. I wanna look at the story to answer that question.

Do we have a right to demand anything of God? The story says this is the master's response to this servant, the ones who were hired first. Friend, I'm not unfair to you. Didn't you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go.

I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I'm generous? I'll make a couple of points here.

Firstly, we need to understand from this parable that God does not owe any of us anything. Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? He is the owner. He owns the money. He owns the grace.

You know, we all deserve and we always will deserve to be sleeping in a tent in the cold and the rain. In a spiritual sense, we are sinful people. They prayed that this morning beautifully. We sang that this morning beautifully. Wretched people in our own sinfulness.

We deserve nothing else from Him than His wrath. We don't deserve Him. We don't really deserve a relationship with Him. We don't deserve to be helped by Him. In our sin, we have offended Him.

And if you're not familiar with the concept of sin, I think today I can challenge you again, you know, look honestly and deeply into your own heart long enough and deep enough, and you will find that none of us naturally like God or wants to worship Him. No human being on the face of the earth except for Jesus is okay with the idea naturally of being ruled and governed by someone other than ourselves. And this puts us in this position. It puts us in sin. It makes us needy people in the marketplace with no rights before the owner.

The best we can hope for is for a benevolent, loving, and gracious owner to come to us and out of His own goodness and love and grace and mercy, spend some of His money on us. Of course, the theme is grace. We are entirely dependent on Jesus who comes to us out of His love, out of His grace, and gives His life to us. Give us completely the opposite of what we do deserve: the forgiveness, the love, the restoration to a loving God who wants to be with us.

God does not owe any of us anything ever. That's the next point. And then the next one to add to that out of this little bit is this: an interesting one. We should not envy in this little parable the eleventh hour people. Now it's interesting to see that the early workers, their gripe with the eleventh hour workers is you have made them equal to us.

They're jealous. They're jealous of these eleventh hour workers. They're envious. And the owner says that. He says, are you envious?

Because I am generous. You know what's going on here? And I guess the first people who read this had to interpret this through Jewish people. Jewish people who have journeyed with God since the beginning of time. For thousands of years, they were the covenant people.

The people from whom Jesus came, and they have, for so long, walked with God. And then Jesus came, and the gospel goes out, and they're jealous because now people are brought into a relationship with God who haven't done the hard yards, if you like, who haven't been there for the thousands of years, and now it's just open. They can become Christians. And then there's this jealousy almost that pans out in the Bible. I think sometimes in churches, this is the case.

You know, sometimes people who have served in the church long and hard and who have suffered much for Jesus may ask themselves, aren't all my hard years, the many things that I have given up, the many things that I have denied myself, isn't this a waste compared to this person or that person who came to know Jesus only later in life, on their deathbed, came to know Christ? Isn't it unfair that I have had to sacrifice so much for Jesus over seventy years, and this person sacrificed nothing and still get the same prize as I do? Sometimes the church struggles with this. Think of the sports, the surfing, you're on the coast, that you had to give up for church. Think about the friends and family times that you sometimes had to give up so that you can participate in the life of the church.

Think about the luxury stuff that you had to give up buying because you take seriously giving and honouring and glorifying God by your money and your resources. Surely, surely, sometimes we as Christians think that we're done in a little bit, who've done all the hard yards and working hard and borne the heat of the day as the parable speaks. And we realise that we get the same reward as the person who comes to Jesus on their deathbed. Well, the point that I'm making here is simply that we should never do that. We should never envy eleventh hour workers, eleventh hour Christians.

And I wanna talk to young people. You've got a lot of young people here this morning, and it's great. And I wanna talk to you in particular. You know, if you, even at a young age, feel the strain of following Jesus, and you think that for the rest of your life, you may be required to walk with Jesus and sacrifice much for Jesus. I don't want you to be discouraged by that because here's the reason why.

You know, the early labourers had the privilege of being taken from that marketplace first. They were the people who should really think we have been rescued first. At a young age in the home in which I grew up, already, I got to know Jesus. I got to be introduced to a life of freedom. That is a privilege.

It is an immense privilege. Those early labourers are the ones who could, at the end of their lives, look back and say, yes. We have suffered a lot. But wasn't it an honour? Wasn't it a privilege to have worked with Jesus and for Jesus for my whole life?

Wasn't it, you know how people sometimes, after you've, I think sometimes our Anzacs are still a good example of that. You know, those who can celebrate the fact that they have been there, they've made a difference. And we could be those people at the end of our lives if you've come to know Jesus early, so you know, I've been there the whole time. I've gone the whole hog. I've put in everything to follow Jesus Christ and celebrate that.

You know, the eleventh hour Christian can look back on their lives, and I bet you now that all of them would look upon their lives, and they'd be saying, if I can do it all over again, I'd love to have been picked first. I'd love to have known Jesus early in my life. If I can have my life again, I would be the person in the marketplace putting up my hand and say, Lord, I wanna be with you. Pick me first. They think of all the or perhaps the meaningless pursuits, the meaningless pursuits that their lives held.

And Paul is a good example of this in Philippians 3, verses 7 to 11. I wanna just read this to us. When he talks about his confidence in the flesh. Philippians 3:7-11. Paul says this: but whatever was to my profit, I now consider loss for the sake of Christ.

What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish that I am again Christ and be found in Him. Not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ. The righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I wanna know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death, and so somehow to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Paul looks on his whole life, and he was in many ways an eleventh hour Christian, and says, I consider all of that rubbish for the sake of having Christ. It is a privilege. It is a joy to know Him early and to suffer with Him and for Him. So young people, people who might be tired of the Christian life, worn down, despaired, I hope that this parable and these words this morning may encourage you to see the wonder of the grace and the privilege of serving in the heat of the day with Jesus. And then I wanna wrap this up, finish off.

You know, Jesus bookends this parable. If you read carefully, you'll see that the last verse just before He tells this parable actually says, those who will be first shall be last, and those who will be last shall be first. So He says that in chapter 19, verse 30. And then He returns to those words again at the end of the parable. He says, so the last will be first, and the first will be last.

What does that mean? What does it say? I think to those of the Jewish faith who would read this first, they need to understand that they were who may be last. And the last, the Gentiles, may be first. To those in the church who historically have claimed God and said He's our God, and we own Him, and we can demand stuff of Him.

All throughout church history, invariably, the church has at many times done that. Church needs to understand that they may be last, and others may be first. To individuals who think that we deserve God, that we can demand things of Him, we need to understand that you may be last, and others might be first. The point, it's really the summary point for today is this: nothing matters in life but receiving God's incredible grace.

Nothing else. We need to look to this master and receive Him, receive His grace. That's the only thing that matters. We can't do anything to deserve it. We can't do anything to earn it.

We have no rights. We can only look to Him and ask Him for His grace to help us, to take us out of that marketplace. I've read Oliver Twist a few months ago, and I struggled my way through. But one of the things that Charles Dickens says in that is this, and I want to finish with this quote. He said, Oliver Twist is a story of two orphans who are on the outside.

I guess their lives were sort of on the marketplace. Oliver is an orphan, and eventually, the story is one of how he makes his way into a loving family, a caring family, and safety. And the book sort of wraps up with this. It says, I've said that they were truly happy. These are the orphans.

And without strong affection and humanity of heart and gratitude to that being whose code is mercy and whose great attribute is benevolence to all things that breathe, happiness can never be attained. Happiness, friends. Fullness and satisfaction in life is going to come from that being whose code is mercy, whose great attribute is benevolence to all things that breathe. The great master of the vineyard who comes to us in the marketplace and pulls us out without us deserving it. Let's pray to that master.

Father, thank you that You are a gracious, a loving, and a compassionate God. Lord, I wanna pray for each and everyone here this morning. We may all be in different places in our walks with You, and yet we recognise that each of us invariably are struggling with something. Invariably, each of us is a worker standing in the marketplace, hoping for a way out. And Lord, I pray that You will step into each of these situations.

Lord, whatever it is that we battle and that we struggle with, may we find that You, that master, will come into it for us, that You will take us out. We thank You, Lord, that in the greater and bigger picture, You have taken us out already, out of our sin. Lord, Your grace has already been at work in our lives. Pray for those maybe here this morning or maybe in connection with this congregation who still are stuck in their sin. I pray, Lord, that You will take them out as well, that they will turn to You, look to You, and find You.

Lord, will You help us on our journeys as Christians to remember that we cannot demand anything of You. Keep us always thankful that You have shown us grace. Lord, make that grace fresh to us every single day. And every single time we gather, may we remember it and celebrate it and say thanks for it. Father, we pray, and I pray for Christians here this morning as well who are tired, perhaps, who are weary.

Lord, those who are wondering if it's all worth it even, I pray that You'll fill them with a great sense of enthusiasm and passion again. Renew their first love for You. Set their hearts on fire again. Lord, may they rejoice in the fact that they can walk this long journey with You. And Lord, will You fill them with Your spirit and enable them to walk this journey well, to bear the heat of the day, so that we may all reach the end and say it was fantastic to have served Jesus.

Even the tough stuff, we certainly don't regret. Thank you, Lord, and we lift up all these things to You, and pray that You'll bless us richly in Christ. Amen.