Reflection of The Ven. Dr Deborah Broome

Grumbling and Grace

“For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire labourers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the labourers for a denarius for the day, he sent them into his vineyard. When he went out about nine o’clock, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and he said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went. When he went out again about noon and about three o’clock, he did the same. And about five o’clock he went out and found others standing around, and he said to them, ‘Why are you standing here idle all day?’ They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ He said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard.’ When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his manager, ‘Call the labourers and give them their pay, beginning with the last and then going to the first.’ When those hired about five o’clock came, each of them received a denarius. Now when the first came, they thought they would receive more; but each of them also received a denarius. And when they received it, they grumbled against the landowner, saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’ 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 the same as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?’ So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”              Matthew 20:1-16

So whose side are you on – the all-day labourers or the ones who came along at the end? 

Like many of Jesus’ parables, this is a provocative story, designed to make us think.  Those who’d worked all day assumed they’d be paid more.  They complained.  But the landowner – who’s astonishingly generous – said, “You agreed to the wage before it was paid” and “it’s my money and if I want to pay everyone the same thing, I can.”  The boss is generous – but the workers are vulnerable.  The late-hired workers weren’t lazy – they may simply have been the ones no one else wanted.  But still something inside us thinks “it’s not fair.”  This is hard for those of us who are concerned about fairness.  It challenges us.  It seems to tell us that God isn’t fair.

Because imagine if that’s how things worked today.  The principle of “equal pay for equal work” doesn’t always operate as it should, but think about how we’d react if people could sleep late and arrive at work in the late afternoon, knowing they’d get paid for the whole day, just like those who showed up at 9am.  The parable shows what it means for the first to be last and the last first – and that can feel threatening to those who identify as “first,” as “insiders” – even to insiders who should know how divine grace operates. Remember that the parable’s first audience was the disciples.  Maybe the story gets to us too, those of us who might be classed as insiders in the church.

Because sometimes, it’s the insiders who grumble – not against grace as such, but against grace shown to others they regard as less deserving.  We can even wonder sometimes whether grace undermines the whole idea of being good, maintaining standards, sticking to the rules.  We’re uncertain how to cope with a God who, like the landowner, pays not on the basis of merit but of compassion.  It’s a challenge.

This story isn’t exactly subtle.  It says God isn’t fair, in the sense that God doesn’t operate according to our calculations of fairness and reward.  God doesn’t give us what we deserve, and maybe that’s just as well.   Because if we got what we really deserved, we’d be a lot worse off.   All of us are human, fallible individuals.  There are times when we have failed to love God and love our neighbour, and if God gave us what we deserve we wouldn’t be so comfortable.  We aren’t merely observers of grace, we’re its beneficiaries.  So it’s just as well that God isn’t fair.

But still it can bother us, when we see someone we deem “less worthy” being blessed or honoured, getting a better deal than they should be.  After all, almost no one raises the issue of fairness when they are the ones who are favoured or privileged. 

We want things to be fair.  We want God to be fair.  But God isn’t fair.  Instead – God is extravagant.  God chooses to give gifts to those who complain – new blessings fresh every day.  God is the generous landowner who chose to pay the workers not on the basis of their merits or what they were entitled to, but on the basis of compassion.  Of grace.

And God’s grace isn’t something we earn.  We’re not entitled to it – even when we’re really trying to live a good life.  That’s part of the specialness of it – that it’s always undeserved, unearned.  There’s nothing we can do to earn the special favour God offers us, here or in heaven.  We are never entitled to grace – it comes from the extravagant love of God, that doesn’t give us what we deserve.  That goes further than it has to.  In the parable, Jesus invites us to move beyond fairness and into extravagant love.  He calls us to stop worrying about whether we’ve got what we believe we’re entitled to and whether someone else is getting a bit more.  He bids us remember God’s grace, God’s generosity and compassion, and invites us to show something of this grace, and generosity and compassion in our dealings with other people.  And when we do this, there’s no room for complaining.  Instead we can rejoice, and look for the blessings God wants to give us, coming to us fresh each morning.

Image credit: Vindemia Winery, Unsplash