The Reward
Jesus isn’t telling strange stories like Aesop’s Fables for no reason, Pastor Chad begins. Jesus tells parables because of something He has experienced or seen.
In this instance, He is telling this parable of the vineyard landowner because of Peter.
If we go back to just before this parable, Matthew 19:27, we see Peter’s question. “What then will we have?” Or, to translate it into a more modern phrase, “what’s in it for us?”.
Pastor Chad points out that Peter has probably been chewing on this question for a while, and it sounds a lot like the question James’ and John’s mother asked.
A few years ago, Pastor Chad recounts, Peter told Jesus that he has no business being in His presence. He called himself unworthy. It seems Peter has forgotten this feeling. He has forgotten his unworthiness.
Instead he has been thinking about what he has given and given up. He has begun thinking of his service as a burden. It seems he has thinking about this for quite some time.
Pastor Chad turns the parable to the congregation. “The longer you sit in the pews, the more apt you are to forget how unworthy you are.” He then turns it on himself with the longer he stands behind the pulpit, the more apt he is to forget how unworthy he is.
We start to think of our service in this vineyard as something we have earned or are entitled to.
We forget how hopeful we were standing in that marketplace.
Moving along, Pastor Chad points out that of course there are some people we are okay with being ahead of us. People like Peter, St Theresa, C.S. Lewis should all receive a bigger reward than us, right? And vice versa, there are others that we should definitely be ahead of.
We want it to be fair.
But do we really?
Three years ago Peter was fully aware of his unworthiness. But give it time and a title, some success, some leadership, and the attitude starts to change.
The same can easily happen in the church, Pastor Chad points out.
Then he emphasizes there is only one landowner.
The sermon could end here, but Pastor Chad wants to bring a few more applications to light.
The first group of workers was upset because they were comparing their pay. The comparison made the pay unfair. If no one else showed up to work, they would have been perfectly happy with the pay and not complained.
Pastor Chad told a story. Imagine a father adopts a son. This father and son have a long life together building a bond and enjoying one another’s company. In the father’s old age, he adopts another son, a teenage punk. Shortly after the father dies. When the judge sat the two sons down to read the will the inheritance was split evenly. The inheritance was not pro-rated based on time as a son.
The reward was being in the family. Being a son in the first place was the reward.
In the kingdom of heaven, the reward is there for all of us.
This parable isn’t for some faraway kingdom that we get to when we die. Do you really think anyone is grumbling up in heaven, Pastor Chad asks.
This is a parable for here and now. We’re prone to grumble because we are prone to compare.
For context, when Jesus was doing His ministry, the Jews thought of themselves as God’s chosen people. How do you think that made them feel about their national identity? Pastor Chad is pretty sure they weren’t going to forget that when they began following Jesus. But there is no such thing as a favored person. There is no such thing as a favored nation.
In fact, Christianity won’t allow it because we are all equal at the foot of the cross.
All of us are equal in His grace.
