Reverend Gregg D. Wood
Proper 20, Year A, 2011
The Gospel for today, the parable of the laborers in the vineyard, is rather disturbing.
What happens? A landowner goes out to hire laborers for his vineyard. He hires some early in the morning, and agrees to pay them a certain fixed wage: one denarius. (We don’t know exactly what a denarius was, but it must have been an acceptable wage for a day’s work or else the workers would not have agreed to it.) Then throughout the day he hires more workers, each of whom works for progressively shorter periods. The last ones hired work for only one hour. But everyone receives the same pay: one denarius.
We can imagine the state of those who worked all day. They began in the cool of the early morning. As the sun rose higher in the sky they begin to sweat. As the long day drags on, no doubt the muscles in their legs, their shoulders, and their backs begin to ache. Their whole bodies long for an end to the grueling labor. Finally, when the sun has set and these tired, bedraggled workers go to collect their pay, they find that the Johnny-come-latelies are to receive exactly the same pay as those who worked all day.
On the face of it, then, this is a parable about unfairness. Nothing we can say will mitigate the fact that the landowner’s system of payment was unfair. He did not give equal pay for equal work.
Unfairness of this kind is characteristic of the world we live in. While many employers will try to pay their own employees more fairly in relation to one another--paying more to those who bear more responsibility, or use higher skills, or have more experience in the field, than those who have less--when we look beyond a single employer we find a lot of unfairness. Some athletes and entertainers earn huge sums for having fun, while people who do difficult jobs in the public interest, like police, firefighters, and military personnel, earn ordinary salaries. Some CEO’s earn 500 times what the average employee earns, even when the company’s financial position is not improving. We are all familiar with these conditions so we have become de-sensitized to the unfairness involved. We don’t expect fairness in a market economy, and maybe we should not. But we would like to think, wouldn’t we, that there ought to be some relation between the effort, skill, and risk we put into something, and the reward we get out of it, and often there is not. It’s just unfair.
Going back to the parable, we find that the workers who worked all day are not about to accept the situation calmly. They complain to their employer. “These last have worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us, who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.” And how does the landowner reply to this? He says, “Friend, I am doing no wrong; did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage?” The employer points out that he acted quite properly within the terms of his agreement with these men. How the others are paid is his business, and it doesn’t diminish the value of either the work or the pay of those who worked longest. Finally, he asks: “are you envious because I am generous?”
And here the landowner touches on one of the great perversities in human nature. When our neighbor is doing badly, we may be concerned about him and try to help him, but usually only to a limited degree. But as soon as our neighbor starts to do better than we, we cry foul.
Sometimes people who have suffered a history of oppression and deprivation are given preferential treatment, for example in hiring or college admissions. Then there is an outcry: this is unfair! It’s reverse discrimination! The question that bothers me is this. All these people who are crying foul when the unfairness may be happening to them: where were they when it was happening to someone else? Why is our keen sense of envy, when someone else might have a little advantage over us, not matched by an equally keen sense of righteous indignation when the injustice is happening to others?
So one lesson from the parable might be: if you yourself have been treated justly, don’t worry about your neighbor who seems more fortunate than you. If you must be concerned about your neighbor, then be concerned about the neighbor who is less fortunate than you. To be upset when your neighbor is more fortunate than you -- that is envy. To be upset when your neighbor is less fortunate – that is compassion.
But there is more to be learned from this parable of the laborers in the vineyard. So far we have spoken only about the human aspect of the parable, what it says about relationships between human beings. But it is also a parable about God. Clearly the landowner represents God, and in his dealings with the workers something is being said about the relationship between God and his people.
Let’s take a closer look at the deal that the landowner makes with each group of workers. To the first group, those who arrive earliest, he agrees on the amount they are to be paid. One denarius, which our version translates “the usual daily wage.” So the first group could be called bargainers. They bargained for certain terms, and a price was agreed. Thus there is a contract which binds both parties. The workers may like or dislike their employer, they may trust or mistrust him. It doesn’t matter because there is an enforceable contract binding them and him. If they do their part, a day’s work, they can be sure of receiving what they have bargained for.
Sometimes we think of our relationship with God in these terms, like a bargain. In the Old Testament, God is often depicted as making covenants, or bargains, with his chosen people the Israelites. “You worship me and keep my commandments,” says God, “and I will protect and expand your nation.” It is a quid pro quo. We do something for God, and God will do something for us.
There is plenty of evidence in the Bible, and especially in the Old Testament, that God is willing to bargain with us. Perhaps the most famous case is Abraham bargaining for the city of Sodom. God decided to destroy Sodom because it was such a wicked city. But Abraham intercedes and pleads with God: Fifty righteous men? – Forty-five? – Forty? – Thirty? – Twenty? – Ten? God allows Abraham to bargain him down from fifty to ten. Alas, it is all to no avail; there are not even ten righteous men in the city, and it is destroyed anyway. But the point is that God is sometimes willing to bargain with us.
Now let’s look at the deal that was struck between the landowner and all the other workers he hired throughout the day. “At nine o’clock, he sees 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.’”
I will pay you whatever is right. Would you take a deal like that? Speaking for myself, I might or might not take such a deal. I think it would depend on how well I trusted the person who offered it. If I trusted him to treat me right, I would accept; if not, I would walk away.
Three more times, the landowner goes out and makes the same kind of deal. At noon, at three, and at five o’clock. This is a different kind of deal. There is no bargain, and the workers are not bargainers. Rather they are beggars. They are asked to trust the landowner to do what is right. There is no discussion of money, or time worked or anything. Just, “trust me.”
Although we may sometimes bargain with God, fundamentally we are beggars when it comes to our relationship with God. We can bring nothing to God except what he has given us. What washes us and makes us clean and acceptable before God is not our own righteousness, but the righteousness of Jesus Christ who offered himself as a sacrifice on our behalf. “Just as I am, without one plea, but that the blood was shed for me, and that thou biddest me come to thee, O Lamb of God, I come, I come.” (Hymn 693) And from the rite I service: “We do not presume to come to this thy table, O merciful Lord, trusting in our own righteousness, but in thy manifold and great mercies. We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy table. But thou art the same Lord whose property is ALWAYS TO … HAVE … MERCY.”
And let’s look at the results of the two different ways of relating to God. Did the bargainers get what they bargained for? Yes, they did, they got a day’s wage. Suppose the workers who came at noon had decided to bargain? In fairness, what could they hold out for? Probably, a half days’ wage, a half denarius. And those who came at five o’clock could hardly have expected anything. But the landowner asked them to trust him, and they got more than they had any right to expect. Everybody got a full day’s wage.
So it is with God. It is better to trust in the Lord, than to rely on our own bargaining power. It is better to approach God as a beggar, pleading nothing but the blood of Jesus Christ, than to try to bargain with God. For God desires more for us than we can either desire or deserve.
“For the Lord is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his faithfulness endures from age to age.”
