"Why are you standing here"-A Sermon for Proper 20, Matthew 20:1-16
We have before us this morning, from Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus’ perhaps familiar parable often called the Laborers in the Vineyard. Jesus compares the kingdom of Heaven to a vineyard owner who goes out early in the morning to the market place, the place where folk gather to be hired for an honest day’s work, and the landowner indeed hires a group of people, agrees on a fare wage for their work, and sends them into the vineyard. Perhaps because the day’s task in the vineyard is a heavy lift, there is much work to be done, he returns to the market place at 9 AM and hires another collection of workers and then does the same at noon and at 3 PM…and then even toward the very end of the work day at 5 PM he does the same…hiring a last group of workers for the final hour our two of the work day…perhaps a needed extra push to complete a time sensitive task.
And as I was preparing my thoughts for this sermon, I read an interesting comment online about this passage. It was a blog post…and in it the author began with a question. He wrote, “The parable of the laborers in the vineyard is about…blank.” In other words, he was inviting his readers to fill in the blank. So, the parable of the laborers in the vineyard, in your own opinion, is about what? Well one of the responses from his readers was that the parable of the laborers in the vineyard is about nepotism…and he added…plain and simple. Now I have never thought of one of Jesus’ parables as plain and simple…entirely clear…with a one size fits all meaning. I find them wonderfully complex, layered and multifaceted. Full of many meanings, in the plural, life lessons, spiritual insights…and all dependent on where we find God and ourselves within them…both of which are often different each time I come back to any one of them in particular. Further, in regard to this parable in particular, the word nepotism was not the very first word, explanation or meaning that jumped to my mind. Nonetheless, for this particular person the parable’s purpose or meaning was entirely clear…it was plain and simple…completely straight forward. It was about connections…who you know…favoritism even. Maybe not nepotism in strictly a familial sense…like the landowner was only hiring nieces and nephews…daughters and sons…but still the suggestion was that those who were hired first and foremost where those who were on the inside…the young man dating the landowner’s daughter…the cousin of his winemaker…the best friend of the person who owned the next vineyard over…or some such.
And as I digested what was a new and fresh take on the parable, at least for me, I thought of the exchange the landowner has with the group of workers he hires at the end of the day…those that were hired at 5 PM. The landowner says to this group, “Why are you standing here idle all day?” And they respond quite straightforwardly, “Because no one has hired us.” It was not because these, likely men in Jesus’ day, were actually idle in the sense of being lazy…or not wanting to work…or not being capable of work…but their idleness was rooted in the plain and simple fact that they had not been approached…they had not yet been chosen. They had been more left out of an honest day’s work, rather than, avoiding an honest day’s work. I imagine they arrived at the marketplace at the break of day, ready to roll up their sleeves and get to work…to bring home food for their family’s table…just like those who were hired first thing in the morning…but for some reason…beyond their own making…they had been passed over…left out…excluded from entering into the vineyard. Their giftedness was left to lay fallow…unused…unappreciated. And this likely hurts in all sorts of ways…on the inside and out…from the top of the head all the way down to the toes…it hurts to be left out, passed over, forgotten, not chosen.
It hurts in a straightforward financial sense…for by being left out from an honest day’s work…they are likely looking at losing out on an honest day’s wage. In Jesus’ day, just as in ours, most people live off of everything they make…perhaps we call it living paycheck to paycheck…but most people indeed need to work…each and every work day…to live…and often more than just the worker him or herself are depending on that income. Children and other family members are also deeply impacted when work is unavailable…when a worker is not chosen. Just speaking for myself…if I couldn’t for whatever reason work…l may be able to miss a paycheck or two…and keep the mortgage paid…but much more than that and we are in trouble…next comes diving into the retirement fund and the kid’s college education fund. I was speaking to a clergy colleague in Houston whose parish serves mainly a working-class, immigrant community. Though most in his parish were spared from the devastating flooding caused in Houston by Harvey, most were not able to get to work for several days or longer…over a week for some…either where they work was closed or the street flooding made it impossible to leave their own homes and apartments. These are folk who are often paid by the hour or the day…and if not working…they are not being paid…but the utility bills and rent and car payments keep coming. So, my friend said most of their immediate Harvey relief work was not ripping out dry wall…but helping people keep the lights on, rent paid, and food on the table…when work was an impossibility. So, I imagine, applying this logic to the laborers in Jesus’ parable…that being overlooked…not chosen…excluded from a day’s work in the vineyard…could have significant impact, maybe devastatingly so, on the laborers and their own loved ones. We’re talking about having wages for the basics here…food, water and shelter.
And being overlooked, left out, passed over, forgotten, not chosen…hurts on the inside, as well. It is also a spiritual and psychological wounding. Like the child chosen last, over and over again, in the back-yard pick-up football game. At some point, not being chosen, being underappreciated, leads to shame…to feeling useless…to feeling less than fully human. Most of us want to be productive…and there is dignity and purpose found in good work. We want to participate in the planting and harvesting of all sorts of vineyards that produce good and meaningful fruit that fill our world with the things that nourish people’s souls. This includes our careers and vocations…our work in the church…the places we volunteer…even our hobbies and recreation…can and should all be fruit producing. Time spent meaningfully in the work of creating things that look like life and love. Most of us desire to understand our gifts and talents and then use them well…use them to further God’s kingdom of Heaven which is already here…among us even now. But if we are left out…for whatever reason…shunned and not chosen to participate…left behind are often wounds that are not easily healed. Further, if we are together going to produce good fruit and if we are to harvest as much of it as humanly possible…there is and must be a place in the vineyard for everyone…every single one of us must be chosen, included, invited in. Every one’s gifts and talents are needed…and each have a unique role to play…that only they…that only you or I can play. If anyone is left out…all are diminished…and the good work to which we are called is diminished as well…there is simply said less fruit to go around.
In the past, I have addressed the rumblings that arise among the workers at pay time, when the work day is indeed fully complete, and won’t have time to do so, again, today, but what I will say is that the parable ends by telling us that every one’s work that day and in that vineyard, was affirmed, appreciated, and honored by the landowner. For by the end of the day, they were each chosen and they were each generously given what they needed for their own daily bread and likely those they care for as well. And such generosity is an occasion for all to celebrate. Such it is in the economy of the kingdom of Heaven. For in God’s kingdom, there is always enough…there is work that gives dignity and meaning and food that feeds body and soul aplenty for everyone. It matters not so much when we enter the vineyard; instead, it matters that we want to enter…we want participate…we have made ourselves available to participate…we have put our whole lives…our selves, souls and bodies…our gifts and talents and resources…out there as a holy offering to be used by God, the owner of the vineyard, to produce good fruit…in abundance.
But I want to close by taking us back to that idea of nepotism…the idea of who gets chosen and who doesn’t…and the means by which that happens. For the vineyard, as Christ’s body alive and active in the world today, has now been entrusted to our care. We are now the proverbial landowner. So, who shall we invite in, who shall we chose, to join us in the fruit producing work to which we have been uniquely called? And I would extend the question to our personal lives as well. Who is gathering around our dining room tables? Who should we be befriending, caring for, and inviting into our own lives? I would suggest that we need to be very intentional, wise and exceedingly generous in this discernment. For nothing less than people’s dignity, and at the very least, their spiritual livelihoods might hang in the balance. And in regard to us as a family of faith, our own invitation and welcome into this place, this family, has in some cases led to people getting their daily bread literally put on their tables.
We say all are welcome, all are included, all have a place among us and gifts to bring to us…and I believe we mean it…we mean it. And Jesus’ parable that sits before us today requires us to continue the work of examining our souls, individually and corporately, to be absolutely certain that we do it. Such that all in the market places around us hear the clarion call of God on their own lives, know that they are indeed chosen, and are fully invited into the vineyard over which we have been given charge…not just our favorites…not just those who look, live and believe like we do…but everyone…that they might give, alongside each of us, their whole lives…their selves, souls and bodies…their gifts, talents and resources…to God’s own abundant fruit producing work. Amen.