17 Pentecost

 

September 20, 2026

Matthew 20.1-16

+ I love this story Jesus shares in my our Gospel reading for today.

 Actually, I don’t love it.

 But I get it.

 And it certainly resonates with me.

 Because I’ve been there.

 A lot.

 And I think that’s the point of the story.

 I think it’s suppose to resonate with us.

 More importantly, I think it’s supposed to bother us and get under our skin and irritate us.

 And challenge. . .us.

 I really do think Jesus intends just that in this parable..

 Because most of us understand immediately why the workers who had  been in the vineyard all day were angry.

 They worked since morning.

 They carried on in the heat of the day.

 They’re tired.

 They’re sweaty.

 They’re aching.

 And then, at the end of the day, they watch the landowner hand exactly the same wage to people who worked only an hour. 

Of course they grumble. 

I would!

You would too.

 Because somewhere very deep inside us is this conviction that life ought to be fair.

 If I work longer, I should receive more.

 If I behave better, I should be rewarded.

 If I have sacrificed more, followed the rules more carefully, showed up more consistently, then surely I ought to receive something extra.

 But then Jesus says this,

 “The kingdom of heaven is like this.”

 And suddenly everything gets turned (as always!) upside down.

 Because the kingdom of God does not operate according to our carefully constructed accounting system.

 Hate to break that news to you today. . ..

 The kingdom of God operates according to grace.

 And grace is almost never fair.

 Now, we should say, thank God.

 But I do so with gritted teeth

 ***Ok.***

 ***Yes.***

 ***I agree.***

 ***Thank God***

 But let’s take notice of something important about the workers who come late.

 When the landowner finds them standing around, he asks them,

“Why are you standing here idle all day?”

 And they answer,

 “Because no one has hired us.”

 It’s not because they’re lazy.

 It’s not because they didn’t want to work.

 It’s not because they were irresponsible.

 No one had chosen them.

 Maybe they were too old.

 Maybe they were too young.

 Maybe they were sick.

 Maybe they were disabled.

 Maybe they simply weren’t the kind of workers anyone wanted.

 Whatever the reason, they had spent the day waiting.

 Waiting for someone to see them.

 Waiting for someone to hear them!

 Waiting for someone to choose them.

 Waiting for someone to say,

 “There’s a place for you too.”

 And eventually someone does.

 The landowner comes back.

 Again and again.

 At nine.

 At noon.

 At three.

 And finally, almost absurdly, at five o’clock, when there’s hardly any working day left. 

Still he comes looking for them.

 Still he invites them.

 Still there is room in the vineyard.

 That is what the kingdom of God is like.

 God keeps coming back.

 God keeps looking.

 God keeps calling.

 God keeps making room.

 Even when everyone else has decided that it’s too late.

 We human beings are very good at deciding who exactly has arrived too late.

 Too late to change.

 Too late to belong.

 Too late to be forgiven.

 Too late to make something meaningful out of a life.

 Too late to become the person God created them to be.

 But God it seems doesn’t own a watch.

 God’s time is not our time!

 God simply keeps going out into the marketplace saying,

 “You too. Come into the vineyard.”

 And when evening comes, everyone receives the same amount.

 Everyone receives what they need to live.

 And this is where grace becomes difficult.

 Because most of us are perfectly happy with grace when it is given to us.

 We become considerably less enthusiastic when grace is given to someone we don’t think deserves it. 

That is the scandal at the heart of this parable.

 The landowner says to the complaining workers,

 “Are you envious because I’m generous?”

 That question reaches across two thousand years and lands directly in our laps.

 Are we angry because God is too generous?

 Are we offended because God refuses to love according to our categories?

 Or the Church’s categories?

 Because God loves the person who got everything wrong?

 Because God welcomes the person who showed up at the last minute?

 Because God forgives somebody we haven’t forgiven?

 Because God makes room at the table for someone we would rather keep out there? 

The uncomfortable truth of the Gospel is that none of us owns the vineyard.

 None of us owns the Church.

 None of us owns the world.

 None of us controls the guest list.

 None of us gets to decide when someone has arrived too late for grace.

 That belongs to God.

 And God is extraordinarily generous.

 Of course, this doesn’t mean that justice somehow doesn’t matter.

 Quite the opposite.

 Notice what the landowner actually does.

 He makes certain that even the people who stood unwanted in the marketplace all day receive enough to live. 

He sees the people everyone else overlooked.

 And he gives them what?

 Dignity.

 That’s not cheap grace.

 That’s mercy becoming justice.

 It’s the kingdom of God breaking into a world that constantly assigns human worth according to productivity, usefulness, success, wealth, stats, race, sexuality, age, health, achievement, or respectability.

 Jesus says,

 That is not how God measures a human life.

 In God’s vineyard, human worth is not earned.

 It is given.

 Because you are God’s beloved child. .

 Or as we will hear toiday at Lucelia’s baptism,

 “You are Gods’ work of art!”

 You are God’s own.

 You belong to god.

 Period.

 And perhaps that is why this parable ultimately leads us to this table.

 Because here, at the Eucharist, the same thing happens.

 Nobody receives a larger piece of Jesus because they have been faithful longer. 

Nobody receives more grace because they prayed harder this week.

 Nobody receives a better cup because they’ve made fewer mistakes.

 We simply come forward.

 All of us

 The lifelong Christian and the person barely holding onto faith.

 The certain and the doubtful.

 The joyful and the grieving.

 The happy and the bitter.

 The righteous and the messy

 Which, of course, is every single one of us.

 We stretch out our empty hands.

 And God gives God’s very self to us.

 The same Jesus.

 The same grace.

 The same mercy.

 The same astonishing love.

 Some of us came to the vineyard early.

 Some came at noon.

 Some of us may have arrived only five minutes ago.

 It doesn’t matter.

 The invitation is always the same,

 Come.

 There’s still room.

 There’s still work to do.

 There’s still enough mercy.

 There’s still enough grace.

 There’s still a place for you.

 Because the kingdom of heaven is not something we earn.

 It is something God gives.

 Freely.

 Lavishly.

 Almost scandalously.

  All we can say in response—this time without gritted teeth—is 

Thank God.