The Unfair Grace of God
Text: Matthew 18:21-45
Pastor Phil Hughes at American Fork Presbyterian Church, Utah
October 13, 2024
Is God fair? We better hope for our sake that he isn’t.
We are in a sermon series on the parables of Jesus. Jesus used parables to teach about the kingdom of God. Parables are stories or metaphors that illustrate something about God and the kingdom of God. Jesus used mustard seeds and wedding banquets and a shepherd searching for sheep to talk about how God works. It says, Jesus taught people many things by parables.
Today the parable we are focusing on begins, “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard.” This is a parable about the kingdom of heaven. The setting Jesus uses is a vineyard.
The vineyard was a familiar setting for people in Jesus’ day. Like an eagle represents the United States, a vine symbolized Israel. In the Old Testament God speaks of his people, Israel, as a vineyard. Vines were engravened into the doorway of the Temple in Jerusalem. Vines were imprinted on coins of Jewish money.
One time, Jesus told another parable about a vineyard and the Jewish leaders knew he was talking about them. The vineyard stood for Israel, God’s people. And everyone knew it.
The crux of this parable in Matthew 20 is that the landowner pays the people who were hired last and worked just an hour or two the same amount as those who were first and worked all day long. Everyone gets paid the same no matter when they started working. Think about it: if someone who worked a lot less than you, who came to the company way after you immediately got paid as much as you, would you think that is fair?
But isn’t that the way the world and this life works? You get in first, you do the most, you get the favored treatment. Ah, but this is not about this world. This is about what happens when God is in charge.
This parable is not just about hiring laborers for a vineyard. It is about God and the way He runs his vineyard, his Kingdom. It’s about how and who God rewards for responding to his call. If God’s going to run a vineyard like that, giving to all the same wage, no matter how long they’ve been there; constantly seeking people for his vineyard until the 11th hour, then is God fair?
Fairness is when we get what we deserve, tit for tat, cause and effect, good deeds equal good rewards. The worthy get the pay. The slackers…well. Especially here in Utah we hear a lot about good lives producing a good heavenly reward.
Most of the time, people would say, God is fair until we come face to face with a story like today’s parable.
Right before this parable Jesus says that the last will be first and the first will be last. I’ll bet you’ve heard that saying. Jesus said this because one of his disciples, Peter, asked Jesus what he and the other followers will get given they have left so much to go with the Lord. They have worked so hard. “What will we get Jesus?” And Jesus says that Peter and the disciples will get their reward and it will be hefty. But then he tells this parable.
And our Lord says the same thing at the end of the parable of the workers and the vineyard. “The last will be first and the first will be last.” Is that fair?
This parable is about that: the lasts becoming firsts and the firsts becoming lasts. (And you thought it had to do with who goes first at potluck dinners.) It is a parable about not earning, and not getting what we deserve or think we deserve.
A landowner hires some workers to go into his vineyard and work. He sees others at noon, hires them and sends them out. Then he finds some at three in the afternoon and hires them and sends them out. Then others at five in the evening. At the end of the day when the workers come to get their wages all get the same pay.
The workers who worked all day are upset that those who were hired toward the end of the day and only worked a couple of hours get the exact same amount of pay as they do. Those who worked all day grumbled against the landowner. “These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’”
It can be easy for those of us who “bear the burden of the work and the heat of the day” to become proud of our sacrifice for the Lord. Those workers were comparing themselves to the workers who did less, who didn’t carry so much burden and didn’t have to face as much heat of the day. Peter kind of had this attitude when he asked Jesus what they would get for all the sacrifices they had made for Jesus. Beware of comparing yourself to others and looking down upon those who maybe haven’t done as much in church, or aren’t always around, or maybe aren’t as knowledgeable about faith. Or newcomers to faith.
The main meaning of this parable is that it reveals the amazing grace of our Lord who lifts the lasts – the least effective, the less fruitful and spiritual latecomers. The last become first not because they have done enough good works but because they have a good Lord – a Lord who invites them into his field and rewards them as if they had been there all along.
The parable begins, “The kingdom of heaven is like a landowner…” This is about God. And the picture we get of God in this parable is that he is full of grace. Extravagant! Generous maybe to a fault.
Read the gospels and Jesus never used the word “grace.” But he lived it and taught it. This parable is an example.
To put this parable into a more modern scenario imagine yourself in a college math class. On the first day of class the professor says, “Now students, I have this complicated, very complicated, math problem, the solution to which shall constitute your grade for the entire semester. I am going ahead and giving it to you here at the beginning of the class so you can start work immediately if you hope to pass the course. I want you all to make A’s.”
Well, being the good student that you are you get the problem and go to work. You go to the library, you check out math web sites and begin calculation. To your surprise you note that by mid-semester only a few of your classmates have begun work on the problem. Well, that’s their business. They will be sorry come the end of the term.
It’s the week before exams. You are proudly putting the finishing touches on your solution to the problem. Some in class tell you that if they work hard over the next few days they may get it finished. There are others who haven’t even begun. But that’s their problem.
Then comes the last day of the semester. You proudly hand in your work to the professor. To your surprise everyone else has their work too. How did they do it? You overhear comments like this:
“Thanks Professor Smith for helping me figure this out last week. Without your help I would have been up a creek.”
“Well, here it is Dr. Smith, and I really appreciate your assistance yesterday.”
“Thanks for coming by the dorm last night. You really helped me.”
You are aghast! No wonder they finished their work! While you were working hard, being responsible, figuring it out on your own, this professor has been all over campus spoon-feeding it to everybody. Everybody but you, that is!
When you tell Professor Smith just what you think of this unequal treatment, she says, “Why do you begrudge my generosity? The goal of this class was to get students to finish the problem. You were able to do it on your own. Fine. Others needed a little special attention. You get an A. They get an A. What’s wrong with that? Am I not fair?[1]
Martin Luther, the great leader of the Reformation wrote five hundred years ago, “that God does not want to deal with us according to work, according to our deserving, but according to grace.”
No, the Lord is not fair, because if he was fair, you and I wouldn’t even know him. One New Testament teacher said, “The Lord’s grace can seem unfair—and in a way, grace is always unfair since it gives [the] undeserving more than they deserve.”[2]
It gives the undeserving more than they deserve.
God always gives us more than we deserve. He gives us his attention. His goodness. His love. His presence. If we think our church going, our praying, all our good deeds deserve big reward, then we are trusting in our own lives to be right with God.
Yes, God does reward. But it is reward on his terms.
You can find the story in the Gospels when Jesus was approached by a Roman soldier to come and heal a servant who the soldier loved. Jesus said he would come but the soldier replied, “Lord, I don’t deserve to have you come under my roof.” Jesus was blown away by this response and he said that he had not seen faith like this anywhere in Israel.
Be careful about presuming upon God and thinking we deserve his grace.
Those who were hired and began work at the beginning of the day began to grumble and complain. Not because the Lord broke his word or cheated them. No, they grumble because the Lord was generous with the undeserving.
The landowner, who stands for the Lord in this parable, questions those who are grumbling. “Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money?” If God is the Lord can’t he do what he wants, with what is his, to whom he wants? Then he asks, “Are you envious because I am generous?”
God is generous. He is generous with grace. God doesn’t make you or I pay for our wrongs against him. That is a popular view people have. Things go wrong in our lives and we think God is punishing us. That’s not in the Bible nor is it the gospel.
God came in his Son Jesus Christ to do what we could never do for ourselves. He came to restore us to the Father. He did it out of grace.
And we are never asked to earn our way to God, nor are we allowed to earn our way with God. Yes, he wants people in his vineyard, doing his work, serving him. But that isn’t what makes us right with him. Otherwise how will we ever know if we have done enough?
Ephesians 2:8: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.”
Many religions and ideologies say that salvation is by our industriousness. But in the gospel of Jesus Christ salvation is by God’s mercy.
The landowner said, “I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave to you.” The lasts become firsts out of sheer grace, not out of work performed. What a gracious God we have! He could make us earn it. He could make us work for it. He could have a quota. If you come to faith late, or didn’t have a particularly religious background, or have been in and out of the church, or aren’t reading your Bibe enough you may think you have to put in some time. But the Sovereign Lord says, “Nope. You receive the same grace, mercy, forgiveness and love as the rest.” Who else does this?
Are you like me and thinking about that thief on the cross? When Jesus was crucified - getting what he didn’t deserve – we are told that two thieves were killed alongside of him. One of them cried out to Jesus, “Remember me when you come into your kingdom.”[3] (Remember this parable about the workers in the vineyard is about the kingdom.)
This thief was getting exactly what he deserved. He had stolen. Probably hurt others. Made their lives miserable. He wasn’t going to bible study, serving as a Deacon, or giving money to the poor. He asks Jesus to remember him. And Jesus said, “Truly, today, you will be with me in paradise.” God gives the one who was hired last the same as he gives to the one hired first.
Do we have a problem with the generosity of God when it is shown to those who we don’t think deserve it? And we think we do deserve it? He is generous. He blesses us and those we might not think deserve it with life and good. His mercies are new every morning. He has a lot of children.
Those who worked longest complained that the landowner made them equal with those who worked less. Equality is a huge word now in our society. Equality for all people is something many people are shouting about. God’s equality is this: everyone’s equal in that we have sinned and everyone is equal in falling short of the glory of God. Those who come first and those who come last are equal before the Lord. We have all fall short. And all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. [4]
We have that beloved hymn, that song, that so many would say it is their favorite. “Amazing Grace.” I wonder sometimes how many who sing it really know what they are singing.
What are the words? “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me…” It’s not, “Amazing fairness, how sweet the sound.” Would we really want to sing “amazing fairness”? No, why? Because fairness is not always sweet. Fairness is, well, just fair. But grace, indeed is sweet.
And grace saves. And grace brings us to the heart of God. And grace allows us to be in relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ even in our failings and struggles.
We don’t always get what we deserve. We get what we are given. And when it comes to God and how he runs things and his kingdom, that’s a good thing.
What more poignant example than that of Jesus. Did He get what He deserved? Was it fair that God sent His Son to be born not in a palace, put in a stable? Was it fair that God’s Son was betrayed by one of His closest friends? Was it fair that God’s only child, an innocent man, was mocked, spit upon, nailed to a cross, and hung there to die?
Maybe the question of fairness is not the right question at all. Maybe we should simply humble ourselves and try not to calculate what we deserve in proportion to all the good we think we have done and remind ourselves that it’s all grace and it’s all a gift. And everyone can have it.
It is by grace that we know who God is. It is by grace that we can pray and are listened to. It is by grace that we have a Savior who took upon himself our wrongs and forgave us.
I guess we don’t always get what we deserve. We get what we are given. And church, thanks be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, we are given grace!
[1] PR, p. 50
[2] Bruner, Matthew p. 725
[3] Luke 23:42
[4] Romans 3:20,21