ITS NOT FAIR!

That’s the cry of the worker who worked all day today and got paid the same as the workers who didn’t.  And, they might be right.  It doesn’t seem fair. But lets cut through the cheese here… In the morning, when they were hired, they agreed to work for “the usual daily wage”, which at that time was referred to as a denarius.  They got exactly what they were promised.  Is that not fair?

The problem here is someone else got the same amount for less work.  Which makes them feel like they got less.  They didn’t get less, they got what they were promised.  But it still seems unfair.

And maybe it is.  There’s a Calvin and Hobbes comic that sums up the way we feel in situations like this perfectly.

When things are “unfair” we want them to be unfair in our favor!  I’m guessing the people who didn’t work all day were pretty happy with what they got.  They got more than they expected. It was those who worked all day and got the same who were upset, and Jesus tells us this is what the Kingdom of Heaven is like.

There is a “flatness” to God’s love that is difficult for us to understand sometimes I think.  We hit on it a little last week when we talked on forgiveness and mentioned that that person who hurt you?  God loves that person exactly as much as he loves you.

How can that be?  That person’s a jerk!  That person did a bad thing!  Until we realize that we can be a jerk too sometimes, and we aren’t perfect either.  I used to have a shirt that said “Jesus Loves You” across the top in big letters with a picture of Jesus under it and on the bottom it said “But I’m His Favorite”.  I admit that my sense of humor might run weird, but I wore it to Wal-Mart once and the lady who rang me up got really upset with me about it.  She went on a rant about how God doesn’t have “favorites” and that he loves everyone.  I didn’t argue with her, I just let it go.  Luckily Walmart has self checkout now, so I don’t have to worry about it anymore.

But she was right, and it can be a hard thing to wrap our minds around.  There is a saying that “Equality feels like justice to the oppressed and oppression to the privileged”.  Maybe how we feel about God’s fairness lets us know which side of that equation we’re on.

Sometimes its hard because we see people who we think have it better than us and we wonder why we can’t have it better.  We get jealous of what other people have.  There’s several stories in the Bible about it.  Cain was jealous of Abel because God favored his sacrifice.  King Saul was jealous of David because the people loved him.  Joseph’s brothers were jealous of him.  In all three of these stories the jealousy led to violence.  We may not get physically violent when we see other people getting more or better things that us, but it can make us mad.

 

You know, we often call God “Father”, as Jesus encouraged us to do.  Sometimes because of this we draw parallels that might be a little unfair between our earthly parents and God, but there’s one here that I think fits a little bit.  There are times as a parent where “Because I said so” is the best answer to a kids’ question.  We see this in todays reading in so many words when the all day workers grumble – “Take what belongs to you and go; I choose to give to this last the same as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me?”

Why?  Because I say so!

There is a story in the book of John where, after Jesus comes back from the dead he has a conversation with Peter and tells him his future.  It doesn’t sound so bad when we read it here, but it wasn’t good news – it was foretelling his death.

“When you were young you dressed yourself and went wherever you wished, but when you get old you’ll have to stretch out your hands while someone else dresses you and takes you where you don’t want to go.” He said this to hint at the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. And then he commanded, “Follow me.”

Turning his head, Peter noticed the disciple Jesus loved (This was John) following right behind. When Peter noticed him, he asked Jesus, “Master, what’s going to happen to him?”

Jesus said, “If I want him to live until I come again, what’s that to you? You—follow me.”

Peter isn’t excited about what Jesus tells him is going to happen, and his first concern is “what about John” – and it doesn’t seem like he’s worried about John out of compassion, but envy.

 Why does he have it good and I don’t?  What is it to you?  Your part to play in life isn’t that person’s part.

And the reality is that there are millions of people in the world who, if they could watch any of us sitting here turn on the water faucet in our kitchen would think, “man they’re so lucky”.

All the disciples died for their faith in Jesus.  All but John.  But John didn’t get off easy either.  Early tradition says that he was covered with boiling oil, but it did not kill him and he ended his days being tended to by his followers on the island of Patmos. That couldn’t have been comfortable, and certainly doesn’t sound like something to be envious of.

Envy though, is enough of a problem in the human mindset that it made the top ten in the lists of things we shouldn’t do that God gave Moses.  Thou shalt not covet.  Meaning we shouldn’t have strong desires for things that don’t belong to us.  I think its OK to want things.  If we didn’t want anything, we’d starve, ok, but if you’re eating your cheeseburger and all you can think about is the lucky guy who is eating a big fat steak across the room, then you’ve got a little bit of a problem.  Or if you’re counting fries and notice that your sister got more than you.   THAT’S NOT FAIR!  She got more!

 There’s a comedian named Louis C.K. who has a video of him and his daughter and his daughter is complaining because her sister got the last popsicle and she says “that’s not fair” and he tries to tell her that life isn’t fair, but she’s not getting it.  He finally tells her that “the only time you should look in your neighbors bowl is to make sure they have enough, not to see if you got less than them.”  Man, what kind of world would we have if we could all just do that one thing?

In all of this, I think the most important part for us to consider is the people who only worked the last hour.  What this tells us about the kingdom of heaven is astounding, really.  Think about the people who would be left at the place where workers hope to get hired daily by the end of the day.  They were the people that no one else picked.  They were desperate for work, or they would have gone home by then.  An hours wage wasn’t going to get them much, but they were still there, hoping for anything.  Everyone else overlooked them, but God (the landowner in this parable) picks them.  He doesn’t leave anyone out.  And the point of the parable isn’t really about “fairness” – it is about God’s incredible generosity and amazing grace.  He gives to the unwanted the same as he gives to the first chosen.  He gives to the last first, and to the first last, but he gives them all the same.  And that is the good news.

In the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.