Scandalous Generosity and the Parable of the Vineyard | Matthew 20:1–16

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

Matthew chapter 20 We are continuing to go through the book of Matthew, verse by verse, line by line. This series is called The Prophetic Kingdom. And today we're going to pick up at verse one through 16 So if you have your Bibles either in your lap or in your app, open them with me. And before I get into the parable, I want to remind us on how Matthew chapter 19 ended. Jesus had just encountered the rich young ruler. It was a man who had wealth. It was a man who seemed to have morality and obedience. And he was sincere in his religious approach to the law and the Torah and the prophets and the writings. Yet Jesus had exposed something that was deeper within him. And that was that the kingdom of heaven cannot be obtained through some sort of physical accomplishment. It's not a badge you can win if you were in the Boy Scouts or in the Girl Scouts. It's not a badge you can obtain through hours of service or servanthood. It's not something that you can wear. It's not a class you can go to, and then you can say, oh, hey, I've met the approval. The kingdom of heaven is something that you cannot obtain through physical accomplishment. In fact, actually, Jesus said with humans, it is absolutely impossible for us to achieve salvation, but with God, all things are possible. Peter asked the question. It's a question that I've asked the Lord myself. Well, we've given up everything to follow you, so what will we get? And Jesus responds by telling his disciples that the first will be the last, and the last will be the first. And then he immediately tells this story. It shifts in to Matthew chapter 20, because Matthew chapter 20 isn't simply a lesson about employment, compensation, and wages. Jesus doesn't immediately shift in to, well, how should you be paid as a worker? It's a continuation of the conversation that's happening in Matthew chapter 19 Jesus is confronting the human tendency to turn faithfulness into entitlement. None of us in this room has ever struggled with being faithful to the Lord and then feeling like somehow we were entitled to something because we were faithful to the Lord. This is a human problem that's existed throughout the centuries. And when we begin believing that we've served God longer, we sacrificed more, we've been holier, we've been more obedient, we've suffered more, and somehow because of those things, God owes us more than somebody else. It's a dangerous slope. And Jesus begins in Matthew chapter 20 by giving a parable that dismantles that very thinking. For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early one morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay the normal daily wage and he sent them out to work. At nine o'clock in the morning, he was passing through the marketplace and he saw some people standing around doing nothing. So he hired them, telling them that he would pay them whatever was right at the end of the day. So they went to work in the vineyard and at noon and again at three o'clock he did the same thing. And at five o'clock in the afternoon, he was in town again and he saw some more people standing around and he asked them, why haven't you been working today? They replied, because no one would hire us. And the landowner told them, then go out and join the others in the vineyard.

The landowner is going into town multiple times throughout the day. Each time he goes, he sees workers and he's recruiting workers to come work in his field. He tells them, I will pay you what is an honest wage at the end of the day. He goes early in the morning, he goes in the afternoon, he goes in the evening. And every time he finds someone in the marketplace who is not working, every time he finds somebody who is not employed, and he tells them, go join, join with them at that moment. He returns at noon, he returns at three. And every time there's somebody there who's not working, every time there is somebody for the Lord to bring in to the field. Don't miss the generosity that begins before everyone gets paid. See, the landowner keeps going back, he keeps looking, keeps searching. He's searching for people to bring in to the vineyard. And even though there's barely enough time towards the end of the day to accomplish anything, he still says, come to my vineyard and join in the workers. When we think of our modern work day, which is honestly not very different from the Hebrew mentality, the Hebrew days start at sundown. So right now, the sun ceases right around 730 Anybody who has been here, I know Brittany and Farah were over there hoping the other night while I was spray painting the ceiling, right around 630-ish, even though 730 is when it gets dark, right around 630, it is too dark in that building to really see much of anything. You're kind of just spraying into the wind, praying for the Holy Spirit to land those paint chemicals, wherever they're supposed to land. And so at five o'clock in the evening, there's not nearly as much daylight or working time left for somebody to go work as there was at 5 a.m. in the morning when Jeff got there.