Dear Family,
We want life to be fair, don't we? If we work hard, we expect to payment commensurate to our labor, right? I mean we have unions to protect the wage and work environment for the laborers. We have federal guidelines that demand, at the most base level, that people earn 'minimum wage.' We go to school, earn degrees, and we, even pastors, have a 'scale' that we seek when we find our place of refuge/employment. We, in the words of Rob from "Jerry McGuire," want people to 'show me the money..."
And if life seems, at least at work, to not be fair, well we protest. Strike. Quit. Or any other numerous choices we make to ensure our voices of disgust are heard. I wonder though, what would we do if, like the owner of the field did in Jesus' parable, we got paid the same as someone who just came off the bus and barely got his/her hands dirty, while we had worked ourselves to the bone, all day, in the hot sun? What would our response be when the supervisor paid all of us the same, regardless of how long we worked or how hard we worked?
Would we protest? Never work for that boss again? Maybe join a union and declare a serious injustice and have the owner brought up on labor violations? Why would we do this? Because i sense, just like the whiners in the parable, that we have an inflated sense of self. We demand certain 'rights' regardless whether we actually deserve them or not. If we feel someone or something has injured or impeded those rights, we will shout from the mountaintops how unfair it must be.
But then we come to the second half of the parable: the owner asking, (in a paraphrase) why are yall complaining and whining? Didn't i pay you what we had agreed would be your day's wage? So whats with this complaining? And we would, with our chests puffed out, declare a serious injustice--we worked hard all day, these guys, the ones you just hired who havent even gotten their hands dirty, yeah they got paid the same as we did. Either pay us more or pay them less. We are better than they!
The owner just pays the days wage and shakes his/her head.
As i reflect on this parable, i can't help but wonder if we wont all have a huge eye opener when we meet Jesus at the gates. One of the biggest maturation elements of my faith is that i have come to realize that God is God, and i am not God. So if God, like the owner of the field, proves to be incredibly generous, gracious, merciful, accepting, why should i complain?
But what are the implications/repercussions of a God who is so merciful? Accepting? Gracious? Like the workers of the field, a parable about the Kingdom of God, what might we experience at the gates? If we get there and standing next to us is the skater punk who can't pull up his shorts and he always appeared out of it, maybe even on drugs, will we protest about the unfairness of his earning a pass into heaven? He wasted his life, we might say, why should he get in with us?
Or maybe the prostitute? Murderer? Child molester? Dr. Evil from "Austin Powers?" Or maybe more challenging, might we stand side by side Muslims, Buddhists, Pagans, athiests, because at the last hour, in some Godly miracle, they came to understand and accept the great mystery of salvation that we follow? Will we protest? Will we stomp our feet like a three year old not getting to watch tv? Will we build a union of self pitying Christians, call ourselves the URC: (Union of the Righteous Christians)?
What is it it us if Jesus/God/Holy Spirit are generous? Arent we still getting what we believed to be getting--entrance into the gates of Heaven? So what does it matter if other less desirables are there too? Doesn't that just show us how good God truly is and how amazing and awe inspiring the love of Jesus is?
What if we knew this was the way things would work out, would we ever proclaim a faith in Jesus? Promise to follow Him? Surrender to His will? Or would we, like wild frat boys, want to remain irresponsible and empty, knowing that it didn't matter anyway, because God is so merciful?
As for me, i hope i would choose to follow Jesus. Not because of a fear of damnation or punishment or some horribly painful existence, but because of the benefits of following Jesus now. I experience an abundant life: Now. I know love: Now. I know peace: Now. Sure heaven is real and good, but heaven, until i am standing at the gates, remains a mystery. My life, my existence, my journey, in the flesh, is real and demands a real presence of Jesus. So i would, i hope, still choose Jesus. Not to be saved for the next world but to be saved in this one.
What about you all? Amen.
Shalom,
jerry
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