Why do I say that? I mean because really, who works one hour and gets paid the same as the person who worked 8 hours?
Beloved, do not for a minute imagine that this teaching of Jesus was just for the 1st century folks who heard it. No, it is for us! I promise, as people of God who witness how systems can strangle the work of laborers. When we observe how easy it is to forgot there is value in every human life. God reminds us that our value is not weighed against the value or merit of any other person. I’m taking this understanding of value and worth right out of our baptismal covenant and the gospel of Matthew.
Our value, the value of our work, is not seen by God over and against another’s value and worth. This is hard to imagine when we have been raised to believe that we, through our own labors, succeed or fail. That it is through our own abilities, we overcome all challenges to be ‘successful’.
This may indeed be mind-blowing. Mustn’t God support our way of doing business, haven’t we been told that our business methods are ideal and reflect the prosperity God intends? Or at least doesn’t God determine our value against some divine standard to establish merit and worth. No, beloved, God does not determine our value based on anything we do or don't do … nothing. This is one of the qualities that make God, God. We emulate, we try, we work toward understanding this way of seeing the world, but our minds fall back to an understanding based on value, on worth, on the perception of one’s ability to succeed, to accumulate, to have.
For a long time, I used to think and say, well of course that’s how God behaves, but it is not how people behave. That is not the real world, because this is not what we see around us. And I further rationalized God cannot expect people to behave like God. Again, because this is not how corporations and governments are structured. That is not how schools work either. However, before we decide to ignore or give up on the teaching altogether -- is it possible, we might learn something from the parable?
Can we learn to be less extracting of others? To be more understanding, to develop empathy, to ask questions, to seek understanding, instead of saying, of immediately, demanding fairness or dismissing the parable.
Justice in the kingdom of God is not based on the number hours of time spent in the vineyard or even in the quality of work given. AND I suggest that offering each worker the same wage does not stop productivity. It might, however, stop the exploitation of workers and encourage the value of the work offered, not just the return on the investment of the vineyard owner.
We see the world in certain ways and when the ways we see the world are challenged, we need time to reset our thinking. To readjust how we see life. The parable of the vineyard is a corrective for seeing and understanding how kingdom justice is not about who gets the most money, it is about seeing the value of all labor, and all workers.
Is there a small way you can understand the parable differently this time around the lectionary? I’m wondering about the conversation among the workers, how would you talk with them? How can this teaching stretch our understanding of work and value?
+Rev. Alison
