New Thoughts (01/05/10-01/08/10)
It seems I have somewhat of a jumble of observations to comment upon in regard to this parable. I will begin by making some further observations concerning the three main symbolic elements that are used. These are considerations of aspects of said elements that may not bear directly on the parable itself, but may have colored the understanding of those who heard it.
I begin with the landowner, then. As I recorded in my preparatory notes, the landowner who is in such a position that he can hire and pay out as this one does without any hesitancy is clearly a man with no anxiety for tomorrow. He is, we would say, well situated. His accounts are flush, his profits consistent, and his vines producing abundantly. He knows he is able to employ as many as ever he may find, and he knows he is well able to pay them in whatever fashion he chooses. He will, at a minimum, deal justly with these laborers. But, beyond that, as the parable unfolds, he will go generously beyond the call of justice in many cases.
Now, in my preparations, I had questioned whether this aspect of the landowner’s condition plays into the significance of the parable, or into how its hearers would have interpreted the sense of it. Let me suppose for the moment that it did. We are clear that the landowner stands as the symbol of God. Is it not an affirming thing to recognize that God, as seen in this landowner, is fully able to take as many as He finds and put them to useful work in His employ? Is it not marvelous to recognize that He is not going to rip you off for such efforts as you put in? At a minimum, He will be just with you, repaying you as your efforts have earned. But, that’s only the starting point.
How wonderful, as well, to know that He is fully able to repay you with such generosity as He sees fit. He doesn’t need to check and see if heaven’s storehouse has enough to do right by you. Listen! This is the message of salvation! That’s what we’re looking at in the parable, that’s what the message of the kingdom of heaven is: You have been restored to God’s household. You are citizens of His lands. You are in His employ, Christian, and however hard that labor may be at present, whatever you may be called on to give into His service, He will repay you and more!
How often do we hear it said that you can’t out give God? That is, to some degree, what we are being told here. At least, it is a part of the message relayed by this parable. The parable is, after all, continuing to answer Peter’s question of, “What’s in it for us?” See how much we have given in Your service. When do the good times start to roll? Surely we get prime seating at the King’s table, since we were founding members here.
The answer Jesus is relaying is manifold. In the apparently flush conditions of the landowner, though, the message contains a certain amount of assurance that there is no need to consider that you might not reap as well as you are sowing. The assurance is that it will be at least as well, almost certainly more and quite probably far more. The King, the Landowner, does not need to check His funds to see if He can afford to take you on.
There is also, as I was saying, the application to salvation. Salvation is the great reward. There can be none greater. Anything else that may come to us in our heavenly estate is gravy. And, in that regard, the image of the flush landowner is indicative of the Truth that the accounts of Salvation, the wealth of the Atonement is absolutely sufficient to see to as many as will come. It would still be absolutely sufficient if, as God would love to see, every man, woman and child in all creation were to come to Him for Salvation. The accounts of Salvation are boundless!
Now, let me take you back to that opening line of the parable. “The kingdom of heaven is like this landowner.” Everything else in the parable is, as it were, window dressing to back up this central point. The landowner is the model of the kingdom, and what does that model tell us? The kingdom of heaven is sufficient for all. The kingdom will continue to seek out citizens until the last minute, nor will the kingdom reward those last-minute arrivals more poorly than the most original members of the domain. It may be ‘to the Jew first, and then to the Gentile’, but the Gentile will be as well benefited by kingdom citizenship as the Jew. There is no favoritism to be shown in heaven.
As to the vineyard, there was a comment I noticed in the ISBE that really strikes home. This comment was made in regard to the physical reality of the vineyard, but I want to hear it again with an ear for the spiritual significance, for God does not choose the vineyard to symbolize His earthly demesnes arbitrarily. So, hear this: “Cultivation of the vine requires constant care or the fruit will very soon degenerate.” Hear that in conjunction with the message Jesus delivers. “I am the vine, you are the branches. Who abides in Me, then, bears much fruit, but apart from Me, you branches can do nothing. The branch that is separated from Me shrivels up. It will be tossed on the fire” (Jn 15:5-6).
We are His vineyard, but as such, we do not stand in some place of pride and power. We abide humbly with our God (Mic 6:8). We are in need of constant care from our Landowner, else we very soon degenerate. In our discussions at men’s group last night, there was a great deal of talk as to how it is that we, who are baptized into Jesus’ death and now dead to sin, are yet so inclined to sin again the moment our guard is down. We are the branches! We are the vines in His vineyard, and we need constant care. That’s the answer. Even though we have died with Him, united ourselves to Him in both death and life, we remain wholly dependent beings. Apart from Him, as He insistently reminds us, we can do nothing. The grapevine left to itself in the wild will rapidly degenerate. Oh, it may still bear fruit, but not as it should, not as it could. The fruit degenerates, becomes less sweet, less abundant. The planting is ravaged by any passing animal, plagued by insects, strangled by weeds. It is in every way plunging towards death.
But, praise God! Our Landowner is a wholly attentive Keeper. He is able to provide that constant care as no other ever could! We poor vines are in the best of hands, hands from whence none can snatch us. With God in the watchtower, no destroying creature and no thieving bandit will top our walls, come and steal our fruit from off of our branches. With God tending the fields in which we are planted, no weeds will be allowed to take over. Indeed, the Promise is that He will so prune us as to improve our fruitfulness! No, we will probably not enjoy the pruning. Those shears are sharp, and the cuts go deep. But, as we turn our eyes upon the inevitable results, as we force ourselves to remain mindful that this Lord with His shears is working for our good, is shaping us so that we can be more fruitful, happier, healthier: We are able to set our dead branches willingly under His ministrations, joyful at least in the certain outcome!
The last symbol to consider is, as it was in the preparations, the laborers. In particular, I want to consider those eleventh-hour laborers, the last ones into the fields. When the landowner comes to this particular group, he asks them, “Why have you been standing here idle all day long”, as the NASB translates it. But, that word ‘idle’ might well bear some very negative connotations. We might take it as, “Why have you been shunning work, you lazy ones?” Given that this is now the landowner’s fourth visit to the market place, that’s not an unreasonable way to hear his question. They answer that nobody hired them. This is doubtless true. The question remains, though, whether they were present and available to be hired earlier, and the evidence presented in this story suggests they were not.
This being the case, it makes the landowner’s treatment of these eleventh-hour laborers the more amazing! Not only has he rightly identified them as lazy men avoiding work, but they have also laid themselves open to charges of being liars. After all, he had been at this place several times through the day and hired all who were available. Where were these men that nobody would hire? Nowhere to be seen, else he would have already hired them! And yet, he hires them and sends them off to work. And yet, he is good enough to pay them not only for the hour they ostensibly worked, but to pay them for the hours they were off hiding from work! This landowner must either be delusional or exceedingly generous! Of course we know which answers for his case.
Take the case of these last workers and move into the spiritual, kingdom application that Jesus is driving at. So it is in the kingdom. There are and will continue to be those who have been doing all they could to hide from the kingdom and its demands. These are those whom the Father has called to come to His Son, but they are resisting the call. We might commonly refer to such people as those who want to go sow their wild oats before they settle down. Were we to be more blunt, they want time to pursue their sins before they come looking for forgiveness. Were we to be blunter still, we should have to acknowledge that even we who have come to Christ long since find ourselves in those moments when we pursue something we know we ought not to pursue, fully aware and fully intending to come for forgiveness once we’ve satisfied that urge.
The point before us, though, is these late-comers, these called and chosen who have been slow to heed the call. Think Paul, for instance, he who spoke of himself as one untimely born, the last of the apostles to acknowledge the Christ when He came (1Co 15:8). Others among the apostles, those who had dealt with the hardship of the disciple’s life on the road, those who had been through the persecutions that Paul had mounted against the Christian sect, might find it very hard to accept this latecomer as a valid disciple of Christ, let alone an apostle chosen by Christ.
Or, go further forward in Church history, to the periods of Roman persecution, and consider the case. There were those who had refused to buckle under the pressures of persecution, and there were so many who had died for that refusal. Then there were those who had renounced Christ to save their skin. Now that Christianity was acceptable again, these last were seeking readmittance. For the ones who stayed strong, the ones who had seen so many of their community slaughtered, this was hard to grant. But, for the Christ they served, it was another group of eleventh hour arrivals.
Even for us today, there are those who come to Christ after a long and particularly dark life. These may be from the ranks of the famous or the infamous. They may be entertainers whose past entertainments were particularly immoral. They may be politicians whose past legislative efforts have eroded the social contract. They may be criminals of the worst sort, murderers, whoremongers, pushers, you name it. Needless to say, if such as these come into the house of God thinking to continue their past employments and habits unchanged, then they shall need a change of thinking. But, if they have truly repented of these past horrors and come to the Redeemer in earnest, we have no right and no reason to withhold the full fellowship of the family of God from them.
Love such as God has shed abroad in our hearts and with which He has filled us to overflow, believes all things and hopes all things (1Co 13:7). That fervent love for one another covers a multitude of sins (1Pe 4:8). This is not like that code which keeps the criminal from snitching on his fellow. This is the humility of those that walk with God, recognizing that there, but for the grace of God, go I. As Phil Keaggy once wrote it in song, “It could have been me.” That was my story, but no more. Why, then, should I find it doubtful in this other?
I will grant you that many an unrepentant sinner has played this attitude for their own advantage. They view us as gullible fools. This we are not called to be, however, and if we have been so, it is to our own detriment. Hear again the call Jesus puts upon His own: “I send you out as sheep amidst wolves. Knowing this, be as shrewd as serpents, yet remain as innocent as doves” (Mt 10:16). Don’t be stupid! Don’t be gullible! Be discerning. Look to the fruit of that one who claims to belong to Christ Jesus. Is there evidence of the Spirit’s working upon him? I care not if he is a finished product, for I am nowhere near to that state myself. But, is he changed? Does spirit cry out to spirit? Does the heart acknowledge a kindred soul, a brother adopted into the household of the King? Then leave off what lies behind in their life, just as you have in your own, and strive together towards the goal of a clean conscience before God. Yes, they were late in getting at it. But, they are here, by God! They are here through God. Rejoice then that this, your brother, is restored to us.
All of this is reflected in the comment of the landowner to those first workers. Are you jealous of my generosity? Actually I really like the Greek idiom that lies below the translation. Is your eye evil because I am good? Would you really do mischief to your fellow because I have done well by him? Let us return to the Law, and remember that “You shall not covet what is your neighbor’s” (Ex 20:17). Rejoice in your brother’s blessing as you would in your own. Love him as yourself.
Oh! Church! Is one exalted among you? Then all are lifted! There is no place for jealousy, and no envious soul ever entered the kingdom of God. Work it out! Subject the fleshly response, for He Who saved you, He Who is absolutely faithful to complete the work begun in you, is even now working within you in order that you might be found both willing and able (as He is willing and able) to do those things that are pleasing in His sight! Rejoice with those who rejoice in God. See the King glorified in this one who is being honored and glorify God for it! Don’t you go comparing lots. Don’t you start carping about how unfair it is that you give so much and get so little while this other has been showered with accolades for such a small thing. God is Just! Hold that! God is Just. Your efforts never go unseen, and they never go unrewarded. Your pay and your hour may come later. You may or may not receive in excess of your giving, but you will never receive less. As the King chooses, so it shall be to you, and as you know He is good and just and faithful and righteous and true, you have no reason to suppose He will cheat you in any way. When He repays, whatever He repays, accept it with gratitude. For, at the core of it all, you know you have never deserved other than death and separation from His household. Already, then, your pay is so far in excess of your efforts as to demand your eternal gratitude.
Thank You, Lord, for that reminder, that recalling to due humility and gratitude for all You have already given me. Holy Lord, against You and against You only have I sinned with all my grumbling and wounded prideful attitude of being so put out by demands upon my time and energy. Whom do I serve, after all, but the King of glory! How much have you done for me, and that before ever I so much as acknowledged Your existence! Forgive me, my God, for this poor attitude, this poor reflection of all You have done in and for me. Restore to me the heart of service, the joy of serving in Your employ, and the marvelous sense of the richness of all You have already given me. May I never be so foolish as to think I deserved it.
I want to spend a bit more time on that phrasing of the evil of the eye in response to the goodness of the Lord. Clearly, there is this equating of the eye’s evil with jealousy. I am not certain that we should always consider these as equivalent meanings, but it does lend a certain nuance to the teaching from the Sermon on the Mount. “If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out” (Mt 5:29). Well, how does the eye cause us to stumble? Is it by failing to see? Not typically, no. Quite the opposite, really. The eye causes us to stumble precisely by what it does see, and by the lustful desire that seeing causes to rise up within us. It would be a rare man who became envious of something he has never observed! If we knew not the sparkle of riches, what would lead us to desire them so terribly? If we had never seen the beauty of some member of the opposite sex, what cause should we have to burn for a closer encounter?
The eye sees, though, and the mind is well equipped to enhance the image. And thus, the eye is made a great evil to us, leading the thoughts into temptation, and the thoughts, already sufficiently sinful as to earn us our place in hell, will lead us to action given half a chance. The tongue may be a great evil, but it is only revealing what has already come into the heart. The eye, however, had been feeding fuel to that deceitful heart all the day long! Does your eye look upon the good of the Lord and make of it an evil? Does that goodness towards another cause you to covet, to envy, to become jealous of your fellow’s good fortunes? May it never be! If jealousy and envy have darkened your eyes, how dark the soul becomes (Mt 6:23)! Let it not be so amongst us, brothers! Let it not be so!
Another question which had come up in my thinking concerns whether or not this passage could be taken as referring to the salvation of the Gentiles. In short, I think the answer has to be that it does not. While one might be able to apply the message delivered to the matter of Jews and Gentiles in the kingdom, it has nothing to do with the context into which the parable is delivered, and no direct connection with the point made. The point, after all, is primarily that our focus, being on the kingdom, ought to be concerned with our own relationship with God and not with everybody else’s. This is not, of course, to suggest that we ought not to be concerned with their salvation. After all, we are called to declare the Gospel to all men that all might have the opportunity to be saved. But nowhere are we called to work out some other soul’s salvation; only our own (Php 2:12).
Do not allow God’s grace towards another to become a cause for the sin of envy in you. That is the point driven home here. This has many applications in the course of life. But, what a key to peaceful fellowship it is! Do not begrudge the honor done your brother. If he is being blessed as he serves and you are feeling put upon as you serve, do not allow this to become cause to envy your brother, to hate your brother (for the one must certainly lead to the other). The outward is not an accurate reflection of the inward. It was that way with the rich man who failed the critical test. He had been showered with all the material blessings of life, and he had been attentive to the matter of righteousness as best he could. But, when faced with the test, he walked away. True, he may have turned and returned at a later date. We are not granted to know that. But, his outward blessedness did not, in this case, reflect a heart wholly devoted to God’s kingdom.
Likewise, what I see here is that a lack of those material blessings does not in any way reflect a heart that is hardened against God. To put it as succinctly as possible: there is no correlation between the two. Neither richness nor poorness is particularly blessed, nor is either condition particularly accursed. They are both to be understood as manifestation of God’s Providence. In the life of the believer, then, the one who is working in His purpose, both must be understood as the Good God’s best possible provision for you and aimed towards achieving the greatest good for you. Perhaps great riches would turn you aside from the Way. Would you still be thankful for those riches if they resulted in your damnation? Perhaps for the moment, you might be foolish enough to do so. But, God has eternity in view, and He invites you to adopt that same perspective in so much as you are able. In the same way, a life devoid of the extras, what we might consider subsistence living (but which is probably far better than we give it credit for being) may seem a hardship for the brief period of this earthly existence. But, if the end result is a certainty of eternity in heaven, how much of a hardship is it really?
Oh! Let me return to the point once again in light of what I have just been saying. If we believe God; if we are convinced that He is true to His word, then we must accept that He is indeed working all things together for our good, as we are indeed working together with Him as best we know how (Ro 8:28). If He is God our Provider, as He has proclaimed, and He is Perfect, as we are assured He is, and He is Good and Just as His Name assures us: then we must surely understand that the life into which He guides us on this earth is the best possible life for us, and will achieve the best possible end. What cause have we, then, to complain that some other has it better than we? If we have the best possible, what could be better? All cause for complaint has ceased when we meet this Perfect, Good and Just Provider of all we are and all we require. Be jealous of another? For what cause? Because he, too, is provided for as perfectly as ourselves? Indeed, the details of his provision may differ. They may perhaps glitter a bit more than our own. But, we have been provided for perfectly and so has he. Be jealous of his gift? No! Rather rejoice in the astounding God of all creation Who is able to simultaneously supply all our need and all his need. Rather rejoice that He Who is working in you has had the details settled in place from the foundation! Before you were born? That’s nothing! Before Adam was born! Before there was an Eden, God had already set forth every needful thing for your salvation and your security in Him. He had also done so for your brother over there. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for your place in heaven is prepared for you. Keep your eyes on that fact and all else must necessarily fade to insignificance.
Finally, I arrive at what is a most marvelous declaration from our Lord. “Is it not lawful for Me to do what I will with what is My own?” This is marvelous on a number of levels. Let me begin with the point that this makes as regards the righteousness of God. This goes back to the message of 1John 1:9, which says He is not only faithful to forgive us when we confess our sins, but He is righteous in doing so. He is Just. As we contemplate the reality that Salvation is wholly by His grace, and that His grace consists in giving out from that which is His own, then we begin to sense the full impact of this parable. It is, after all, a parable of the kingdom. The kingdom is like this landowner, and He does as He wills with what is His own. The King of heaven is not meting out what our works have deserved. Heaven forbid! No, He is giving out freely from His own stores. He is simply being generous. I dare say that had He been paying off these laborers solely on the basis of what they earned and deserved, the pay would have again been equal, but equal at zero pay.
Our works are truly worth nothing in the economy of salvation. Oh, there will be reward for whatever good is found in those efforts. We have just seen that promise (Mt 19:29). Yet, as much as that part of the reward is in payment for our labors, it is really but the bonus. The real pay is in salvation, and that pay, as we see here, is given not on the basis of our efforts, but wholly out of the goodness of His heart.
Here, I find not surprisingly that Jesus stands in perfect accord with Paul’s teaching. I should doubtless say the opposite, that Paul stands in perfect accord with the teaching of Jesus. But, when it comes to this matter of salvation by faith alone, Paul is the advocate of that position that typically comes to mind. That Jesus supports it wholly is necessary, to be sure, but it’s not the thing we typically consider part of what He was about. His ministry was all about Love. He didn’t get into these theological fine points as to whether free will or God’s Providence trump. He never taught about predestination, did He? Well, I could happily maintain that one can find traces of predestination in this very claim under consideration. “Is it not lawful for Me to do what I will with what is My own?” “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and compassion on whom I have compassion” (Ex 33:19). It’s His very name, after all! Will you really find fault with your Maker for making you this way (Ro 9:20)? Is it not lawful for God to do as He chooses with what is, after all, His own? Of course it is! Now, then, consider that there is nothing, no man, no creature, no anything that is not included amongst His possessions.
He Who created all assuredly has ownership over all. If, then, He has chosen to harden the hearts of some, and to soften the hearts of others, it is no grounds to malign His goodness or His justness. If He has determined from the outset that this one shall be saved and that one shall not, it is likewise no grounds for maligning His good name. He is but making determinations as to His own possession, and any man among us would have no quibbles about doing likewise. Our possessions may not be so impressive, but the parallel stands. Indeed, we who count ourselves happily amongst His possession and even His household, must recognize that our possessions are, like ourselves, His to use as He wills.
As much as the Arminians love to decry the great evil of predestination, it is no evil. It is only God exercising His just right over His own creation, His own property. We who call ourselves servants of the Lord should understand that the term implies slavery, even though it be a slavery gladly entered into. We have declared ourselves His property forever. Of course, in doing so, we must realize that this is the outflow of Him working in us that we might so will and so work (Php 2:13). It is not of works, not even in the least of works that consists of us exercising our free will, as so many feel it needful to insist. No! Even in this, you shall have no cause to boast, for that exercise of your will were impossible except He willed it. None comes except the Father calls. That’s the sum of it. If He has not graciously extended salvation to you, no amount of effort or desire or any other thing is going to bring you that salvation. The great Good News is that where He has extended that salvation, no power in heaven or hell is going to prevent you from not only laying hold of that salvation, but clinging to it to the very end. Surely, if no power in heaven or hell can thwart the decree of God, your puny will is not going to be up to the task, and thank God for it!
It’s all God’s grace, or it’s nothing at all. The demand that is heard to include our willingness in the equation, the insistence that this all powerful God can do nothing in us unless we accede to it, is nothing but a repeat of Adam’s games in Eden. It is man once again insisting that he is in control, that he is greater than the God he serves. How is it that we remain blind to this? How can we think that we are so easily able to thwart the Almighty? And, if we do think that, why should we give Him any thought at all? If all I have to do is say, ‘no,’ and He is all undone, then what is He that I should care? The reality is that it is quite the opposite case. The reality is, “Who are you, O man, that you would question Me?” The reality is, “I am but a worm. How can it be, my God, that You care for me?” The reality is that there is no injustice in God’s grace. Nor is there injustice in His providence.
His Providence, for those who are called according to His purpose, is the greatest good, for it is in His Providence that we have been granted the immeasurable great good of Salvation. His Providence, for those who are perishing, sustains them for a time in this life, although they feel no thankfulness for it. But, His Providence in their regard must inevitably result in damnation. They will not feel benefited by that, rest assured. Yet, He is no less Good for having thus arranged their final outcome. He is no less Just, no less Righteous. All that He has done is chosen not to give this one gift to that lot. It’s a gift! How can He be unjust in how He gives a gift? It is nonsense to suggest injustice in this case.
Am I unjust if I give birthday presents to some of my acquaintances and not to others? No, of course not. Is there injustice in me if perhaps I send a card to this one, but do not send one to that? Oh, there may be hurt feelings on their part, perhaps, if they compare notes, but there is no injustice in my choosing. I am but deciding how I shall give out of my own goods. So it is with God. The gift of salvation is given out to whom He chooses, and in that He chooses any at all, He has already given out far more than is deserved. Were He to determine that He would not save so much as one of His creatures, He would be perfectly just in doing so. It is, after all, what we have earned by our efforts, this damnation of an eternal death. We knew it and we didn’t care. But, grace is in Him, and He has chosen – sovereignly chosen – to rescue a remnant for Himself. There is no injustice in that. There cannot be.
