Of all the parables of Jesus, this is one of my very favorites. A parable is a little made-up story to make a point about God. Jesus came to reveal God, and because most of his audience was made up of simple people, he made up little pointed stories as a way to get his message across. It was a way to help them understand something they didn’t know by comparing it to something they did know.
The point that Jesus makes about God here in this parable is that God is nuts about us! The hero in this little parable is a vineyard owner and that vineyard owner is God himself. Jesus’ listeners were familiar with vineyard owners, but the owner in this story seems a little crazy in the way he operated his vineyard. You know what this vineyard owner did? He gave all his workers, even those who came in at quitting time, a full-day’s pay no matter how much or how little they worked for him because they all, no doubt, needed the income.
There were two different audiences listening to Jesus that day and he wanted both audiences to hear him. (1) He spoke to the “religious types,” the ones who kept all the religious rules, and to the “non-religious types” who couldn’t, wouldn’t or hadn’t kept those religious rules.
The message from this parable outraged the “religious types” who thought that God should love them more because of all they had done for God. To them, this parable was “bad news.” It was unfair. On the other hand, the “non-religious types” were bowled over to hear that God loved them with all his heart, in spite of the fact that they were able to do so little for God. To them it was “good news.” The message of this parable is not about God's fairness, but about God's generosity.
If Jesus wanted us to know that God loves us no matter how much or how little we do for him, then that parable has a pretty mind-blowing message. It sounds unbelievable! It sounds too good to be true! Because it sounds too good to be true, many cannot accept it or this parable has never been explained to them. Those who find it too good to be true try to tell us that Jesus must not have meant what he said so let’s help it make sense by adding a list of “yes, buts,” playing down the radicalness of this mind-blowing good news, saying “Yes, God loves you unconditionally, but, if, when, except.”
The reason why so many religious types were threatened by this parable was their fear that if people start believing its message, they would start doing anything they damned-well please!
These religious types today believe that what people really need to hear is more about the "fear of God." These people believe that fear is what keeps people in line. However, in my experience, what really happens is when people finally “get” this incredible message the opposite starts to happen. People start wanting to change their lives for the better – just like those who followed Jesus in his day. They started “hungering and thirsting” for holiness.
How about you? Do you really believe the message of this parable? Do you “get it?” Do you understand that God already loves you and you don't have to earn it? Do you understand that "grace" is when God gives you the good things that you don't deserve (unconditional love) and "mercy" is when God doesn't give you the bad things that you do deserve (condemnation)? Let me repeat that for emphasis!
Once you accept this “good news,” once you begin to live that “good news,” God can slowly turn your spiritual life around and cause it to blossom in a very amazing way! You will begin, maybe for the first time in your life, to love God, to love your neighbor and to love yourself with all your heart because you finally understand that God has always done that for you - even during those times when you didn't, or couldn't, love him back!
The “good news” today is this! God is always giving us a "full day’s pay" of love, no matter how late we show up to love
him back!
No comments:
Post a Comment