25^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Gospel – Matthew 20:1-16

It’s Not Fair

Basilica of the Annunciation, Nazareth

The love of your life is diagnosed with a debilitating disease.  Your elderly mom takes a fall and you struggle to deal with all the stresses of rehab, medical bills, and juggling your other life responsibilities!  Your favorite uncle passes away unexpectedly, and all those wonderful childhood memories come flooding back.  You go through a routine medical exam and discover you have cancer.  It all feels so surreal but it’s not!  It’s like you’ve been cast in the role of Job and you never even audtioned for the part!  And all we can think is – what next??

We all face trials and tribulations!  And in the midst of all that stress and distress, only one thing seems certain/ LIFE IS NOT FAIR!! 

That is essentially what we are hearing today in the Gospel.  Laborers in a vineyard who have put in a long full day of work – 12 hours, from 6 to 6, are complaining that others who only worked as little as one hour are being paid the same wage.  I have worked all day with the sweat of my brow.  And here someone you hire at the very last and only works one hour gets the same pay as me??

IT’S NOT FAIR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  If we were honest here, and we were those same day laborers, we would probably be complaining and grumbling long and loud just like them.

But notice that there really wouldn’t have been an argument at all if the owner had paid the full day laborers FIRST!!!  Then they would have been on their way and never heard the rest of the story.  They would have walked away with a full day’s pay for a full day’s labor!  Perfectly acceptable, perfectly fair!  They never would have seen that the one-hour workers were generously paid the same wage.  So something else is going on here, more than a simple lesson on justice!!  Jesus deliberately flips the order of payment so that the day long laborers go LAST.  And as each group gets paid, you have to believe the 12-hour workers are getting more and more HOPEFUL of a bigger paycheck!!!  But that doesn’t happen; they get paid exactly what they agreed to, exactly what they expected, exactly what was FAIR!!  And all of that hope explodes into anger!

Contrast that with the hope displayed by those chosen last.  They stayed and hoped ALL DAY LONG that someone would hire them.  If you were ever involved in choosing teams for a baseball game and ended up being chosen last, you can identify!!  All the talented people are picked first.  And last are the unskilled, those who are somehow lacking in physical ability or mental acuity.  These are the laborers who have stuck around through the heat of the day, still hoping for a job, for a chance to prove themselves.

So consider that this is a parable NOT about human justice, but really about God’s unlimited generosity.  The laborers get angry only when they compare their wages and effort with the effort of someone else!  They get upset when they think more of themselves and less of someone else!!!  They think the owner has been unjust to them when he really has only been generous with the others!  Who’s to say we all wouldn’t have had a similar reaction!

Such a good reminder that God’s ways are not our ways!  That He has a plan and will not abandon us!  Consider this - when a flashlight grows dim or quits working, do you just throw it away?  Of course not!  You change the batteries!  When a person messes up or finds themselves in a dark place, do you cast them aside?  Of course not!  You help them change their batteries.  Some need AA – attention and affection.  Some need AAA – attention, affection and acceptance!  Some need C – compassion!  And some need D – direction!  And if they still don’t seem to shine, simply sit with them quietly and share your light!

In God’s eyes, it doesn’t matter if we have lived our whole lives in faithful service to God or if we have only just come to the Faith.  It doesn’t matter if we have lived a good moral life or if we repented and asked for forgiveness on our deathbed.   It doesn’t matter if we have worked in the vineyard all our life or if we entered the workforce at the last hour.

God loves us ALL – wholely, completely, unconditionally, EQUALLY!!

Whether we worked 12 hours or one, the reward He offers us all is one and the same – eternal life with Him in heaven.  God is just and fair, but also kind and loving, generous and compassionate to us all.  And while His ways are not our ways, we are called to strive to be the same, to be fair and generous, just and compassionate, to be Christian to all those around us. 

So in those moments when we are overwhelmed with the ‘unfairnesses of life, let’s remember this!

There are things we don’t want to happen but have to accept

There are things we don’t want to know, but have to learn

There are people we can’t live without, but have to let go

But just for a little while!

 

God didn’t remove the Red Sea; He parted it.

God doesn’t always remove our problems; He makes a way through them!