It's Not Fair!!" **a sermon for 17 Pentecost (9/20/26)

“But that’s not fair!”

 

            Bill’s death came as a shock to all who knew him.  Bill took care of himself and swam laps almost daily.  After being diagnosed with Munier’s disease, Bill carefully watched his diet.  He was fanatical about limiting his sodium intake.  A brain bleed and a fall down some stairs changed all that, however.  Bill’s death was so unfair.

            You or I may do everything right- exercise, diet, see our doctor.  And still the cancer diagnosis comes.  We may do everything right at work.  We work hard, we do all that is asked of us.  And still we are fired.  Life can hand us many such situations that are unfair.  Jonah and the workers in the Vineyard can relate.  The prophet and the workers both face unfair situations.

            Jonah gets upset that his revival mission goes all too well.  The people of Ninevah repent and God forgives them.  That does not sit well with Jonah.  “I knew, God, that you’d forgive my enemies,”  Jonah says.  That is why he tries to hide and heads to Tarshish instead.  Jonah knows God is a god who “is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.” (4:2).

            So, Jonah goes off and pouts that “the enemy” was not wiped out.  In the heat of the day, God causes a vine to grow and cover Jonah.  When the vine shrivels up and dies, Jonah is more upset about that than he was about Ninevah.  God calls the prophet to task.  Should not God care about each soul, created in God’s image?

            In the Gospel, Jesus tells a parable about a vineyard owner.  There are not enough workers at harvest time.  So, at various hours, the vineyard owner goes and hires more workers.  The first workers are promised a denarii for their labors.  Imagine their disgust when, at day’s end, everyone who works gets a denarii.

            “It’s not fair!” the early workers cry out.  They demand justice.  After all, it is only right.  They bore the brunt of the work and the heat of the day.  They feel they deserve more.  Or that the later workers receive less.  The owner rebukes the workers.  I gave you what we agreed upon.

Should I not be able to do what I want with my money?

            Both Jonah and the workers have a faulty understanding of God’s grace.  They believe that God’s grace is earned and that good, hard work ought to be rewarded with a proportionate amount of grace.  This is the basis of the Protestant work ethic.  That is not how God’s grace works in God’s economy, however.

            God’s grace is freely and equally given.  No one gets more.  No one gets less.  Grace is not a pie, where there is only so much to go around.  God’s grace is freely given to all who will accept it.  That is a hard concept for many of us to fathom.  Sure, we are all in favor of God’s grace for us.  Maybe not so much with those who are “other.”

            For those we consider “other,” we try to limit God’s grace.  “Look at that rainbow-colored hair!”  Did you see all of those tattoos?  Such thoughts show our own faulty understanding of the radical nature of God’s unmerited love that we call grace.

            Grace is more like an Oprah giveaway moment.  You get grace.  You get grace.  And you get grace.  And, they, too, get grace.  Everybody gets grace!  I, for one, am glad and grateful for the lavish abundance of God’s grace.  I know I don’t deserve such divine mercy.  Yet, God freely gives it to me (and you) any way (Romans 6:23).

            Truth be told, no one is worthy.  As Paul tells the Romans, all have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory (3:23).  There is nothing any of us can say or do to earn God’s grace.  And we are the latecomers to the Vineyard.  Yet God gives you and me the same grace given to all who obey the call to come work in the fields.

            But we are not called to hoard God’s grace for ourselves.  We have been given grace to share that grace with others.  A hymn of my youth goes:

“He said, Freely, freely you have received; freely, freely give.  Go in my name and because you believe, others will know that I live."  May you and I go forth this week to share the lavish abundance of God’s grace.