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Matthew 20:1-16 • September 18, 2011

Brothers and sisters in Christ grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus. Amen.

How many parents are here today? How many parents with more than one child? How many who have been around children at some point in time regardless of whether or not you are a parent? Cool.

Have you ever encountered a situation with children that is similar to the story in Matthew’s gospel today? If you give one child 2 cookies and the child right next to them 1 cookie – one of these children will probably let you know very quickly that it’s not fair. My wife Wendy has always been extremely careful about this with our twin daughters. If she gives one of them 6 crackers as part of their snack for school, she gives the other one 6 crackers as well. Birthday and Christmas gifts are always the exact same monetary value. But no matter how hard we try as parents, inevitably we hear “it’s not fair” from one of our children.

But you and I know that this voice isn’t just part of a child’s world. Many adults I know are constantly comparing what they have with what someone else has. A friend has something that you really want and so you shout that it’s not fair??!! I’m struggling a little with that right now every time I see someone with an iPad 2.

Luther Seminary Professor David Lose says that “We tend to assess fairness, as the examples from childhood demonstrate, in terms of what seems fair not only to us but also for us. We tend to measure fairness, that is, in terms of our own wants, needs, hopes, expectations, often with little – or at least secondary – regard for the wants and needs of others. And unfortunately this doesn’t end with childhood.”

Some of you may remember a time when Jay Leno was not the host of The Tonight Show, Johnny Carson was. One night on the show Carson told a joke about a toilet paper shortage that was taking place in Los Angeles. There in fact was no toilet paper shortage in Los Angeles. But the very next day there was a toilet paper shortage because everyone who watched The
Tonight Show when Carson cracked that joke ran out afterward and bought all the toilet paper they could find just in case there was in fact a shortage. People panicked and grabbed way more than what they really needed, rather than
being OK with what they already had.

Think with me about the vineyard in Matthew’s gospel for a bit. Let’s say that the vineyard is Good Shepherd. Here are a few thoughts. Are the families who will be joining our congregation for the first time in the next month less deserving of God’s love and grace than are the members in this congregation who have been here for 50 years? I mean, is it not true that longtime members in a congregation have been out working longer in the scorching heat of the ministry field? Why would these newcomers who have done no work in our congregation’s ministry field be entitled to the same amount of God’s love and grace as those of us who have already been working for a long time?

God as our landowner gives us the gift of overwhelming grace and generosity and love that is for all. It is a gift freely given by God, regardless of whether you have been living your life in Christ for one day or for 80 years. Regardless of whether you are just entering into a congregational relationship or you have been part of a community of faith your entire life.

In Jesus’ parable today, I think it’s important to pay close attention to the last workers who are hired. Why did they not get hired before – were they late to arrive in the morning? Were they addicts or drunks or homeless or criminals or divorced people that nobody wanted to hire because they were different from everyone else? The landowner asks them why they haven’t been working all day. Their response is simply, “Because nobody has given us a job.” Nobody, in essence, wanted them. But the
landowner hires them and pays them.

What the landowner offers to the workers in Matthew’s gospel today may not seem fair, but in fact it is. All of the workers are paid what was promised to them. The parable gives attention to the giver of grace rather than the recipients. God rewards according to grace, not accomplishments.

When we look at our own lives and our own walk in faith, do we think about how blessed we are or about how we always seem to want more? Do we spend all of our energy focusing on the bad things that happen to us, or on all the good things that are constantly happening right in front of us? Do we live in the light of thanksgiving for the free gift of relationship with God through our savior Jesus or are we constantly falling into the darkness of jealousy and envy? Do we look to our neighbors with love and compassion or only as a source of conflict and competition?

Knowing that we have options before us doesn’t always make it easy for us to choose without constantly thinking and saying, “It’s not fair.” And you know what – that’s good news! It’s not fair.

It’s not fair that God’s grace is freely given to you and me each and every day in spite of our incessant need for something else. It’s not fair that God continues to mold us and shape us as his children in spite of our constant attempts to distance ourselves from being in relationship with God. It’s not fair, that God loved you and me so much that he was willing to let his son be sacrificed on a bloody cross. It’s not fair that death could not hold on to the sacrificed son. It’s not fair that God gave us a savior named Jesus that not one of us deserves. It’s not fair that you and I will never get everything right every time. It’s not fair that you and I will never show up on time or know the right answers. It’s not fair that in spite of all my efforts to stop thinking about, I will still want an iPad2 that everyone else seems to have already! It’s not fair.

I pray that you join me this week in giving thanks. Giving thanks that our landowner God is gracious and loving beyond our wildest expectations and that it’s never going to be fair and that’s the good news of life in Christ. Amen.

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Matthew 18:15-20 • September 4, 2011

Brothers and sisters in Christ grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus. Amen.

I know one week is a long time, but I hope some of you remember what the Gospel Reading was last week in worship. If not, let me refresh your memory a bit.

The disciple Peter has just confessed that Jesus is “the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.” after that a short exchange happens between Peter and Jesus resulting in Jesus telling Peter to “Get behind me, Satan.” And then Jesus turning to the disciples and saying “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”

I think it’s no accident, and I’m actually thankful, that today we head to Matthew 18. It’s a text that many of us know, but far fewer of us seem to have a clue as to what we are supposed to do with it.

To take up our cross and follow Jesus was last week. In light of the gospel reading before us today, does any of that change? I think it is often easier for you and me to say “I Love You” to someone than to say “I forgive you.” Or maybe even more directly, easier to say “I love you” rather than say “I am sorry.”

Do you know that this text from Matthew 18 appears in nearly every constitution of congregations in the ELCA and many congregations outside of our denomination? It is also one of the most significant ways in which we are called to engage each other during conflict as it arises between staff, pastors, or committee members that serve in those congregations. If this is true, which it most definitely is in the life of our own congregation, why is it so difficult to actually do?

Maybe it’s the somewhat hypothetical questions that are brought forth in Jesus teaching today. The first question is – “If another member of the church sins against you” or another translation from the Greek is “if your brother sins against you.” The second question is “If the member (brother) refuses to listen…”

I like the intimacy that the translation of brother or sister offers in those questions. It moves us from relationships among only members of churches into all relationships of our lives. I don’t believe that it’s a matter of “if”, it’s a matter of “when” these questions will need to be addressed in human relationships.
What Jesus is saying here about relationships is significant, not because we don’t know what we’re doing – but because we don’t always understand the depth and importance of relationships to our life in Christ. Jesus is not talking about us as individuals who constantly seek to control relationships. Jesus is lifting up the fact that all children of God are called to live in community and that all of our relationships are deeply connected together and deeply affect the life of the entire community.

So Jesus is giving us a bit of a guide today for times when relationships aren’t working well or not always filled with happiness and joy. When those times come, more often than not, our response is to simply and strongly point a finger at the other person and let them know what is wrong with them. Is that what Jesus is talking about here? Pointing fingers at our brothers and sisters in Christ?

I don’t use a lot of props in my preaching, but I thought I’d use one today. My brother and I used to play crochet in our backyard growing up. We were fairly competitive when we played, especially if there were other kids from the neighborhood playing. One day, and I honestly can’t remember why – I think it’s one of those memories I’ve repressed into the deepest recesses of my memory. Anyway, on this particular day we were playing crochet in the backyard when all of sudden we are running around the yard and through the house, me in front – my brother chasing behind me swinging the crochet mallet at me.

Needless to say our father wasn’t too happy to witness this activity taking place, he grabbed both of us in a fatherly way that demonstrated clearly what he thought of the entire situation, and sent us to our rooms for the remainder of day. Eventually my brother and I apologized to one another and I don’t think we ever played another game of crochet together again.

I make light of this a little, but I also lift it up in all seriousness. That experience had a impact on the community of my family that day, whether my brother and I knew it then or not. I think it changed our relationship in that community forever. We eventually figured out that what we had done was wrong, but I’m not sure we will ever know the impact or hurt it may have caused our father. The community of family is not easy. It requires active participation from everyone involved.

The community of being church is not easy either. Sometimes it’s about playing fun games with kids or celebrating new life in baptism. At other times it’s about death of people we love and loss of things and programs that we will miss forever.

What other communities and relationships are important to you?

Jesus doesn’t promise us that the relationships we experience in community will always be easy or that everything will go the way we expect it to go or that we will all get along with each other all the time and nobody will ever disagree. What Jesus does promise is that he will be with us in all of those relationships, in all of those communities, and in all of those times. In verse 20 of today’s gospel, Jesus says, “For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”

I think that life in community as brothers and sisters in Christ is not found in the fact that inevitably something bad will happen or a struggle will take place or that eventually a treasured relationship that we have will fall apart and require reconciliation between both parties. Life in community as brothers and sisters in Christ happens through the presence of our risen savior. Christ’s presence in our relationships and the communities in which we live invites you and I to experience times that I believe are a glimpse of the kingdom of heaven on earth in a most incredible and beautiful way.

And on this first weekend in September, following some of the most challenging times that many communities in which you and I participate in have ever faced, we gather as a Christian community in worship, children of God who are forgiven and freed to become the people God wants us to become. My prayer on this day is simply this – Good and gracious God, may your kingdom come. Amen.