But God, I Wanted You to Hurt Them, Not Care for Them!

The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets
September 24, 2023
Proper 20, Year A
Jonah 3:10-4:11
Psalm 145:1-8
Matthew 20:1-16

But God, I Wanted You to Hurt Them, Not Care for Them!

“But God, I wanted you to hurt them, not care for them!” That’s Jonah’s complaint against God over the people of Nineveh. Jonah was a prophet sent by God to tell the people of Nineveh to turn from their harmful ways and follow God’s ways instead. Jonah didn’t want to go there because he wanted God to kill all the people of Nineveh, and he knew if he went there, they would repent and God would show mercy.

So, when God took him to Nineveh on the Whale Express, he preached to the people, and they repented, and then Jonah began to sulk. “I wanted you to hurt them, God, not care for them.” Jonah was displeased because God’s love for humanity was too much for Jonah’s taste. “It’s great that you love me, God, but you’re not supposed to love those other ones. I don’t love them. I don’t care about them, so you shouldn’t either, God.”

If we’re really honest, Jonah’s contempt for humanity tends to show up in all of us, even if in less obvious ways. The people we won’t forgive. Our “my way or the highway” mentality. The irredeemable people we know are on the outs with God. Sometimes our contempt for humanity is even less obvious than that. Jesus illustrated this in his teaching about the Kingdom of God with his parable of the laborers in the vineyard.

In Jesus’ parable of the Kingdom of God, people who only worked an hour got paid the same as people who worked all day. That’s not fair, we may cry, and we’d be right. It’s not fair. God doesn’t seem all that concerned with our notions of fairness. God seems concerned about people, the healing and well-being of all of us and of all people.

All of the people in Jesus’ parable needed enough to live on, and so they each received the usual daily wage. That wasn’t making anyone rich. The daily wage was enough to live on. So, when folks who worked only an hour received the usual daily wage, they were receiving just enough to live on.

Well, it’s still not fair, we may say, so let’s look at where our notions of fairness get us. If the folks who only worked for an hour only got paid for an hour’s worth of work, they’d have had about an eighth of what they needed to live. If they kept on with only an eighth of what they needed, they’d soon enough be starving and dead.

The landowner had enough for that not to happen. He was able to pay all of his workers enough to live on, even those who were only able to work for an hour. Is it fair? No, but the other option for the people who could only work an hour is eventually just to let them die.

That’s where our notions of fairness get us. You can’t live off only an eighth of a day’s worth of wages. So we see, our notions of fairness actually hold people in contempt just as much as Jonah did with the people of Nineveh. “I wanted you to hurt them, God, not care for them” Jonah was thinking. Then the laborers in the vineyard were thinking, “It’s not fair that those who only worked an hour got paid for a full day’s worth of work.” The possibly unconscious reality was then, “I don’t care about them, and neither should you, God. If they die, they die.”

We may not actually think that last part, but our notions of fairness leave us with the contemptuous mentality of “If they die, they die.” That’s the economic reality of those upset about fairness.

Jesus’ parable of the kingdom of God is about economic justice, because economic justice seeks to care for people and heal people. Remember, that’s the whole point of the gospel, for God to heal us and for us to heal each other. So, in God’s kingdom, we use what we have for the well being of others.

The wealthy landowner needed workers, and the workers needed enough to live on. The landowner could have only paid an eighth of a day’s wage for those who only worked an hour, and that’s probably what would happen most often in our economy. The landowner got to save some money by only paying them for the hours they worked. They weren’t owed anything else, and anyone who complained could easily be replaced by someone else the next day.

That’s often how our economy works, but that’s not how the kingdom of God works. If all who call themselves Christian were really serious about living the kingdom of God, people would be paid what they really need, not just what employers can get away with paying them. Of course, not all employers do that. Many employers do pay what people need, but a great many do not, and a great many people get extremely wealthy while their lowest paid workers are in poverty.

That’s not the kingdom of God, and for those who think Jesus’ parable is all about getting into heaven when we die, don’t kid yourselves. Saying this parable is all about life after death is definitely a convenient way of ignoring the economic justice that is taught in this parable, but getting to heaven when you die is not what Jesus was teaching. The parable wasn’t a metaphor for life after death. Jesus was talking about life here on Earth and God’s continued desire for us to treat one another with love and to create a society in which we care and use our riches generously.

If you look at the acts of Jesus and his other teachings, he was continually healing the poor and sick, those who had been left with only an eighth day’s wage, and he was continually telling those with great wealth to give what they had to the poor.

Pretending that this parable is not about economic justice is just one more way to ignore the fact that our apathy towards others and our desires for “fairness” would leave many people dead, and in fact, our apathy and unthinking ways do leave many people dead.

“But God, it’s not fair that those who only worked an hour got paid for a full day’s worth of work.” Well, if we paid people what the really needed, not just for the amount they were able to work, wouldn’t that lead to apathy? Many would argue that, saying, “God’s economy wouldn’t work. I’ll bet the next day, in Jesus’ parable, no one showed up to work until the last hour.” Well, I’ll bet the landowner had a fix for that.

Notice the people who only worked an hour wanted to work, and the landowner was happy to hire them. If folks had showed up at the last hour, unwilling to work until then, I have a feeling he wouldn’t have hired them. God’s economy works. We just have to be willing to care about one another as much as God does. We have to be willing to let go of our ideas of fairness. We have to be willing to let go of our apathy towards one another and our contempt towards one another. Then, we will see “justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” (Amos 5:24) Then, “all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God” (Isaiah 52:10). Then, we will see God’s kingdom here on earth as it is in heaven.

But Jesus, That's Not Fair!

Brad Sullivan

Proper 20, Year A

September 24, 2017

Emmanuel, Houston

Jonah 3:10-4:11

Matthew 20:1-16

But Jesus, That’s Not Fair!

“But Jesus, that’s not fair!”  That pretty well sums up the response of the laborers at the end of Jesus’ parable of the laborers in the vineyard.  They had agreed to work for the day for the usual daily wage.  They negotiated those terms with the landowner.  Then, when they found out that those who worked for only an hour also made the usual daily wage, they felt cheated.  “That’s not fair!”  Well, as a friend of mine was thinking of titling her sermon for today, “Suck it up, Buttercup.” 

Clarence Jordan of Koinonia Farms once said, “Whenever Jesus told a parable, he lit a stick of dynamite and covered it with a story.”  At first glance many of us, myself included, look at this parable and think, “Well that’s not fair, Jesus.”  Then we look a little deeper into the story, and “boom”.  The dynamite goes off.  Our notions of fairness and deservedness, our shoulds and aught tos get blown up. 

True enough, it isn’t exactly fair to pay those who worked only an hour the same as those who worked all day, but look at the alternative.  If the landowner was being fair it, would seem that the laborers who worked all day would have had the landowner pay for only an hours’ worth of work to those who worked an hour for only.  That would be fair, but that was 1/8th of what they needed each day to get by.  So, ultimately the attitude of the laborers who worked all day was, “in order to be fair, you should let those other people starve.  Ultimately, the laborers who worked all day were saying that those who were only able to work for an hour should die.  “Boom.”  The dynamite goes off.

“Well wait, no, Jesus didn’t mean it like that.”  “I thought it was unfair, but I didn’t want the other laborers to die.”  We hear Jesus’ parables, the dynamite goes off, and then while the dust is still settling, we often try to rebuild our world just like it was before Jesus’ pesky meddling.  “No, he didn’t mean it like that.”  “Sure Jesus is the messiah, but he didn’t really mean what he said in this parable.”  “Something in this story got lost in translation.”  It’s easy to try to rebuild too quickly, wanting the security of our previous notions of what is right, without first looking at what Jesus has revealed in his pesky parable dynamite demolition thing.

We often want this parable not to be about money, and it isn’t only about money.  This parable may not be Jesus’ instruction manual for economists, may not be, but the response is often to see the economic flaws in Jesus’ notion of generosity over deservedness.  “This wouldn’t work as an economic system.  You know what people are like.  No one would work more than an hour a day.”  Probably true, and that’s a fair point, but before we rebuild what Jesus demolished over that one security keeping argument, what lessons might there be for us as we consider this parable?

Looking at how people tend to get compensated for their work, we tend to look at averages.  What do others make on average for this same type of work?  That seems fair enough, but in the light of Jesus’ parable, a more appropriate question would be “Is this compensation enough?  While others might make “X” for this job, I know that “X” isn’t really enough in today’s world.  It may be fair in comparison with what others make, but it isn’t really enough.”

For a modern example of choosing to pay what is enough, rather than seems fair by comparison, Dan Price, the CEO of Gravity Payments cut his own salary by 90% back in 2015 so that all of his employees could earn $70,000.  I don’t know that Mr. Price was inspired by Jesus; I’ve read nothing to indicate that he was, but his example shows the possibility of living into the kingdom way that Jesus taught, even in our modern economy.  The company is still going strong, or was as of January of this year when the article I read about it was written.  There were some negative consequences.  Some clients pulled out of the company, fearing their fees would increase.  They didn’t.  Other clients liked what the CEO had done and began giving him their business.  Some of the employees didn’t like the new arrangement and quit because they didn’t think it was fair for those who had been earning less than they to receive the same as they.  These employees felt diminished by their boss’ generosity.  I tend to go with the title of my friend’s sermon on that one.  “Suck it up, buttercup.” 

Like the laborers in the vineyard who worked all day, they felt it wasn’t fair to earn the same as those whom they felt didn’t deserve as much.  Jesus again takes dynamite to our notions of fairness and to the comparisons we so often draw.  “Am I making as much as compared to others?”  “Should those people earn as much as I do when I compare the amount or kind of work I do with the work they do?”  “Do they really deserve to have enough for the work they do?”  “Don’t I deserve more than enough for the work I do?”  Boom.

Such comparison is something else Jesus dynamites in the parable of the workers in the vineyard, along with our notions of fairness and deservedness.  When the dust settles, we might just learn from Jesus that comparison may seem like wisdom, but it doesn’t tend to lead to a good place.  Comparison leads to jealousy and envy.  Comparison leads to being bitter about what someone else has rather than being happy about what I have.  Comparison leads to always wanting more.  Comparison leads to feelings of inadequacy and never being good enough.  Comparison leads to us being deaf to Jesus’ teaching not to worry; his teaching that we are enough as we have been made to be; his teaching not to put our faith in stuff, but to put our faith in him, to trust in our beloved-ness, and to love others as we are loved. 

Theodore Roosevelt, Brené Brown, and others have said variations of the following concerning the supposed wisdom of comparison.  “Comparison is the thief of happiness, and jealousy is usually it’s partner in crime.”  The laborers in the vineyard and the employees of Gravity Payments were happy with what they had, until they started comparing what they had to others.  Then comparison and jealousy stole their happiness away and did absolutely nothing to help them or anyone else.

To the cry that this story isn’t fair, I’d simply say, God isn’t fair, and thank God for that.  God’s Kingdom doesn’t deal all that much in fairness and deservedness.  God’s kingdom doesn’t deal in our jealous comparisons.  God isn’t interested in our hierarchies.  He’s not interested in us raising ourselves up above others because we feel that our greater efforts make us deserving of greater benefits.  In God’s Kingdom, Jesus dynamites or concepts of deservedness, fairness, and comparison.  Then in the crater and debris that is left, Jesus teaches us, and God builds up in us his love, his selflessness, and his generosity toward others.