Rev. George Miller
March 5, 2023
Matthew 20:1-16
You are about to hear the 2 scariest words in the English language: Junior High.
Perhaps the most treacherous, confusing era in our entire lives.
The lunchroom where the cool kids sit here; the nerds there.
Science room when the teacher says, “Pick your Lab partner, you’ll be
working together all semester.”
English class where introverts are forced to stand up and read infront of
everyone their book report.
The group project in which 1 person does it all while 1 person does absolutely
nothing.
The locker room, when everyone gets to see who is developing where and at
what rate.
Picking teams during gym class and the sense of “please don’t let me be picked
last.”
Could this be another way to approach today’s reading? What if the Landowner was an athletic coach
who lets everyone play on the team?
Imagine this: The people picked
first are the athletically astute, the tall, the agile, the quick, the strong.
That would be a winning team, but the coach goes to the theatre department,
he gathers the drama geeks and the tech nerds.
Now we have a team that will not only win but put on a dang good show
while doing it!
The coach sees there are others who want to play. So during lunch, he goes up to the outcast
table in the lunch room and says “C’mon, I want you to be part of the team.”
Though they may have glasses, acne or funny sounding accents, they get to
play alongside the jocks and the drama nerds.
Not only are they now a winning team that puts on a good show, but they
are a team that has become wonderfully diverse.
But that’s not enough. The coach
goes out behind the school building, under the bleachers, and finds the ones
who are making out, smoking, skipping class and being oh so goth.
The coach says “C’mon, I want you to be part of the team.”
At 5 the coach goes to the class delegated as “special education,” the
coach reaches out to the students listed as “special needs.”
The coach asks “Why aren’t you playing on the team.”
To which someone in in a wheelchair says “Because no one will pick us.”
To which the coach says ““C’mon, I want you to be part of the team.”
Now, there’s a field full of jocks and beauty queens, muscles and mathematicians,
computer techs and trombonists, students the shades of brown, black, white, and
sunburned.
And at the end of the event, the coach says “Congratulations, you have
all won the game!
“Congratulations- you all get 1st prize!”
Would that upset you? Perhaps if
you were the jock selected at 7 am; but for the students selected at noon or 5
pm, it would be a joy.
...but what if we look at today’s reading another way.
What if the vineyard is not a place.
What if the vineyard is a person, and the person is you?
And what if the hours actually represented eras in your life?
What if the people are you at those different eras.
Think of this for a moment.
If you were born before 1960 there is a good chance you were raised going
to church.
Perhaps you got to be that sweet innocent child who got to sing “Jesus Loves
Me” and attend Confirmation.
But then as you became a teen, go off to college, get your first job, date,
church was no longer a priority or a regular thing.
Then maybe around the noon hour of your life you have a child, raise a
family, so you decide it’s time to go back to church.
But then the kids grow up, the kids leave. And with no more need of Christmas pageants
and bake sales, your participation begins to wane.
Then there comes that moment- death and disaster break in at the 3 pm
hour, and when it does, one may find the desire to come back to church or come
back to God….
…or some may find themselves pulling further away.
Then there is the 5 pm hour in our lives.
The long day has begun to come to a close.
We’ve done it all, we’ve seen it all, we may know it all or discover we don’t
know a thing, asking “Was any of it worth it?”
And as the night begins to fall…there can be that thought:
“Does God still care about me?
Does God still want me to be part of the team? Am I still a beloved child of Heaven?”
To which the owner of the vineyard comes along, extends a hand and says...
“Yes. Yes YOU are!”
Maybe today’s parable isn’t about us judging others on what time they “arrive.”
Maybe it’s a story saying -
“No matter what hour of life you are in, God is seeking you out, God is
extending an invitation to you, God wants YOU.”
Maybe the beauty of today’s story is that the Kingdom of God is a place
in which there is space for all, a time for all, and a way for all to be part
of the team.
For that, we can say “amen.”
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