God’s Not Fair

Sermon preached on September 21, 2014 at Germantown Mennonite church.  Based on Matthew 20:1-16

My family will tell you–when I drive I become the finger wagging educator  for all the clueless drivers around me.  I will remind folks about the meaning of the words “yield” vs. “stop”; I will tell people to get off their phones and pay attention to the road; but most importantly, I’ll tell people the proper way to merge into traffic.

It is admittedly a pet peeve of mine.  We should all be fair.  We should all take turns.  It’s a basic rule we learned in kindergarten, isn’t it?  Take turns.  Be fair.  It’s so simple.

This week, while driving in some backed up traffic on the expressway, I was merging–inch by inch–into the lane beside me, because my lane was ending.  And all the cars in front of me were taking turns.  I put my signal on, and inched to the right.  And the car beside me made no move to let me in.  So, I inched to the right a little more, this time, looking at the driver beside me, prepared to give a wave and a smile.  But the driver was staring straight ahead and I knew he had no intention of letting me in.

So I scooched over one more time, hoping this guy would be fair, follow the rules, and let me in.  But then I realized, this guy is being a huge jerk, so I’ll let him go ahead and get that one car length ahead of him, if that would make him feel better.

And then something amazing happened.  The guy in front of me and the non-merging car beside me rolled down his window and waved me in front of him.  He must have seen me giving up on merging, and decided to send a message of fairness.

I was thrilled–I blew kisses at the kind driver in front of me, I waved.  I perked right up.  All was fair again.

And then I had this moment of–”Who cares.”  I am ahead of the guy that wouldn’t play fair.  But it’s traffic.  And he’ll get ahead of me, and then I’ll get ahead of him, and then we’ll both end up where we need to go.  Why am I so concerned about fairness?

John Dominic Crossan defines parables as the opposite of myths.  Myths are stories that we live by; stories that tell us about ourselves and what we value.  Parables, on the other hand, are designed to undercut those myths.  And, since parables tell us about what the reign of God will be like, it seems to be Jesus’ way of saying, “The reign of God will not look the way you think it should.  It’s going to look like this other thing instead.”

In today’s parable, God is commonly understood as the landowner–since this is the reign of God, or the kingdom of God.  And that works here, except that I can’t get past that feeling that God’s just not fair.  If I was working in the vineyard for a whole day, I’d want my wages to be commensurate.  If I worked only a few hours, I’d fully expect to make less than others who were there longer.

God, the wealthy landowner in this story, is not fair.

Over the last century, the unions have been formed to help the wealthy landowners of our nation treat workers fairly.  We’ve fought for equal pay for women and men, for fair treatment for workers.  We’ve lobbied for a living wage for restaurant workers and teachers.

We are concerned with fairness.  And it seems–in this text–that God is not.  And if I’m being really honest with myself and with you, that makes me really angry.

I want God to treat me the way that I believe I should be treated, to give me what I deserve, to prefer me when I’ve worked extra hard.  And, according to this upside-down parable, God’s not going to be what I want God to be; God’s not going to act the way I want God to act.

In our parable today, God the wealthy landowner, goes out to find workers for his land.  Now, this would have been a familiar scene, and a part of life in the time of Jesus.  If you get there early, you get in the line first, but if you get there late, you may not get any work.  Folks were typically paid one denari, the equivalent of “our daily bread.”  It was enough to eat for a day.  So if you didn’t get work, you didn’t eat.

Who knows why folks got to the work spot late, but if they did, they waited all day in the hot sun for just the chance for work.  They were no less hungry than that folks that were working in the vineyard.  In fact, they were probably more anxious because they were standing in the hot sun, praying for work that may not come, anxious to have some security–to know that their daily bread would be provided.

God the wealthy landowner, is not fair.  But, maybe that’s ok.  Perhaps it’s ok that I don’t get all that I deserve.  It’s better that God’s love and grace flow to all.

And by all, that means even the people that I don’t like.  It means the people that don’t work as hard as I think I do.  It means the folks that have treated us badly, have hurt us, misunderstood us, and talked trash about us.  It means the homophobes, the racists, the xenophobes, the people that don’t recycle, don’t believe in climate change or evolution.  It’s all those people that we’d rather not hang out with if given the chance. God is generous to all “those people” too.

In our desire for fairness, we can become smug with things go our way (like when I was in the traffic), or become blind to the things that go too much in our favor (as we can do with our white privilege).  But when things aren’t fair according to our standards, well oh Lord, people are going to hear about it.

The landowner addresses the outrage of the workers by saying, “Are you envious because I am generous?”  A literal translation of this from greek is, “Is your eye evil because I am good?”  Do you mean people harm because I am good?  This literal translation cuts–do I have such a hard time handling God’s goodness and generosity that I think harmful thoughts towards others?  Am I so concerned with fairness, that I become angry when things don’t go according to my playbook on fairness?

One of the most difficult part of parenting is that I have strong urges toward fairness, but find it impossible, because each child is different, each child brings their own uniqueness, their own anxieties and skills.  To treat each child the same would be unfair.  Although that can be pretty difficult to explain in the heat of the moment.

There’s a big difference between fairness and justice.  Fairness in today’s parable means that everyone gets a decent hourly wage.  But justice in this story means that everyone gets their daily bread, that no one goes hungry, that all are fed, regardless of how much they can work, regardless of their economic status, their race, gender, sexual orientation.  Regardless of how long they’ve been in this country, and whether they have proper paperwork.

God does not care one bit about our sense of fairness, but God cares deeply about justice.

Fairness is about us, according to our own sensibilities; but justice is beyond ourselves, our own needs and ideals about what is fair.  Justice has nothing to do with how people merge into traffic, and everything to do with daily bread, with love and grace.

There is a place for fairness, but in the reign of God, we put that aside, and take our cues from a God that gives of God’s self to everyone, no matter who they are or where they come from, no matter how much or how little they have worked, and no matter how concerned we may be about the fairness of it.  AMEN.