Grace Is Unfair

In all the parables that Jesus told, I think the one that raised the most eyebrows during His time and probably even now is the Parable of the Vineyard Workers. (Matthew 20:1-16 NIV)

¹"For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire men to work in his vineyard.²He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.

³"About the third hour he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. ⁴He told them, 'You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.' ⁵So they went.

"He went out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour and did the same thing. ⁶About the eleventh hour he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, 'Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?'

⁷" 'Because no one has hired us,' they answered.
"He said to them, 'You also go and work in my vineyard.'

⁸"When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, 'Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.'

⁹"The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received a denarius. ¹⁰So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. ¹¹When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. ¹²'These men who were hired last worked only one hour,' they said, 'and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.'

¹³"But he answered one of them, 'Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn't you agree to work for a denarius? ¹⁴Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. ¹⁵Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?'

¹⁶"So the last will be first, and the first will be last."

It is no wonder that the first group of workers who toiled the longest was mad! They had worked the longest under the hot sun and these late comers who were doing nothing earlier but loafing around at the market square barely worked for a few hours after they were given the job and they received the same pay! Surely the landowner was out of his mind and extremely unfair to the first hour workers.

Let’s examine his answer “'Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn't you agree to work for a denarius? ¹⁴Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. ¹⁵Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?'” The landowner hit the nail on the head! He asked if they were jealous because he was generous!

The landowner in Jesus’ parable did not cheat the group of first hour workers, he paid them according to what he promised them. They were upset and discontented because they could not accept that their employer could do whatever he wanted with his money and he paid the late comers the same amount as them. They felt that he was being downright UNFAIR by their own standards.

When Jesus told this story, He was giving us a parable about grace, and yes God’s grace is unfair because it cannot be measured, not by a day’s wage or by our “good” works. Jesus put it very plainly, “So the last will be first, and the first will be last." Grace means it is not about counting! Grace is a GIFT, to be RECEIVED from God, we cannot do anything to earn it. Yes, God’s grace is unfair, it is unfairly GOOD!

Philip Yancey in his book, “What’s So Amazing About Grace?” sums it up so eloquently. “ We like to think of ourselves as responsible workers, and the employer’s strange behaviour baffles us as it did the original hearers. We risk missing the story’s point: that God dispenses gifts, not wages. None of us gets paid according to merit, for none of us comes close to satisfying God’s requirements for a perfect life. If paid on the basis of fairness, we would all end up in hell.”

Have you embraced this unfair grace?