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Forming in the Church the Mind of Christ Text:
Matthew 20:1-16 We regularly hear the words of today's Old Testament reading in prayers at times of natural disasters or crises. “Almighty God, merciful Father, a very present help in time of trouble, again we are brought to realize that your thoughts are not our thoughts, your ways are not our ways” [Collect “After a Great Disaster,” LW Altar Book p. 150] . But it is not only when bad things happen that we are to remember or realize this. This same principle also applies to the blessings, the goodness, the gifts and steadfast love of God. On the one hand, God's righteous judgment against sin is more severe than many think. On the other hand, God's love is greater than we often perceive.
In the beginning, in the Garden of Eden, God set a limit in the form of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil of which Adam and Eve were told they were not to eat. It was a sign indicating that there was a definite distinction between them as creature and God as Creator. Having crossed that line in the fall into sin, God then barred access totally to the tree of life (Genesis 3:22). It has been like that ever since. There is a point beyond which we are not free to proceed, the line that reminds us that we are the creature, not the Creator, human beings and not God.
This is what we mean when we confess that we are “by nature sinful and unclean.” In the book of Genesis God says, “the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth” [Genesis 8:21 (ESV)]. St. Paul writes to the Corinthians, “no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God” [1 Cor. 2:11-12 (ESV)]. Writing to the Ephesians the apostle describes the fallen, sinful nature as those who walk “in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their harness of heart” [Eph. 4:17-18 (ESV)]. Indeed, in his foremost description of the fallen nature in Romans chapter one he writes, “although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened” [Rom. 1:21 (ESV)]. Pressing the issue he wrote to the Corinthians, “But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God” [1 Cor. 1:27-29 (ESV)].
Because of the blindness and hardness of heart of the fallen nature, and in order that we may, nevertheless, perceive and understand God, his ways and his thoughts, God must reveal himself, his word, his will and his ways. And he has done so in the Holy Scriptures as he gave to his chosen writers, the prophets, apostles and evangelists, the thoughts that they expressed and the words that they wrote. Yet even with the Bible in hand God must also give the reader his Spirit “that we might understand the things freely given us by God” [1 Cor. 2:11-12 (ESV)]. Even the first apostles did not understand everything until, after his resurrection, Jesus “opened their minds to understand the Scriptures” [Luke 24:45 (ESV)].
In our opening hymn we prayed to and praised God the Holy Spirit for “ever forming in the Church the mind of Christ” [LW 164:2] echoing St. Paul's words, “for who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ” [1 Cor. 2:16 (ESV)]. Today's parable of the workers in the vineyard describes the generosity of God's love with a warning against trying to keep God's grace to oneself.
“It's not fair,” say the first workers “who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat” when they see the master paying those who worked only one hour the same wage as those who worked all day. And we would agree. I remember a professor in college saying to me as a general principle of life, “nothing is fair.” I didn't like that when I first heard it, of course. But then I realized that's exactly what the “grace” of God is all about. We in no way ever “deserve” God's love or salvation. It is totally because of and dependant upon the amazing grace, mercy and love of God.
We teach our children the principle of fairness. How many laws are on the books requiring equal pay for equal work? Of course fairness requires also unequal pay for unequal work. The first workers in the parable (the apostles themselves!) thought that when the master paid the one-hour workers a full day's wage, to be fair, they ought to receive some sort of bonus. But when they were paid the same wage as the one-hour workers—the same wage, they were reminded, that they agreed to at the beginning—they grumbled.
Jesus, I mean, “the master,” addressed them beginning with a word he uses only three times in Matthew's gospel. “He tai re” is translated “friend,” and has a little “sneer” or scorn attached to it. Besides here it is used to address the man in the parable who presumes to enter the wedding (the kingdom) without a wedding garment (on his own terms, refusing the grace of God) (Mt. 22:12). And it is the word Jesus employs saying to Judas who had led his enemies to him in Gethsemane, “Friend, do what you came to do” [Mt. 26:50 (ESV)]. He is addressing his apostles and us with a warning to remember that to work in his vineyard is a privilege and the pay is pure grace for everyone. The enigmatic statement, “so the last will be first, and the first last,” means to warn us that to question or withhold that grace for others is to lose it for yourself.
That the Holy Spirit, working through the Word and Sacraments, forms in the Church “the mind of Christ,” means, among other things, the joy of bringing the grace and forgiveness of God to others and to the world. It means sharing in Christ's sufferings, “becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead” [Philippians 3:10-11 (ESV)]. It means denying self, taking up our cross and following him (Mt. 16:24). In other words it means to be “Christians,” the presence of Christ to others. That the grace we have received from God is to be shared liberally and freely with others St. Paul put into words that form the basis of the hymn we are about to sing: “For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's” [Romans 14:7-8 (ESV)]. As St. Peter would later write, “Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God's varied grace” [1 Peter 4:8-10 (ESV)]. ___________________
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