2026 09 20 Proper 20a Pentecost 17a
Exodus
16.2-15 Psalm 105.1-6, 37-45 Philippians 1 Matthew 20.1-16
“To be or not to be”. Do you recognise this statement? Did you study Shakespeare’s Hamlet at school? Our reading in Philippians always reminds me
of Hamlets speech, as it stands in stark contrast. Hamlet is one of Shakespeare’s tragedies - it
does not end well. Hamlet’s father, the
King, was murdered and the murderer, Hamlet’s uncle then married his mother and
took the crown. Hamlet is upset and he
ponders;
To be, or not to be,
that is the question: -Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer- The slings
and arrows of outrageous fortune, - Or to take arms against a sea of troubles -
And by opposing end them. To die—to sleep, - No more; and by a sleep to say we
end- The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks - That flesh is heir to:
'tis a consummation - Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep; - To sleep,
perchance to dream—ay, there's the rub:- For in that sleep of death what
dreams may come, - When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, - Must give
us pause—there's the respect - That makes calamity of so long life.
Hamlet is talking
about taking his own life to end his suffering.
However, Hamlet contemplates that he doesn’t know what is after death…
maybe what is after death could be worse.
In contrast, Saint Paul is writing his letter while he is in house
arrest and facing an unknown future. The
possibility of death was real. In this
context, Paul writes that to live is good, but to die is to be with Jesus –
which is ultimately fantastic…. Paul says this, not at all because he wants to
die, but to reassure his people that if dying was to happen, he was totally
certain that he would be with Jesus and all would be well.
Both Hamlet and St.
Paul had one thing in common. Both knew
that death is not the end. For Hamlet,
it was a great unknown and it held no reassurance. St. Paul had miraculously met the risen Lord when
he was persecuting Christians. He became
absolutely sure that there was more than this life here and now, because he had
encountered it. From that moment Paul
was changed. But we need to explore more
about why Paul was not afraid to die, because someone who’d spent time
persecuting and having Christians put to death, could well be fearful of what
future they might have in the after-life, knowing that they were responsible
for hurting the King of that after-life’s beloved people. That would be a logical fear, don’t you think?
Yet Paul has none of this fear.
Something else that doesn’t
fit with our normal human logic is the parable Jesus tells in our Gospel
reading. Surely if there were workers
who worked all day, and some that only worked the last part of the day, those
who worked the longest would receive more pay.
That is how it usually works, and that is what is fair, so what is Jesus
trying to tell us in this parable? He is
NOT advocating for some kind of political system where everyone gets the same
regardless of effort. It is explaining a
spiritual reality.
The Kingdom of Heaven
is like…. This is how Jesus begins the
parable. The previous reading in Matthew
19 says ; “Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, at the renewal of all
things, when the Son of Man sits on his glorious throne, you who have followed
me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And
everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife
or children or fields for my sake will receive a hundred times as much and will
inherit eternal life. But many who are
first will be last, and many who are last will be first.” This is something
that St. Paul understood and he, who calls himself the least of the apostles
was sure of his place in the Kingdom.
In any group, there
can develop an arrogance and hierarchy of those who have been there the longest. We always and forever fall into patterns of
hierarchy. Our world is forever fighting
over this, men over woman, one race over another, etc. This is not the way of
the kingdom of God. We might be working
hard for the church thinking we are building our heavenly home but all in all
its not just another golden brick in the wall, because this parable puts us in
our place… Note that the first workers were happy with their reward for their
work, until they saw that those hired last also received the same reward.
It makes sense to
have hierarchy. It existed in the
religious structure of Jesus’ time where the Pharisees assumed spiritual
superiority and could motivate the people to do things in this way. But those same people who were the keepers of
God’s word, were furious that Jesus was spending time with those considered the
sinners. Surely those sinners could not
have the same eternal reward as those who had been born into the priestly
family and part of the church all their lives, could they?
The Kingdom of heaven
is different. But what reward do we
really need or want? Hold onto that
question.
In the history of
humanity, there was a time when God chose a nation. We’ve been reading about this in God’s
interaction with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel and
was the father of the Israelite nation. We’ve
been reading lately about Moses and how he led the Israelite nation out of
slavery in Egypt so that they could possess the promised land that God had
promised them back in the time of Abraham.
This week we read
about those people and the things they wanted.
They complained to God they wanted meat and bread. So, God sent quails for them and also Manna,
the bread from heaven. Quails we
understand, but Manna was a miracle that ended when the Israelites no longer
needed it. Bread from heaven. It was a substance that they collected each
morning and ground to make bread. On the
6th day they were to collect twice as much because there would be
none on the 7th day, their day of rest. Everything about this Manna was a
miracle. It was a gift. It was God’s abundant provision. This slave nation didn’t understand about
having a day of rest, so God had to command it.
If we were to read
more of the text about the Manna experience, we’d find that those Israelites
showed that they didn’t trust God to give them what they needed for each day
and some of them collected more and overnight it went rotten. Yet when they collected twice as much on the
6th day it was still good for the day of rest.
These Israelites were
used to hard labour and the concept of being gifted something, relaxing for a
day because it would be there tomorrow when it was needed, was something
absolutely foreign. They were a nation
who worked mighty hard for any reward.
That is what they understood. Even
in the Egyptian system of spirituality this is what was understood; work,
sacrifice reward. But the God who is who
He is, provided food and rest for his people.
How are we with
this? God gave the bread, but the people
still had to work to collect it and make it into bread. It isn’t that they were passive in this. They still had to work. There is no indication that some had too much
and others too little. This was the provision
of heaven for those people. God gave them all that they needed.
What then is the
reward of Heaven? What do we need? What could we possibly want as a Heavenly
reward?
We are called to work
with God in His Kingdom and for His Kingdom, but economy of this Kingdom is
love. Meh… that sounds a bit sappy…
whatever… but honestly, what is it that we really, really need? To love and be loved… to be happy, accepted,
valued… hmm… I think what I’m trying to
say is; to be loved!
In 1998 I wrote a
song called “It’s enough”. The lyrics
are; “Some people live in hope of your rewards. They imagine a goal and strive and press
toward. Crowns of gold they see and of
eating from the tree of life that gives them immortality. Some people they see streets all paved with
gold. They imagine the glory and the
power they will hold. See them on the
street, with the fear of hell they beat a rhythm that gives their inner fears
release. But it’s enough – it’s enough
to know His faithful love. And it’s
enough, it’s enough to have His unconditional care. As for me, I know the passion of the man who
died for me. All I care about heaven is
that His arms of love will be there.”
It doesn’t matter if we’ve been serving God
all our life or turned to him at the last minute, we have the love of God as
our reward… how can there be more or less of that? We know that God has a plan for us beyond
this life, but we don’t know what that is.
We, like St. Paul, are called in this life to courageously be God’s
witness and be the body of Christ – doing what Christ wants done, without
fearing death, because our life is safe in God.
We can rest in the assurance that He who gives the manna in the desert most
certainly blesses us with all that we need – and rest – He gives us the true bread
from heaven… Jesus – a reward we can never deserve or earn. Eternal life through Jesus is more than a
most extravagant reward.
This statement, “The
first will be last and the last will be first” is to be understood in the
context of the whole story of the Bible – Jacob, the younger brother was the
chosen one - King David who was the youngest was chosen – Israel is spoken of
as being rejected and small…. God
delights to choose the small, the insignificant and the outcast. He does this to reassure us of his love. We have ALL his love.
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