Matthew 20:1-16
September 20, 2026
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at Lakeshore Avenue Baptist Church, Oakland, CA.
Like many of you whose crown is as gray as mine; we can sit around and share stories about how much we were paid on our first job! I was paid $1.65 an hour in 1965 when I worked as a food service storeroom worker at the Boston airport. How much did you get?
Soon I was no longer in high school but a college student. I wanted a pay increase! Eventually, I was paid more when I was promoted as a sandwich man, making tuna sandwiches and sealing them in cellophane for sale at the snack bars.
Many of my coworkers were from the Dominican Republic and probably were being paid meager wages. I started to organize for better pay but soon the company wanted to make me a manager. But I declined because I didn’t want to be coopted by the owners.
The Scriptural text for this morning has had many interpretations over the years because we try to find support for our situations to ask for a pay raise. Some read it as an allegory viewing those hired at different times of the day as representative of different generations of Israel, such as Adam, Moses, Abraham, and in the last hour, Gentiles.
Others have interpreted the early workers as Christ’s original disciples and the latecomers as recent converts in Matthew’s congregation. Apart from these probable historical interpretations, the parable contains theological meaning for us today.
Landowner and Workers
The vineyard landowner needed workers and hires laborers early in the day to which both the workers and the landowner agreed on the pay—a denarius, about a daily amount of money to feed one person a day. When the landowner returned to the marketplace, perhaps like day laborers waiting to be hired in front of Home Depot, he hires more laborers and does this not just at early in the morning, but at 9:00, then at Noon, and then at 3:00, and finally at 5:00 when there was just only one more hour in the work day. At every time, the workers were idle, wasting time, and the landowner hires them.
When it was at the end of the work day, the landowner paid the last to be hired a daily wage. He paid the 3:00 workers, the Noon workers, the 9:00 workers; all the same daily wage. Just imagine if you were hired early in the day before the hot sun even poked its head and then worked for about 8 hours, and getting only the same amount as those who were hired to do the same work, getting the same pay, as late as only one in the workday, wouldn’t you be mad! This is unfair! You would go to the Farmworkers Union and call for a strike!
If we took this parable literally, we would probably win on this unfair labor case. When I was working at the Boston airport and was required to come in early to open and staying late to closeafter cleaning all of the grills, I felt I should have been paid more. The reason why we should not apply this parable literally to our lives can be found in the first few words that Jesus said, “For the kingdom of heaven is like…”
The Kingdom of heaven is like the Prodigal Son where the elder son is incensed that the younger brother who squandered his inheritance is welcomed home with lavishness by his father. The elder son said, “It’s not fair!”
You and I are quick to identify with the workers and the elder son because it’s unfair. We relate to the grumbling laborers who assumed that because they went into the vineyard early in the day, they would be paid more.
We see here dangerous assumptions by the workers. We have assumptions about close relationships and family relationships that we have, within our work settings, within our congregations, maybe even assumptions we have in our society and in our country. When we have unfounded assumptions and these don’t live up to our expectations, we end up disappointed and resentful. Whenever we assume anything, we set up for ourselves possible disappointment or even worse. We set the other person, place, or thing up as the object of our disappointment, anger, or resentment.
Lakeshore’s Assumptions
What are your assumptions as members of this church? What assumptions do you have in regard to the calling of a new pastor? Are you assuming that the new pastor would be a man or a woman, married or single, has a family or no family, coming from across the country or nearby, liberal or progressive, someone like Pastor Jim, someone like me or maybe not. We all have assumptions that pre-sets our expectations and when they are unexposed, they become obstacles for us to seeing clearly. They could even lead us to disappointment, anger and resentment.
If we identify with the workers in this parable, we would most likely end up with different expectations of what may happen at Lakeshore. Your different assumptions would only lead to possible disappointments. Rather, the focus for us is on the landowner.
The landowner gives everyone work. Each of the unemployed workers is given work to do and a promise of getting paid. They all begin in the same situation but easily forget by the end of the day where they started. Their energy goes not to the fact that they have had work and are being paid but to the inequity they see. Envy becomes more important than what they received. “Are you envious because I am generous?” asks the landowner.
Envy and jealousy of others can also harm the life of a church. Do you find yourself envious of another’s gifts, talents, abilities, possessions, social status, and so on? Envy can cause us to diminish our own gifts and talents and secretly to rob others of theirs. God is the giver of every good gift, whether it is ours or someone else’s.
In the days ahead, as members of Lakeshore, fellow workers in the vineyard, God is calling you to work faithfully utilizing your many gifts and talents without envy and jealousy for the building up the Body of Christ.
God’s Grace of Not Too Much
Getting paid $1.65 an hour was not too much to pay for my college tuition even almost 60 years ago. Before God called me into ministry, my father wanted me to become an electrical engineer because it would definitely be paying more than $1.65 an hour!
When we read about the equivalence of a denarius was only enough to buy food for one person to survive for one day, how fair is that? Why wouldn’t Jesus rewards those who worked longer with more pay? That would only be fair.
The meaning of this parable also takes us to a better understanding of what is enough. In the Old Testament we see God giving manna to the Israelites in the wilderness to sustain them each day. But when the people started to hoard the manna, the bread went bad.
When we pray every Sunday to God to give us our daily bread, it’s not to fill our pantries or our storerooms with too much to eat, but only for our daily bread. When the 5000 who became hungry after following Jesus were given only 5 loaves and 2 fish, everyone had plenty and no one has too much.
In our parable for today, we can also say that a pay of one denarius might seem too little but it was enough, plenty for the day and no one had too much. Jesus seeks to create a new people, a new world order. A new people who would not think about themselves first but others first.
The world that we live, the old frameworks of the world have the rich and the poor, superior and inferior, the powerful and the unpowerful, etc. Through this parable, Jesus interrupts the old assumptions and create the possibility of something new. Jesus calls his disciples, the church to become a new reality, as an alternative to the world. In this new church reality, as in the wilderness, everyone receives the necessary “daily bread” to survive and become valuable people.
Working Together
As we enter into the Fall season when Lakeshore is experiencing transitions in many facets of our church life together, it is important that just as all the workers in the vineyard had work to do, so do we. It doesn’t matter whether we have been long-timed members or we just joined last year, all of you have gifts and talents to share. Let us not be idle and wasting the precious time that we have.
In this Fall season of football, here’s a story about giving the ball to Calhoun.
There once was this important football game between two teams. One team was much larger than the other. The larger team was dominating the game and beating the smaller team. The coach of the smaller team saw that his team was not able to contain or block the larger team. So, his only hope was to call the plays that went to Calhoun, the fastest back in the area, who could easily outrun the larger players once he broke free.
The coach talked to his quarterback about giving the ball to Calhoun and letting him run with it. The first play the coach was excited, but Calhoun did not get the ball. The second play was again signaled for Calhoun, but once again Calhoun did not get the ball. Now the game was in the final seconds with the smaller team’s only hope being for Calhoun to break free and score the winning touchdown. The third play and again Calhoun did not get the ball. The coach was very upset so he sent in the play again for the fourth and final play. The ball snapped and the quarterback was sacked, ending the game. The coach was furious as he confronted the quarterback: “I told you four times to give the ball to Calhoun and now we’ve lost the game.”
The quarterback stood tall and told the coach, “Four times I called the play to give the ball to Calhoun. The problem was that Calhoun did not want the ball.”
Let us work together to get the ball across the end zone. Let us accept responsibilities to get the job of being church done. Let all of us be willing to take the ball as a team building up the Body of Christ known as Lakeshore Avenue Baptist Church!
Instead of being envious of someone else’s gifts or abilities, let us rejoice that we have such an amazing group of people at Lakeshore to give witness to the love of God that we want to share it in the world.
Remember when we pray the Lord’s Prayer that we don’t say, “Give me this day my daily bread,” rather we say, “Give us this day our daily bread.” God is giving us our daily bread, our one denarius so that we would always rely on God’s sustenance rather than only on our own human endeavors. Don’t get me wrong, we do need everyone’s abilities, gifts, and talents to serve actively at Lakeshore, but it’s not only about us alone, it’s has and is only about God making all things possible.
We may worry about our budget, pledges, expenses, reserves and endowments that we may not have enough. By God’s grace of not too much, our daily bread will be enough. We have faith that God will provide not too much that we would become dependent on our own efforts. God’s grace is that there will be enough.
Lakeshore is envisioning God’s new order that proclaims equality among us, resourcefulness in us, and the trust that God’s grace is not too much but more than we can ever imagine to bring good news in a world that desperately wants to hear hope, love, and joy.
May we become that possibility of something new.
Let us pray.
Thank you, Lord for teaching us that we have enough to continue to be a vibrant and transforming church at this corner of Oakland. You have blessed us with gifts, talents, abilities, and the compassion for others like that of Jesus’ compassion for people. Call us to come together to do the work in the fields of this world with no complaints but the thankfulness of your loving grace and tender mercies. In the name of Christ Jesus, we pray. Amen.
Benediction
In all your labors, God has given us all that we need.
In all your struggles, the love of Jesus surrounds you.
Glory be to God’s holy name.
Let us all work together for God’s reign on earth.