Valois United Church

September 21, 2008 - Matthew 20:1-16

This week’s Gospel certainly makes it clear that God’s way is not the same as the human way....

Consider the backdrop:
The scenario described here fits quite easily into the experience of Mediterranean peasants. On the domestic economy ladder, day labourers were near the bottom; they were among the poorest persons in society. They were usually landless peasants who were either noninheriting sons or persons who had lost their ancestral lands through debt and drifted into cities and villages looking for work.

Since loss of land usually meant loss of family and the supporting network that implied, such persons were often desperate. Survival was often
a bitter struggle.

And so, with hope and fear, they arrive in the marketplace early in the morning seeking work.

And then there is the landowner.

The landowner is strange.  Nothing odd about paying a fair daily wage.  In fact, a fair daily wage was an amount that allowed one to live on for a day or so.... less than that, and one went hungry.

So those who headed off in the morning figure they’re going to get a full daily wage.
Those who joined the work a little later, or a lot later - they did not know what to expect, but they trusted that they would receive something that was fair and reasonable.

But it did not quite work that way.  

Those who arrived late in the day were shocked when they got what they got - a full day’s wage.  They celebrated that they were valued that much.  Fully valued.

But then along came those who had worked a little longer, arrived a little earlier.  Well, they received a full day’s wage too - and they were happy, though perhaps slightly puzzled.      

And so it went until those who began earliest in the day arrived in the line-up to receive their reward.  And they received a full day’s pay.

Now, at 7:00 in the morning that is what they were expecting to get at the end of the day.  Indeed, that is what they had agree to at the beginning of the day.  But they just saw others get the same ..... how is it that they would not get more?

But that’s what the master chose to do.  
In fact, what the master was doing was valuing the labourer
more than the labour itself.

But it’s a tough text.  It was tough for the Jewish leaders who heard it, who thought that maybe Jesus was saying that others who did not ‘work’ so diligently on their faith, nor so long, might be rewarded equally.  And then there were the Gentiles - the ‘newcomers’ to faith in God.  Hard to think of them as equals.  When the parable was told, they would not have even come to mind, but as the parable was re-told in the years to come, it becomes clear that Jesus is talking of them.

And Jesus is clearly saying that in God’s eyes, the new Gentile believer was of equal value to the long-faithful believer of Jewish origins.

There is no hierarchy in grace, there is no ranking of individuals when it comes to God’s grace.  

Our theme this month is being church.  Today.  

We are not faced with the question of what to do with the dynamics of emerging from the faith of the Israelites, the Jewish faith, and trying to figure out what to do with these new non-Jewish believers.

But it does speak about new additions to the faith community.
It speaks of how we are challenged to value the new additions to the faith community.

Sounds so simple - let’s welcome new folk.  I think that every church I have ever attended has insisted that it is looking for new members, and is ready to welcome folk in the door.

And sometimes there are people around us who are looking.  Not looking for work, but looking for spiritual answers, looking for a spiritual home.  They may have experience in some other United Church, or some other denomination - or they may have no church experience at all

And they may come here.

Well, as I say, pretty much every church indicates that it wants to welcome  new members.

But what is the reality?  
There are all sorts of questions around welcoming people into a congregation - things like all the hidden rules, and who decides what, and do you need permission to do this or that, and who gives that permission, how dressed up to be, and whether you can drink coffee in your pew, whether you can nurse in the pew.....   Different churches, different, unwritten rules that can make people uneasy when they know they don’t know what is expected, even if they have attended other churches.

Those are questions we can look at here at Valois if we want to be welcoming.  For being welcoming goes beyond have our wonderful greeters

But today’s parable is dealing with only one thing: valuing the newcomer to the faith, valuing the newcomer to the congregation, just as much as the person who has been here for 10, 20, 40 or 80 years.

And that goes a little against the grain.

One minster writes:
I had a woman in one church who thought becausevshe did lots around the church for decades that her vote counted for 20 and I should put her
opinions above everyone elses'. She would be incensed if I spent time listening to the opinions of those who were not as active as she was. I
tried to explain that the church is not a reward and demerit system and I am not keeping     track of who does what on a weekly basis. We're
all in this together.

What this ‘valuing’ of the other means is that all are equal - all deserve a turn to speak, to be heard.  And “That’s the way we have always done it” is not a good enough answer to the newcomer, for it says “we’re not interested at looking at your ideas.”

Valuing all:  In one congregation I heard that someone was not the best candidate for chair of the Board because she had only just arrived a few years before from the Roman Catholic Church.  Well, turned out she was an excellent chair. And in some communities, there may be a reluctance to elect a new-comer to the community - especially if they have been living in town for less than 25 years.  We may chuckle here - but what are our limits?

Valuing means that all are given opportunities to serve and to be served.

As well, valuing each person equally means doing things in ways that we hope the other will find helpful in their journey of faith.  That can affect worship services, which are the centre-piece of most church’s weekly life.

And one of the toughest things to change.  Change!  Adapt!  Why?  Has not worship always been done this way?

Well, no.  Go to church a few hundred years ago and sit down?  Probably not, because you would find yourself on the floor, for there were no pews.  Go to church on Communion Sunday a hundred years ago?  You might get asked to leave when communion is served if you’re not a member!

No, worship has changed.  But I’m not talking about change to be modern.  I’m talking about change to show that we value each other, including those who are newer, or people who might potentially arrive in the congregation.  

Research tells us something about what people who are not long-time members might look for.  And there are things we could do to respond.

So, sometimes if you’ve been around a long time and something different happens, certain things shift.... I invite you to reflect upon it, and think about whether the change - which may or may not appeal to you - might show that this congregation values everyone, including those more recently arrived, or even those yet to come.

But.

Ah, yes, there is a but.
“Show that this congregation values everyone” - Jesus’ parable by itself, before the commentary, does not reduce the worth of those who laboured through the day.  They were valued as well.

Bible study this week we’re going to be looking at how Paul insisted that the ‘old-timers’ be respected and valued.

This parable is not to be understood as a plea for us to throw everything out and not worry about how anyone who has been here feels about it.

For as the newcomer is to be valued by the established member,
as the young person is to be valued by the senior,
so too is the established member to be valued by the newcomer,
and the senior to be valued by the youth.

Know that we are ALL valued by God, in God’s grace.
And be challenged to value all, as people of grace.