Pastor's Message: Sermon of 9/21/08
They
deserve survival (Matthew 20:1~16)
It has always been a big issue to take care of social underdogs in history. Throughout the 20th century, Communists claimed they could make Utopia real through complete regulation by the government on every walk of life. It turned out, however, that their approach was the biggest failure in history. On the other hand, Western Hemisphere has been thriving by adopting free market system on the basis of democracy. Though not perfect, it has been working relatively well.
Now let me remind you what has happened lately in the nation’s economy. I am doing this because it has something to do with our Gospel text for today. Recently we have been observing a grave turmoil coming from Wall Street, the center of free market, that complete deregulation on financial industry could bring in disaster to our society. In the wake of the collapses of major financial giants such as Lehman Brothers and AIG, now our Government known as the champion of deregulation policy has decided to intervene the current financial chaos through unprecedented measure of bailout in order to avoid the domino effect of the crisis.
The other day, I saw a poll at CNN web-site. The theme of the poll was, ‘Do you agree to Government’s bailout to save AIG? Yes or No?’ I clicked ‘Yes’ and then checked out the result of the poll. Surprisingly, about two thirds of those people who responded were in favor of ‘No.’ I am no expert on this matter so I’m not supporting that my position was right. However, I wouldn’t be off the mark in saying that an economic system totally free of regulation could put all of us in peril. In my understanding, it’s due to the simple fact that the greed of human beings knows no end. As for the current financial crisis that bothers us all, the experts say it is the combination of the greed of those finance companies and of consumers as well.
Now let us revisit our Gospel text and hear what Jesus had to say regarding this issue. It is called the parable of vineyard laborer. Though it sounds like a simple story, it delivers us the gist of Gospel of Jesus Christ. It reveals to us what kind of world Jesus dreamt of and, therefore, what kind of life we as his followers are called for. It is a story involving a landowner of a vineyard and the laborers whom he hired at different times throughout the day respectively. A conflict broke out when those laborers who were hired early in the morning and worked all day long saw their landowner to pay the same amount of wage to those people who started working late in the day; they felt it was most unfair.
What perplexes us is the response we hear from the landowner. Dealing with the complaint from his laborers, the landowner shares quite a different view starting with verse 13, “But he replied to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage? 14.Take what belongs to you and go; I chose to give to this last the same as I give to you. 15. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?’ 16.So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”
Here the landowner argues that their complaint was unjustifiable. Paraphrasing his words loosely, he says ‘you see the tree but not the forest. You’ve received what you need for you and your family. What about the other people who were left out in our society?’ Let us be mindful that Jesus specified in his parable the reason why some couldn’t find job early in the day in spite of their willingness to work.
The reality is that we still see lots of people like them in our society. Generally speaking, they are the people who don’t have the competitive edge in the free market system and are threatened for survival. Perhaps, they are less educated, fall within inferior social bracket, born with less capability, or are simply less fortunate. No matter what the background is, a fundamental question remains the same: What should our society do with those people? This was the question Jesus had asked to his contemporaries. It is the question thrown at us, too.
Here Jesus raises the issue of distribution in our society. As depicted in the parable, the social and economic levels in a society vary. Some are equipped with better opportunities than others just as those laborers that were hired early in the morning as opposed to those that were hired last. (In Jesus’ days, a daily work started at sunrise and ended at sunset. The most fortunate were hired at around 6:00 a.m. while the least fortunate were hired at 5:00 p.m.). Also, the daily wage in Jesus’ day was a minimum salary for a family to survive.
By merciless economic logic, those who were left behind should have been paid just a twelfth of the daily wage. The parable sums up God’s message to us this day with Cain’s answer to God when asked about the whereabouts of his brother, Abel (whom he had killed): ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’ Jesus’ answer is, ‘Yes, you should be. Your society should be.’ Amen.
|
|