Advent I B [Mark 13:24-37] (3-Dec-2017)

This sermon was preached at St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough, and Grace Lutheran Church, Childers, 10.30am.

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

Prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.

Today is the First Sunday of Advent, which is the first Sunday of the Church Year. The calendar year begins on January 1, but the Church Year begins on December 1. Advent is a short season in the church year which leads up to the celebration of Christmas. Advent, though, is not Christmas yet. Already for a month now, there have been Christmas decorations in the shops, and Christmas events and Christmas shopping has already begun. But the church is not celebrating Christmas yet—but Advent. Advent means “coming”, and over the next few weeks we will be hearing a lot about Jesus coming: his coming to earth as a baby, his continual coming to earth to be with his people, and also his appearance at the end of the world.

In our Gospel reading, it is this last coming, the second coming of Jesus, that we read about today. Today in the creed, we say: He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.

Just before our reading begins, Jesus is talking about the terrible hardships that will occur, and how there will be many false prophets and even false christs will that come, performing false miracles. Then Jesus says: But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken. Jesus tells us here that before he comes, that the sun, the moon and the stars will be affected in very strange ways. If we are going to understand what this is about, let’s read from Genesis chapter 1, about when God created the sun, moon and the stars. It says: And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. We can see that the reason why the sun and moon exist is not just some kind of accident of the universe, but they have a particular purpose to mark times and seasons, days and years, and to shine light upon the earth. But Jesus now is pointing forward to the end of the world, where there will be no need anymore for a sun or moon, because there won’t be any need for time anymore, because he is talking about his eternal kingdom, which will have no end. In Revelation 21 it says: I saw a new heaven and a new hearth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away…And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. And so Jesus says: In those days, after that tribulation, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven. Even Jesus says: And the powers in the heavens will be shaken. When the bible talks about “powers in the heavens” it is often talking about angels. And so, in this passage, we read that even the angels will be shaken and moved and disturbed and amazed by what is about to happen. So what is this thing that Jesus is talking about that is about to happen?

Jesus says: And then they will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds with power and great glory. And then he will send out the angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven.

This is an amazing passage. Jesus says the sun, the moon, the stars, the angels will all be shaken and disturbed, and then he will appear. Jesus will outshine the lot of them. And it says that he will come in the clouds with power and great glory. Now in the Apostles’ Creed, we say that Jesus ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, from thence he will come to judge the living and the dead. What this means is that just as Jesus ascended into heaven, so he will also appear from heaven again to judge the world. In the book of Acts, where we read about Jesus’ ascension into heaven 40 days after Easter when he rose from the dead, it says: When [Jesus] had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

So just as Jesus entered into heaven on a cloud, so also he will return at the end of the world in a completely miraculous and supernatural way, on the clouds, with power and great glory. Just as it was the same Jesus that had lived among his disciples and had died and risen again who entered into heaven, so also it will be the same Jesus—the Son of Man­—who will return at the end of the world. We see here that Jesus is both true God and a true man. He will not return like some kind of ghost, but he will return in his human flesh, because it is Jesus’ in his human flesh that sits at the right hand of the throne of God. But he is also true God: he will not just return like any man, but with power and great glory, and he will also send his angels. The angels only belong to God. And so Jesus, who is both true man and true God, sends out his angels. He says: Then he will send out the angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven. Now when we read about “the elect”, it means all those people all throughout history who have heard and listened to God’s word and the Gospel, and then the Holy Spirit has created faith in their hearts and caused them to trust in that word and God’s promises. Even we believe that those who believe in Jesus were chosen right from the beginning of the world. Now, sometimes people think, “But who are the elect? Maybe I simply haven’t been chosen, and I’m going to hell, and there’s nothing that I can do about it.” No—that’s not what Jesus wants you to believe. He calls you through his word to recognise first of all that you are completely and totally a sinner. Even your good words and good thoughts are tainted by sin, and that there is nothing good in you that can save yourself. But then he calls sinners like you to trust in him, and to believe that he is a faithful Saviour, that he has died for you, that he has paid not only for your sins but for the sins of the whole world on the cross, and that he has risen again from the dead for you. The Holy Spirit creates this living faith in you, and calls you to persevere in this faith every day of your life until your death. Even we ask God to keep us in this faith, because we don’t keep going in it in our own strength, but in God’s strength and in the power of the Holy Spirit. And so, trusting in Jesus and his righteousness and his holiness, and his atonement and his sacrifice, we look forward to that time when he will then send his angels to gather his elect from the four winds.

Jesus up until this point has been talking about things that are almost impossible for our tiny little earthly minds to comprehend. It’s hard enough for us to imagine what it must have been like at the beginning of the world, and now Jesus is talking about the end of the world! And so, now Jesus tells us a little parable from every day life, to help us understand what he’s talking about. He says: From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that he is near, at the very gates.

Have you ever heard Aboriginal people (maybe on TV) talking about how they want to pass on their culture and their knowledge? I once saw something on the Aboriginal channel about a man in Arnhem Land talking about a certain flower on a certain tree, and over the centuries they had worked out that when the tree flowers, the crabs in the sea are ready to be fished for and caught. Isn’t that amazing? This is a bit like what Jesus says here. He says that when a fig tree’s branches become tender and put out its leavens, then you know that summer is near. In the same way, when we see the sun, and moon and stars being affected like this, and when the world gets worse, and when the world’s suffering gets worse, and when there are more and more false prophets and false Christs, then we know that Jesus will return soon. But when Jesus will return, for us who trust in him and his sacrificial death and resurrection, it will be like a glorious summer. What is happening in the world will look like a long, slow winter—but in actual fact, it is simply a reminder from Jesus that summer is not far away.

Jesus then says: Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. Now this is the heart of our reading today, and is a very important passage for us as Christians today. Jesus says: This generation will not pass away until all these things take place. What does he mean when he says: “This generation”? Who is “this generation”? He is not talking about the people who were alive back then: they have all died now. He is not talking about the apostles. He is talking about his own Christian people, made up of believing Jews and Gentiles all throughout the world, and all throughout history. Jesus promises that there will always be a church on his earth. This is the generation of people that will not pass away.

Now, this is so important for us today. Many people say that the church is old-fashioned, and needs to keep up with the society. No—it doesn’t. All throughout church history, where Christians have tried to keep up with society, the church has died out. The church has outlived many civilisations. In the year 300 or so, North Africa—today’s Tunisia and Libya—was one of the strongest places for Christianity. Not any more—there are very few Christians in those countries today, and most of the people there are Muslims. But the church on earth didn’t die out—the church is still here. And so it’s of such great importance for us today that we keep the faith, and pass it on. Who knows where the people we pass it on to will take it? Jesus says: Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. What makes a church survive? If we want to make allegiances with this earth, then we will pass away with it. The thing that makes the church the church is God’s word. God’s word will not pass away. The world will pass away. Australia will pass away. Queensland will pass away. Maryborough and Childers will pass away. But not God’s word. And so at the beginning of a new church year, it’s of such great importance that we build our lives and our church on this foundation and on no other foundation, because when we stick with the word—with God’s law which shows us our sin, and with the Gospel which shows us the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world—when we stick with this word, then we will be part of that generation that will not pass away until the end of the world. As Jesus says: Behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. And also, when Peter made a faithful confession of faith that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, Jesus said to him: On this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

Now, at the end of our reading today, Jesus says: But concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. No-one knows when the end of the world will be. Only God the Father knows, not the angels and not even the Son. Now—here’s a question? If Jesus is true God, and knows everything, how come he doesn’t know that day or that hour? Well, let me try explain. Jesus is true God, and he has every right to know everything that there is to know. But also, when he became man, he chose to become like us, in such a way that he would have had to learn things from his mother, like how to talk, how to feed himself, how to wash himself, and so on. He could have done these things without being taught, but he chose to learn them. As soon as Jesus was born, he didn’t begin preaching sermons, even though he could have, because he was true God. But Jesus chooses to put away certain knowledge from himself, such as when the end of the world will be. He has every right to know, but even if he did know, he wants to make it very clear to us that we will not know. And when Jesus says to his disciples: I don’t know, it means that the disciples won’t ask him. If Jesus said, “I know, but I’m not telling you,” then they would beg him to tell them. Imagine if I put some chocolate at the back of a cupboard, and said to my children, “I know where it is, but I’m not telling you”. They would beg me to tell them. But if I said, “I don’t know where it is,” then they wouldn’t bother asking me. Now, Jesus isn’t lying to us here, but even though he has every right and every power to know as true God, there are many things he choses not to know when he became man, and this was one of those things.

Now, this is also very important, because we often hear about people who think they know when the end of the world will be. We always know that they’re wrong, because Jesus says here in our text that they don’t know. Even some people think they have a secret method of reading certain numbers in the bible, and in the book of Revelation, or they make certain predictions, like horoscopes, about the stars, and all kinds of things like that. Even this year, there were some people who thought that the world would end in September. Well—they were wrong! But we should have known that they were wrong before September, because fortune-telling, or divination, as we might call it, is forbidden in the bible. It’s even forbidden to use the bible in a mystical, secret way, to do fortune-telling. This mystical numerology and astrology and horoscopes are also forbidden. The word “occult” means “secret” – it means when people want hidden power and information that God hasn’t told us. We can’t use the devil’s means for God’s purposes. So if anyone is saying that the world will end because “Jupiter is in Pisces”, don’t listen to them. Deuteronomy 18 says: There shall not be found anyone among you who…tells fortunes or interprets omens…for whoever does these things in an abomination to the LORD. And also in Isaiah 48, we read where the prophet speaks about those who divide the heavens, who gaze at the stars, who at the new moons make known what shall come upon you. So when Jesus spoke at the beginning of our reading about the sun, moon and stars, he’s not telling us to listen to horoscopes.

So what is he telling us? He’s telling us to watch. Jesus calls us to watch very carefully that we don’t mix in anything with the Word of God that doesn’t belong there. Otherwise, we will mix in false belief with our faith. Our faith needs a solid, pure, completely trustworthy word to hang onto. And so, Jesus says to us: Watch. Watch. Stay awake. He says: Be on guard, keep awake. For you do not know when the time will come. It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his servants in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to stay awake. Therefore stay awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning—lest he come suddenly and find you asleep. And what I say to you I say to all: Stay awake.

And so this watching, this staying awake, means, being stubborn in the faith. It means, hanging on to Jesus and his words that will never pass away. It means, testing and sifting things and checking to make sure we have not muddied God’s word with our human opinions. It means, to keep coming back to Jesus again, to remember the wonderful gift of baptism, to receive the forgiveness of sins, and to receive afresh his body and blood in the Lord’s Supper. We will never know when the end will come, but in the meantime, we hold to his word. And we hold to this word, because it contains the Gospel, and the Gospel is the power of God for salvation. Let’s place ourselves in Jesus’ hands at the beginning of this new church year, on this First Sunday of Advent, and pray that he would bless our lives, our homes, and our church with his Holy Spirit, that we may stay awake and stake our lives on the pure clear word of God and the wonderful message of the Gospel of the free forgiveness of our sins. Amen.

Dear Jesus, keep us steadfast in your word, your word that will never pass away. Create in our sinful hearts a living trust in you and forgiveness, so that we may look forward to your glorious appearance at the end of the world. Amen.

Pentecost XVI (Proper 20 A) [Matthew 20:1-16] (24-Sep-2017)

This sermon was preached at St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough, 8.15am, and Grace Lutheran Church, Childers, 10.30am.

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you and go. I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you.

Prayer: Dear Lord Jesus, send us your Holy Spirit, to me that I may preach well, and to all of us that we may hear well. Amen.

In our Gospel reading today, Jesus tells the parable of the labourers in the vineyard. In the first part of our reading we read: The kingdom of heaven is like master of a house going out early in the morning to hire labourers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the labourers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and to them he said, ‘You go into the vineyard too, and whatever is right I will give you.’ So they went. Going out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour, he did the same. And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing. And he said to them, ‘Why do you stand here idle all day?’ They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ HE said to them, ‘You go into the vineyard too.’

Now from this parable, we learn some wonderful things. We can see God our Father like a master of a house, and we Christians are the labourers in his vineyard. We learn in this parable how God goes about calling people. We also learn what kind of a master he is, and we also learn about what he calls us to.

So how does God call us? He calls us through his Word. We see the master of the house in this parable constantly and regularly going out and calling more and more workers into his vineyard. God the Father constantly does this. He is always sending out his Word, and he is constantly calling people. In fact, we read in the Scripture that God the Father sent his Son into the word to do exactly that. We read in John 3:17: God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Then Jesus sent out his apostles, and says: As the Father sent me, so also I am sending you. And then there are pastors who are called to carry on this teaching work of the apostles. And in fact, all Christians—wherever God has called them—are sent into the world as people who carry His word in their hearts and on their lips. You can see that God the Father is always sending people, Jesus is sending, the Holy Spirit sends. And what does He send people for? To speak his word. In Luke 24, after Jesus had risen from the dead, he told his disciples that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning in Jerusalem. Also St Paul says about himself and his fellow workers: We are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of God, be reconciled to God. You also might know that parable of Jesus, where he tells of a king calling people to his son’s wedding banquet, and he constantly sends out a servant over there, another servant over here, and so on.

Can you see? God wants his Word to go out. And if anyone is a Christian, it is because we have heard the Word of God. God has send his Word out from heaven to be spoken on earth, people like you have believed it, and that is a wonderful gift and privilege of God.

Now, also, we learn here how wonderful God our heavenly Father is. He is constantly making an effort to save us, just like the master constantly goes out to gather more workers. He is constantly calling us, he is jealous for our souls and he doesn’t want them to belong to anyone else. And at the end of the day, he promises a wonderful reward. He says: Go into the vineyard too, and whatever is right I will give you. He is a faithful master, and he looks after us, cares about us, and wants to shower his gifts upon us.

We also learn from this parable what God calls us to. We are called into his kingdom, into his vineyard, onto his own property, and we are also called into his service. Now, if we were a labourer and we were looking for a job, it would be a wonderful privilege to work in a famous vineyard, like Penfolds, and be involved in making Grange Hermitage. (Of course, you might have to move to a place like South Australia to have such an honour!) In the same way, it is simply a wonderful privilege to be on God’s own property, to be in his vineyard, and to be one of his workers. This is the wonderful joy of our faith, to have been called by God through his Word!

But also, God has called us to work. In a vineyard, there are many jobs to do. The grapes need to be inspected for diseases and pests and ripeness. The grapes might need to be treated. When the time is right, the grapes need to be harvested, and put into presses, and crushed. The fermenting process needs to happen and to be monitored, and the finished wine needs to be bottled and sold. There can be no lazy workers in a vineyard.

And so in the same way, as Christians, God calls us into his service, and he calls us to work. Our faith is not simply a tree that is stuck in the ground and does nothing, but it produces all kinds of fruit. Faith is something that is productive. In Galatians 5, we read: The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. We also read that wonderful passage in Ephesians 2, where St Paul says: By grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. These are the verses that many of us know, but then he also says: For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Now the fruit of our faith, and our works as Christians, are not things with which we earn God’s grace, or his favour. He has already called you into the vineyard. He is not holding auditions to see who the best and hardest workers are, before he employs you. He has already called you. Our works have nothing to do with earning our way to heaven. Our works are simply what we do as Christians—just as working in the vineyard is simply what the labourers do once they are called, and it is their joy and the privilege to work. We don’t boast of our work, but as Jesus says: So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty.’

So you can see how it’s a natural thing for us to be productive and fruitful as Christians. In our Gospel reading, the master doesn’t want anyone standing around in the marketplace on some everlasting smoko being idle. Even John the Baptist pushes us very sharply, and says: Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. We are not saved by being fruitful, but we can lose the faith by being unfruitful.

And so, what kind of work is there to be done in the Lord’s vineyard? Where should we start? Jesus gives us a wonderful word of encouragement when he says: The harvest is plentiful and the labourers are few. Therefore pray to the Lord of the harvest to send labourers into his vineyard. Jesus does not call us to panic and fret and madly rush around, but to pray. Prayer sounds like such an easy work and almost sounds a bit uninteresting. But it is hard work, and rewarding work. How do we learn the trade of working in a vineyard, if we don’t talk to our master about the trade? He has to show us the ropes. The most important work in a vineyard is all that inspecting. The harvest is a big flurry at the end, but how do you know if it’s the right time to pick, how do you know if your grapes are all growing nicely and healthily if you don’t go and inspect and check that everything is going right? Prayer is a bit like that – we go and look at things, and then we tell Jesus about it. We give him a little report, and he—like a master winegrower—then shows us exactly what he will do about it. We inspect our own faith, and we ask him to strengthen it. We look at our fellow Christians, and we ask Jesus to strengthen them, and we try to encourage them and we build our fellow Christians up. We see our neighbours who are unbelievers, and we tell Jesus about them too, and pray for their conversion, and we pray that their hearts and ears might be opened, and that we might have an opportunity and the courage and the words to speak a good word to them. And so, we work with our heavenly Father, we work with our Lord Jesus, and we work with the Holy Spirit, and we learn the family trade, the family business, and it is a privilege to be associated with their label, and their brand.

We now come to the next part of our reading. Jesus says: When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the labourers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last, up to the first.’ And when those hired about the eleventh hour came, each of them received a denarius. Now when those hired first came, they thought they would receive more, but each of them received a denarius. And on receiving it they grumbled at the master of the house, saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’

Here in the reading, there have been some workers who have worked all day, and they see that the ones who were hired at 5pm get the same pay as them, and they get a bit ticked off! We read: They thought they would receive more. They grumbled at the master of the house.

Now, let’s step back a moment. Let’s say someone has a regular everyday job, working at Bob Jane T-mart, or McDonalds, or Aldi, or whatever, and they do a day’s work. That pay-cheque that they receive at the end of the day is a gift from God. You might have worked hard, but your income is still a gift. And so, what a privilege it is, that while we work at Bob-Jane, or McDonalds, or Aldi, or as a nurse, or teacher, or whatever, we are working for God, and then we are paid not simply by our employer, but by God through our employer. Or if we have our own business, we should remember it is not our business, but it belongs to God and it is for him to grow and expand it and make is successful. Apart from employment, we might also be a father or a mother, a husband or a wife, a son or a daughter, a grandpa, a grandma, and in just simply doing what Christians do in those callings, in those vocations, we are working for God, and what a privilege it is.

Now, what happens in our reading, is that the workers who have worked hard take their eyes off the privilege of being a worker there, and they turn their eyes to the quality and strength of their own work, and what they think they deserve. It’s not about the wine label any more—it’s simply about their pockets. Can you imagine a well-paid worker at Penfolds complaining about his pay? People would say: Hey! You’re at the top! You work for Penfolds. Or a well-paid mechanic who works for Lambourghini complaining. All the other mechanics would say: I always dreamed of working for Lambourghini! These workers in God’s – own – vineyard—listen to that!--think they deserve more, because they worked harder, even though at the beginning of the day, they entered into a work contract that they thought was fair. They were happy to work for a denarius. But now they are angry, and they grumble against their master.

Now there are many people who grumble against God. They think God is unfair. People say to Christians: Are you saying that if Adolf Hitler after a lifetime of killing half of Europe became a believer in Jesus in his last dying moments, and if Mother Teresa after a life-time of hard works decided to pack in the Christian faith and give it all up at the last moment, that Hitler would be saved and Mother Teresa wouldn’t? And we would have to say: Yes, that’s exactly what we believe. Because you see salvation is not about works. Good works are good, because they’re good. They don’t make us good. God saves us by faith even though we are bad. People think this is not fair, but if God were only fair, if he were only just, then all of us would be condemned, and none of us would be saved. The fact that God is also good and gracious and merciful means that we can be saved after all, despite our sin and our failure.

You might remember when the prodigal son came home and his father put on a wonderful banquet for him, and celebrated, what did his older brother do? He grumbled. He thought his father was unfair. And he sulked. But his father said: Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. Let those words sink in: Your heavenly Father says to you, My son, my daughter, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. You might have worked hard in the Lord’s vineyard all your life, and endured many sufferings for Christ, and carried many burdens and ridicule and even persecution. But what happens if someone receives Jesus as the Saviour minutes or hours or days just before their death? If God wants to kill the fattened calf for them, shouldn’t we celebrate? If the whole of heaven rejoices, shouldn’t we join in? If the angels rejoice over one sinner who repents, shouldn’t we?

And so in our reading, these workers who had worked all day, complain about the fact that the master made the last worker equal to us. But didn’t they know? Those workers were always equal to them. If you are a hard worker in God’s kingdom, you are still equal insofar as you are a sinner with every other sinner in the world. And sometimes we forget that, and we think that we are so good and so worthy, and those people over there are so bad and so unworthy. We think we are without sin. And those who are without sin, always want to throw the first stones!

So, we learn here that those of us who work hard can fall. It is possible to lose the faith, and look at God’s goodness with an evil eye. Even our hard work can become a dead false god that we start to worship instead of the living God. And we also learn here those of us who are fallen cannot earn God’s grace at all. It is all God’s gift, and God’s gift alone. St Paul says: There is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

And so we learn that we are chosen by God not because our goodness, but because of his goodness. God has chosen you, he has elected you, not because he saw ahead of time that you would believe and trust in him, and then chooses you because of that. Actually, he does see things ahead of time, but he does not choose you because of the goodness that he knows he is going to see in you. He chooses you because of His goodness and His grace.

And so in our reading the master says: Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you and go. I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or is your eye bad because I am good? So the last will be first, and the first last.

Listen to these words: I choose to give. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Our whole salvation rests on these words.

God chose to give you his Son, and to give him up in death for your sins. He chose to give. He chose to baptise you and to call you through his word. He chose to pour out on you the Holy Spirit. He has chosen to give you the body and blood of Jesus in the holy Supper. He has chosen to give you the forgiveness of sins, and the promise of the resurrection of the body and everlasting life. All these things belong to God. And isn’t God allowed to do what he chooses with what belongs to him! Let’s thank our heavenly for his choosing, for his grace, and for his goodness. Amen.

Heavenly Father, what a privilege it is to be called into your vineyard. Strengthen us in faith, and help us to be useful workers in your service. Teach us to thank you and praise you for your wonderful gifts of grace, which you have given to us through Jesus. Amen.