Clarifying The Kingdom of Heaven

Sunday, February 27, 2022

A Story About Workers

20 1-2 “God’s kingdom is like an estate manager who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. They agreed on a wage of a dollar a day and went to work.

3-5 “Later, about nine o’clock, the manager saw some other men hanging around the town square unemployed. He told them to go to work in his vineyard and he would pay them a fair wage. They went.

5-6 “He did the same thing at noon, and again at three o’clock. At five o’clock he went back and found still others standing around. He said, ‘Why are you standing around all day doing nothing?’

-Matthew 20:1-6 The Message

Laborers in the Vineyard

20 Verse 1: “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard.

Verse 1 study: Jesus clarified the membership rules of the kingdom of heaven; entrance by God’s grace alone. In this parable, God is the landowner, and the believers are the laborers. The parable speaks to those who feel superior because of heritage or a favored position, to those who feel superior because they spent time with Christ, and new believers are reassured of God’s grace.

Verse 2: When he had agreed with the laborers for a denarius for the day, he sent them into his vineyard.

Verse 3: And he went out about the third hour and saw others standing idle in the marketplace;

Verse 4: and to those he said, ‘You go into the vineyard also, and whatever is right, I will give you.’ And so they went.

Verse 5: Again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour and did the same thing.

Verse 6: And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing around; and he *said to them, ‘Why have you been standing here idle all day long?’