In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

As much as our human reason doesn’t want to believe it, the truth is that we’re all sinful from the very moment of conception. As Scripture says, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me” (Ps 51:5). And anyone who’s spent any time with a toddler knows the truth of this. Their defiance, hitting, and coveting with screams of displeasure, for example, are prevalent long before they have any rational understanding of right and wrong, that is, a rational understanding of their own sinfulness. And, as God has also revealed to us in His Holy Word, “The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 6:23).

Most, if not all of you, have heard this, but I bring it up because all of our Scripture readings for today are talking about those who’ve already been called by the Gospel to be the people of God along with the benefits that go with that, namely, the forgiveness of sins and eternal salvation. So, if this is the first time you’ve heard this, then know that “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved…” (Mk 16:16). If – by the grace of God – the Holy Spirit has worked faith in your heart that clings to these promises of God, then you too are among the people of God that are spoken about in today’s readings.

Now, St. Paul explains that the Israelites we heard about in our first reading were “all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea … “, prefiguring our own entrance into God’s kingdom through our baptism into Christ’s death and resurrection: that “we too might walk in newness of life” (Rom 6:4). And in that same Epistle, St. Paul refers to Christians as those who run the race: that they might receive the imperishable wreath of eternal life. And in the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard, the “master of the house” – that is, God – goes out and hires “laborers for his vineyard”: a parable of God calling people by the Gospel into the “kingdom of heaven”.

So, now that we know that the Scriptures appointed for today are talking about the people of God, what do we take away from these passages?
“the people quarreled with Moses … And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?”
or … “When those hired first came, they thought they would receive more, but each of them also 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 …”.
This is a perfect example of the truth that even as God’s people, we remain both just and sinner in this life.

The truth of the matter is, that even we who’ve been baptized into Christ and declared righteous by grace, through faith, on account of Christ’s saving work continue to struggle with being sinful, grumblers. We’re often no different than that defiant and covetous toddler who lashes out in unloving greed and selfishness, and who doesn’t want to sit still and listen to God’s Word. We all do this. We just can’t seem to be content with God’s provision. We complain about our homes, our jobs, our spouses, our children, and the food that’s provided to us. We grumble about our brothers and sisters in Christ and having to sit in church when we’d rather be off worshipping our other idols. We even sometimes despair of God’s grace and mercy. So, perhaps we should our lives “Massah and Meribah” because of our own quarreling and testing of the Lord.

We should remember and take to heart what we learned in the Catechism about how to examine ourselves when we slip into such grumbling: “Consider your place in life according to the Ten Commandments: Are you a father, mother, son, daughter, husband, wife, or worker? Have you been disobedient, unfaithful, or lazy? Have you been hot-tempered, rude, or quarrelsome? Have you hurt someone by your words or deeds? Have you stolen, been negligent, wasted anything, or done any harm?” Whichever of these apply to us, let us pray that we would be led by God’s Word and Spirit to contrition and repentance: that we might return to our baptism and daily receive the forgiveness of sins that we desperately need as those who are at the same time just and sinner.
The Christians in Corinth were no different than us, so St. Paul’s exhortation is equally applicable:
“Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable.”
That’s why he also exhorts us (by example of himself) to discipline our own bodies by fleeing from sin so that we don’t end up disqualified, that is, so we don’t lose the imperishable wreath of the kingdom of heaven.

A little further on, St. Paul also gives a very understated example of the dangers of not repenting of our sinfulness:
“Our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food,
and all drank the same spiritual drink. … Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.”

They were baptized. They heard the Word of God proclaimed by His called servant. Yet to say that most of them were nonetheless overthrown is about as understated as you can get. Of the more than 600,000 men above twenty years of age who experienced the Exodus [cf. Numbers 1] only two ended up entering into the Promised Land: Joshua and Caleb. Paul’s point is that just as this vast multitude of baptized Israelites were disqualified from entering the Promised Land because of their idolatry and faithlessness, so to do we Christians run the risk of being disqualified from God’s heavenly kingdom.

But that’s what happens if we resist the work of the Holy Spirit in Word and Sacrament: turning away from God’s grace and mercy, and embracing lives of sin and unrepentance instead. God forbid that should be any of us!

Now, while we should certainly strive by God’s grace and Spirit to run our race with self-control (putting down the desires of our flesh), it’s also true that the weakness of our fallen nature will stumble (more often than we’d care to admit). But at such time, we can take comfort in the fact that, for all their sinfulness, God graciously provided the Israelites with the Rock which was struck, and from which the they drank: and that Rock was Christ. And, in our own wilderness of sin, Almighty God, by His grace, sent that same Rock, His only-begotten Son, to be struck with nail and spear: shedding His life-giving blood to blot out our transgressions, dying the death that we deserved to die, and rising again as the Firstborn of we who are baptized into His death and resurrection. There’s our comfort as we struggle to discipline our bodies and run the race that is the Christian life: God’s grace. And that is just what’s pictured for us in the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard.

This parable is all about God’s grace. The landowner (who is God) hired laborers (that’s us) at various times throughout the day. When the workday was over, he paid them all the same wage no matter how long they had worked. Jesus told this parable to teach us that the kingdom of heaven is not about what we deserve. It’s about the grace of God, and not about any merit or worthiness in us. Jesus has promised that by His suffering and death, He’s won for us the forgiveness of sins and life everlasting. We are called to be God’s people by His abundant grace and mercy.

Christ redeemed us by the shedding of His own blood, and He richly and daily provides for all our needs. He is truly our rock and our fortress and our deliverer, For He has saved humble and lowly sinners like us.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Pr. Jon Holst