March 1 -- Second Sunday in Lent

“Create in us clean hearts, O God, and renew a right spirit within us. Amen.”

Well, pick your analogous story to today’s fabulous, but potentially bitterness-inducing Gospel lesson from Jesus: 

1. You’ve got the new hire, who comes on board right at the beginning of December.  And when the boss hands out the Christmas bonuses, she gets the same amount as everyone else.
2. Or you’ve got the guy who gets a World Series ring, even with only 4 plate appearances with that winning team.  He still get the exact same ring in October that those guys who showed up for Spring Training way back on March 1 get.  Happens all the time.
3. Children’s talk -- jumping.
4. We’ve got the tactile example of the rain today -- showering everyone/everything, regardless.   
5. Or you could easily tell this same story that Jesus tells today. Don’t need to make analogies: Every day there are day-laborers, ready to work.  You can go hire them yourself on Broadway, standing out by the Home Depot in Lemon Grove.  $20 for the day -- that’s the equivalent to one denarius.  (Joey, one of our confirmation kids, looked that up on his own yesterday.)  $20 -- might not seem like much for a day’s wage, but it’s enough to feed a family that night at the dinner table -- some rice and beans, maybe a bucket of fried chicken.  So one guy’s doing some major landscape work instead of vineyard work, he hires guys all day, and pays the guys he hires last, right around happy hour, the same wage he pays the guys he hired at 6am.  [pause]

Any bitterness?  Are you above it?  Are you happy for the late hire-ons,  the shortest jumpers?

When you think of it in terms of providing dinner that night for the worker and his or her family, maybe it’s understood a bit little differently.  Seems to me that’s what the landlord was thinking.  

God is certainly interested in everyone having enough to feed their family around the table.  God is certainly interested in the community taking care of one another.  God is certainly compassionate and generous.  That’s what Jesus kicks off this whole story to say the realm of God is like...everyone having enough. [pause]

Do you hear this story and relate more to the land owner -- what’s your first inclination, in terms of your perspective: are you too in a position to hire day laborers?  Or do you relate more to the workers?  Have you too been or are you currently in a tight spot where you need to feed your family tonight or pay rent this month?  [pause]

Interesting point: that the ones who were hired last aren’t lazy.  They just weren’t as attractive physically as the big strong ones who were hired first.  [pause]  The late-comers desperately wanted to feed their families too; they wanted to be hired all day too.  But someone else could jump higher, lift heavier -- offer more bang for the buck.  

“Are you envious because I’m generous?” the landowner asks the bitter ones.  There’s a perspective that I think we all may be able to share: We can be envious of others’ blessings.

Lent is a season, as the rain sinks into the soil, as mud and dirt, and the opportunity to slip and fall, becomes even more prevalent, there’s also an opportunity for growth and great soul searching.  There’s also in the midst of the unwanted -- the unwanted mud, the unwanted hard lessons about being generous and compassionate -- there’s also a God, who is working on us/you peacefully and quietly:  

“Let go of your bitterness and resentment.  Stop worrying about what others are getting and what you’re not getting.  Do you have enough to eat tonight?  I want them to have enough too.  Your anger and bitterness is pulling you down, holding you back from being the fully human being I created you to be.  Let that stuff go, and share...as I have shared with you -- generously, freely, and compassionately.  That takes some work, I know,” says God, “but I created you to do this, so I know you’ve got it in you.”  

Lent is our time -- not just to recognize God’s compassion and generosity -- but also to dig out our own...if its been buried.  Better yet, (don’t dig it out) let it go to seed:  let God’s compassion grow in and through us, finally breaking the surface and bettering the world, offering beauty and food and companionship.  Isn’t it great when a new tree you’ve planted turns from from a beautiful little sapling, to an actual source of food, and then maybe even to a companion or a friend? 

That’s the kind of growth God’s got in store for us, sisters and brothers in Christ.  God has planted us, and grows us.  God is the vineyard owner, bestowing gifts of enough on all of us.  Again, the plants teach us:  they don’t grow looking around and being jealous of this tree or that rose bush getting more water and attention...no, plants just grow and entrust themselves...to getting enough.  

We entrust ourselves to Christ, who loves us, showers us with blessings, brings us in, and sends us out...with enough.  

Today we continue down this narrow path, together.  And we sing our praise and thanks to our generous God all the while.  

AMEN.