This is the Baymont podcast with Marty Solomon. I'm his co-host, Brent Billings. Today we discuss the parable of the vineyard, a generous god, and the interactions that follow as Jesus makes his way towards Jerusalem.

That's right, we start with one of my favorite parables. They're all good. We would hope they're all good. They're all Jesus' parables. But of the parables that I have studied, one of my personal favorites is the parable of the workers and the vineyard.

So, let's just have a look at them.

Alright, Matthew 20. For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.

About nine in the morning, he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them you also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right, so they went.

He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. About five in the afternoon, he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing? Because no one has hired us the answer. He said to them, you also go and work in my vineyard.

When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.

Alright, I'm going to stop you right there before we finish the parable because it's a good spot just to reflect on a couple of things.

Story ends, we should have, we should review here. Story has a landowner and this landowner hires different groups of people throughout the day.

He heads into town, group of people standing there looking for work. He keeps hiring people throughout the day. Some of them are hired early, work all day.

While others are hired halfway, work half of the day. Others are hired even later and barely even, I've gotten to work at all, barely even started by the time to work day ends.

And when it comes time to pay the workers at the end of the day, because that's how it worked at that, Tora said you have to pay a worker at the end of every single day, get paid for your day's work.

So when it comes time to pay them at the end of the day, he starts with the ones that have worked the least first.

So I have some notes just written down here, even though we know how the story ends, don't race past the immediate assumptions we make about the story. They are worth wrestling with.

Ask more questions about the story. For instance, why would the owner start with the ones who worked the least? I mean, if he, the story is going to end with everybody getting upset.

If he want to start with the ones that worked the most Brent, what do you think?

They'd be gone. They wouldn't even realize. Yeah, they'd get your paycheck. They'd be out of there. He could have just avoided this. Isn't the God character in the story smart enough to know.

So why is it that God starts? He could have avoided this entire mess. Why do it the way that he does it? And I like the stuff here and just go, no, really, like really wrestle with that.

Pause for just a moment and go, wait a minute. Why would God purposely pay the least first in front of everybody else?

There must be something to, like almost, almost like God is wanting to show something like the God character almost wants it to be seen. Interesting. So go ahead and finish the parable.

The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more.

But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner.

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