Growing in Faith – “Pay Them What They Need”
Matthew 20:1-16
September 20, 2026
Today’s scripture text is a parable from Jesus about workers in a vineyard.
If you will, while you read the text, relate the parable to your particular place of work,
where you currently or formerly held a job.
“For the Kingdom of Heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning
to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the laborers for the usual daily wage,
he sent them into his vineyard. When he went out about nine o’clock,
he saw others standing idle in the marketplace and he said to them,
“You also go to the vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.” So they went.
When he went out again about noon and about three o’clock, he did the same.
Then about five o’clock he went out and found others standing around and he said to them,
“Why are you standing here idle all day?” They replied, “Because no one has hired us,”
He said to them, “You also go into the vineyard.”
When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his manager,
“Call the laborers and give them their pay, beginning with the last and then going to the first.”
When those hired about five o’clock came, each of them received the usual daily wage.
Now when the first came they thought they would receive more,
but each of them also received the usual daily wage,
but when they received it they grumbled against the landowner saying,
“These last worked only one hour and you have made them equal to us
who have borne the burden of the day in the scorching heat.”
But he replied to one of them, “Friend, I am doing you no wrong.
Did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage? Take what belongs to you and go.
I choose to give to this last the same as I give to you.
Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me?
Or are you envious because I am generous?”
So the last will be first, and the first will be last.
Friends, the Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.
The parable of the workers in the vineyard has been interpreted in several ways over the years.
Some have interpreted the parable not in terms of economics, but in terms of eternal life.
The reward at the end of the day is heaven.
One person has lived their whole life in Church.
They were brought up in the faith. They went to Sunday school.
They tithed their income, gave ten percent to God’s work.
They served as a leader in the Church and community all their days.
And when they died, they were welcomed into heaven.
The “late arrivals”, on the other hand, were not raised in the church.
Their life did not include Christian service or discipleship,
but, in their last few years, or even on their deathbed, they were found and they were saved.
Just like in the parable, the landowner comes to them and says,
“Why have you been idle your whole life?”
“Because no one came and hired us.”
And at the end of the day, they receive the same reward of eternal life.
Another way that this parable has been interpreted is in terms of discipleship.
Some scholars claim that Jesus was talking directly to his disciples, to his inner circle.
At least a few of the disciples were supposing that, because they were close to Jesus,
they could expect some greater reward in the kingdom of heaven.
Just one chapter before this text in the Gospel of Matthew,
Peter remarked to Jesus that he and the others have left everything to follow him.
“What reward will be given to us?”, asked Peter.
Just after our text for today, the mother of James and John approaches Jesus
and asks if her sons may be seated on his right and left hand when he comes into his kingdom.
Many believe that those who do good deeds in this world will be rewarded
and have a higher place in heaven.
But the parable seems to claim that while the Church workers are laboring in the vineyard,
doing the work of the Church, God is out there in the marketplace looking for more workers,
especially those ones whom no one else has hired.
The surprise, at the end of the day, is that God welcomes the late arrivals on the same terms
and rewards them exactly the same as those who have been around for decades.
Am I not allowed to do what I choose? God says. Are you jealous because I am generous?
Those interpretations are interesting and helpful and should be taken to heart,
but what if Jesus was also talking about worldly economics?
An astounding thing about Jesus’ parables is that they are multi-valent;
they have many applications and interpretations.
Those who stand at the front of the economic line in this life
may tend to prefer the eternal life interpretation or the discipleship interpretation.
With those interpretations, we can recognize that God alone is in charge of heavenly rewards,
but we are not forced to reckon with Jesus’ challenges to the economic realities of today’s world.
Those who stand at the back of the economic line,
those who are struggling to meet their basic needs of food and shelter,
will find an economic interpretation of this parable very hopeful.
Do you remember how Jesus began his ministry?
He was in his hometown of Nazareth, and he was reading on the Sabbath day
in the synagogue. He unrolled the scroll of the prophet Isaiah and found the place
where it is written: ‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.’” (Luke 4:18-19)
If we read this parable with an economic interpretation,
Jesus’ story is really good news for the poor,
good news to those who are unemployed or underemployed,
good news to those who, because of their life station or their mental or physical disability,
or their lack of privilege or lack of transportation,
or their missed opportunity or whatever reason, have found themselves in dire financial straits.
In the kingdom of this world, our wages are based on the hours that we work.
The reward at the end of the day is based on the time extended by the worker.
Landowners and companies treat people based upon their economic value.
What’s most important, it seems, in the kingdom of this world,
is that the company has a profitable bottom line, the shareholders are happy,
and the executives receive large bonuses.
Whether or not the surrounding community is well-fed, or has access to healthcare,
or decent schools for their children to attend, well, those things often do not seem
to be included on the list of strategic goals for the business elite.
Life is different in the Kingdom of Heaven.
In the Kingdom of Heaven, the wages are based NOT on the needs of the owner,
but on the needs of the workers.
The reward at the end of the day is NOT based on the hours worked,
but based on the hours that were needed to be worked to earn bread to eat.
In the Kingdom of Heaven, people are not treated based on their economic value,
but are treated based upon their intrinsic value as human beings.
The all-important question in the Kingdom of Heaven is NOT
“what can the company can get out of the worker?”; the question is:
“what do the workers need in order to survive, or even thrive,
so that everyone will be whole and well?”
In the economic interpretation, those who are “kings” or “landowners” or “stockholders”
are challenged to consider a different mindset about the economics of this life.
In the kingdom of this world, we uphold what is fair –
the first shall be first and the last shall be last. That’s how it is.
You work the hours, you get the pay.
In the Kingdom of Heaven, everything is turned upside down.
Based on the grace and generosity of the King, “the last shall be first and the first shall be last.”
The ones with the greatest needs will be provided for first
while those whose needs are less wait until others have been fed.
How could this possibly work in real life? What would this look like?
Consider for a moment what happens when a natural disaster strikes.
You have seen the news footage.
The hurricane comes and desperate people are sitting on rooftops
needing shelter and water and food.
The governor declares a state of emergency; Federal funds are made available.
The abundance mentality comes to the fore, at least for a little while.
For several weeks or even months, the response is:
Yes, we can provide a place to sleep.
Yes, we can give some money for food and necessities.
Yes, we will ensure that we will do the best we can to help everyone in need.
In times of such crises, the practice in has been to for our nation to step up
and provide for others out of an abundance mentality.
The grim reality is that many people in our nation, particularly the children of poverty,
are living in a constant state of emergency. But in the kingdom of this world,
we tend to live not with an abundance mentality, but a “scarcity” mentality.
There is not enough to go around, and I had better grab mine while I can,
and I had better guard mine against anybody taking anything from me.
I am responsible only for myself and my family.
I need to take care of my own bottom line, and maximize it as much as possible.
I need to pay as little taxes as possible, for it is not my responsibility
to be worried about those unemployed idle ones hanging around the marketplace.
Those poor and hungry children are not my problem.
And yet, beginning with the crisis of the Great Depression, almost one hundred years ago,
our nation responded to the scriptural command to provide for the less fortunate.
We began to provide unemployment income in our nation.
We began to provide for disability income for those unable to work.
We began to provide benefits to poor children so that they could eat and go to school
and receive basic healthcare.
And in those one hundred years, even as we responded to the crisis of those in poverty,
we became the world’s economic powerhouse.
And yet, as most of you are well aware, over the past fifty years in the United States,
the rich have been getting richer and the poor have been getting poorer.
For most of the span of my life, the gap between the rich and the poor has been growing,
and the numbers in the middle class have been declining.
There are many economic factors leading to this widening gap, but at least one
of the contributing factors is self-serving actions of the owners of industry.
They pay as little as they can for as long as they can.
They take advantage of workers who have very few options in life,
and pay them less than a fair wage, far less than a livable wage.
They only hire workers part-time so that they do not have to pay benefits.
And then they line their stock portfolios with profits.
In the kingdom of this world, many of the landowners, the stockholders, the CEOs
focus intently on the bottom line, and sometimes, it seems, only on the bottom line.
In Jesus parable, in the Kingdom of Heaven,
the landowner’s primary focus is NOT on the bottom line.
The landowner’s primary focus is NOT his or her own wealth.
In the kingdom of heaven, the generous landowner is concerned for the worker.
The landowner is generous, NOT self-serving, but self-giving.
The landowner in Jesus’ parable lives with the “abundance” mentality.
There will be enough to go around. There will be enough for everyone to eat tonight.
And Jesus’ parables ring true.
Economic analysts report that there are actually enough resources in the world
for everyone to have food to eat, and a roof over their head, and even basic healthcare.
Recently, I was speaking with a woman who works in security at Emory Decatur Hospital.
For twelve years prior, she had worked with the Dekalb County jail, daily handling prisoners.
I asked her, in her opinion, what percentage of the inmates at the Dekalb County jail
had some form of a mental disability. I was expecting her to answer maybe 30 or 40%.
She replied: “Oh, I would say about 75%.
Three-fourths of the inmates probably had some form of mental disability.”
Some people with mental disabilities are difficult to employ.
Ask yourself, would they be the first, or even second or third person you would hire?
You may have read about UBI – universal basic income.
The idea is that everyone who needed it would receive some minimum basic income;
let’s say $1000 per month. In the past ten years or so, various experiments have been run,
in places as diverse as Virginia and Kenya, to see what would happen over time
if people in need were given a monthly allowance.
What has been discovered after thousands of people were given a basic income
over a period of time is that the vast majority of them were far better off a year later.
The vast majority did not become more idle or spend more on addictive substances.
The vast majority had improved their station in life.
Now, sometimes, good news for the poor may sound like bad news for the rich.
These parables of Jesus about the kingdom of heaven may seem like wonderful news
for those who find themselves at the back of the line in human life,
but, at least sometimes, the parables may seem to be disturbing
for those who find themselves towards the front of the line in human life.
There is no doubt that the values of the kingdom of heaven eventually come into conflict
with the values of the kingdom of this world.
What would Jesus say to the CEO who laid off a number of twenty eight year employees,
just shy of their retirement dates, in order to ensure that all of the top managers
received another multi-million dollar bonus?
What would Jesus say to the factory owner who is so focused on making more profit
that he refuses to address that the majority of his employees
live near the poverty line and have no access to affordable health care?
What would Jesus say to the stockholders of a company located in an area
where the public schools are poorly funded and failing?
Most often, perhaps, Presbyterians see themselves in the parable
as the workers who were hired near the beginning of the day.
Presbyterians are known for being hard workers, for showing up on time,
for organizing committees to get things done and take care of business.
How many of us today related to the workers hired near the beginning of the day?
Did any relate to those who were only hired at the end of the day and worked only one hour?
Would our perspective change if our life station was more like those
who, for whatever reason, did not get hired earlier in the day?
In the Kingdom of Heaven, those who have received what is due to them,
those who have worked hard and received a fair wage,
are not to begrudge any generosity toward those who did have the privilege to be hired.
Instead, we are to rejoice when others are blessed and all the children are fed.
We are to marvel at the generosity and openness of the King
towards those who are undeserving, and learn to imitate that generosity ourselves.
Over time, we pray that today’s landowners and stockholders
may become more like the One whom we worship,
concerned not so much with personal needs or maximizing profits,
but concerned also with the needs of the last and the least,
especially the ones whom no one else will hire. Amen.
Rev. Dr. Todd Speed
Decatur Presbyterian Church
Decatur, Georgia
