DAILY BYTEI don’t like hearing the challenge of this parable anymore than you do.
I have resisted and even grown angry over its teaching because it challenges my own selfishness and pride, my fear of what it means to truly love those that I struggle to even like.
I want to sit on the throne of my life, to control it all! I want the fruit of my life and work all for myself, and for those I choose to share it with! There are some people that I just plain don’t want even to try to love, it makes me angry and afraid to even think about having to!
Yet Jesus seemed willing to face any amount of anger or resentment over this challenging message. In fact, he felt so strongly about it that he was willing to die for proclaiming it.
Let me give you an example of just why this is so important. Not so long ago, my wife felt it necessary to have a little talk with me. Many husbands out there would instantly recognise the sheer depth of meaning conveyed in the term ‘a little talk’.
She gently told me that I had, of late, been allowing my stress to pile up, making me grumpy and snappy with her and our children. It was very much like I was allowing myself to shrink down into my little corner of vineyard, getting all selfish and defensive and obsessive. I was never truly giving of myself to my family – even when I was home I was not really present because my mind and attention were constantly on other matters.
In this ‘little talk,’ my wife reminded me that I was worth so much more than that. Not in these exact words but something very like them. She told me that she missed the man she knew me to be – someone usually quick to laugh and slow to stress, someone who was normally much more open and alive to joy and life and love.
It actually took me a couple of days to process our talk because sulking is kind of my spiritual gift. I might even have got a little irritable about it all, I might have snapped something like ‘What do you mean I am easily angered and overly defensive lately?!’ as I stomped out of the room.
In this case, I angrily ignored a messenger graciously sent to me by God.
But as I thought about what she had said, the truth of it all struck me. Humbled me even.
I could no longer be offended over something so true, because there was so much more to me than how I had been living. There was so much more out there for me if I could just begin to open myself up again. If I would just stop frantically trying to control my patch of vineyard.
If I would let go and let God.
PRAY AS YOU GO
God of Hope, we ask that you would constantly send your messengers of grace into our lives, even if their message is challenging enough to make us angry. Keep us from trying to control those parts of life that we really should not be. Once again, we place our lives into your loving hands. Amen.
FOCUS READING
Matthew 21:45-46 NRSV
When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard Jesus' parables, they knew he was talking about them. They looked for a way to arrest him, but they were afraid of the crowd because the people held that he was a prophet.
