God's Ways are Not Our Ways

by Dcn Bob Evans  |  09/17/2026  |  Weekly Reflection

It was Tuesday evening of what we now call Holy Week. For the second time, Jesus had driven the buyers and sellers from the Temple area [cf. Mt 21:12-13, Mk 11:15-17; Lk 19:45-46]. This infuriated the Temple authorities who profited handsomely from those transactions. All three evangelists, Matthew, Mark and Luke, tell us that, afterward, they went to the Mount of Olives to spend the night. There, Jesus shared with His disciples the parable which we hear in this week's Gospel - the Parable of the Workers [cf. Matthew 20:1-16].

This was one of the last parables Jesus taught about the Kingdom of Heaven. He was speaking only to His disciples, in a quiet evening setting, no crowd around, so we should expect that this parable will be subtle in its message - not at all what the storyline alone might suggest. It's fairly lengthy and there is a pattern in how Jesus conveyed the details that gives us a clue to the lesson in the parable.

Detail: "a landowner went out at dawn to hire laborers for his vineyard." Ordinarily, the field foreman hired the daily workers. For the landowner to go out and hire his workers indicated very unconventional behavior. Detail: "agreeing with them for the usual daily wage" - one denarius. This indicated conventional thinking; there was nothing to bargain about, one denarius was the standard wage. We know that a denarius was barely enough to feed a small family for a day. Detail: "Going out about nine o'clock ... and he went out again around noon and around three o'clock ...going out about five o'clock." The landowner went out a total of five times during the day to hire workers, something most unconventional. Detail: "he saw others standing idle in the marketplace... Why do you stand here idle all day?... You too go into my vineyard."" This indicated the conventional way of thinking by landowners about hirelings - they're lazy and avoid work and need to be told what to do.¹

The pattern was that Jesus placed conventional thinking in juxtaposition to unconventional behavior to point to an underlying principle. The underlying principle was hinted at but was not explicitly stated; it was up to the listeners to discern the principle being taught. This was a common rabbinic construct often used in biblical times, called a semukha.² The punchline, so to speak, was the landowner's words: "I will give you what is just"... And later, "Are you envious because I am generous?"

The people of those times, as would many today, expected the landowner to act in a way that heavily leaned toward justice (i.e. pay the laborers based on their effort), but he acted in a way that heavily leaned to mercy (i.e. pay each what he needed that day to support his family). Jesus was teaching His disciples, those there that evening, and all of us today, that in the Kingdom of Heaven mercy takes precedence over justice. If His followers were to be truly righteous people, that is, hold mercy and justice in right balance, as God does, then, His followers must place mercy well above justice in dealing with one another.

History has shown that the lesson in this parable was of enormous importance. In the lifetime of Jesus' first listeners, there was the threat of a great split in the Church over whether those who had not been circumcised should be "allowed" to be Christians. After much debate, mercy took precedence over justice and circumcision was not made a requirement to be Christian. In the following generation, an even bigger conflict arose. During the period of persecution under Emperor Domitian, 90-96 AD, there were thousands of apostates (those who renounced the faith in the face of persecution). When Domitian was assassinated by the Roman Senate, the period of persecution ended. And, many apostates wanted to come back into the Church. The Church struggled for decades over: "Are we to accept apostates back; and if so, how do we do that?" In the end mercy prevailed. In our own times, there are many whose "behavior and lifestyles" cause them to be rejected as being "outside the Church." The very sustainability of the Church in the twentyfirst century may depend on whether the lesson of this parable again prevails.

It's the very last line of this reading that ties the Gospel message to the message in our First Reading from Isaiah [cf. Isa 55:6-9]. Jesus concluded the parable with the phrase: "the last will be first, and the first will be last" [Mt 20:16]. God's values and ways are not the same as our values and ways. To live our earthly life as God intended, we must adopt God's values and ways - mercy must take precedence over justice in our dealings with one another.