Parable of the Laborers

Excuse me just a minute.

They gave me a wireless mic and I forgot to put it on and I better get it turned on. It's on. Good morning, everyone. It's good to see all of you. To be with you.

I was honored when Mr. McCready asked me to come and speak here one Sabbath. I helped him out while he was in his other congregation. Then yesterday he told me that he'd be here for the service and I thought, well, he must be checking up on me and wanted to hear exactly what I had to say. That I didn't speak anything untoward and wrong.

And then he said, no, I'm just going to stay through the announcements because of his scheduling and everything and then I'm going to leave. I thought, well, then I got offended that he wouldn't say and listen to me speak. But I'll forgive him on that. I understand that he has to get on down to the other congregation or whatever else. And so I assume that he does trust me and we can speak to you here.

Anyway, it's good to be with you. We've never attended services with you here in Dayton. We've crossed paths over the years. A number of you we know from working at camp and coming to the Feast of Tabernacles over here and crossing paths at various feasts of Tabernacles as well. But my wife and I just moved down to Cincinnati from Indianapolis after having been there for 21 years and taking an opportunity to come over and work in the media area of the church and help develop Beyond Today and teach at ABC.

So that's been a whole change of life for us after a number of years. But fortunately it wasn't that far. Our four grandchildren still live in Indianapolis and our two sons, so we're still close by to them. But it still is a change and we're adjusting to it. We've just been moved into our home a couple of three weeks now. So it's good to be here and living in Ohio. My wife's family is from up in Akron. She grew up in Northeast Ohio, so in one sense it's coming back to where she used to live.

But Indiana and Ohio has been her home and ours for a number of years, so this whole area is quite familiar to us. I wanted to comment just a little bit about the Kingdom of God seminars and the emphasis that the church is certainly placing upon that with the seminars that we're having now. Unfortunately you had to cancel yours last week, as Mr. McCready was saying, and I don't know how many other congregations may have had to do that, but the storm that came through the Midwest and Northeast last week did cut down on the attendance, but not completely.

We did have new people attend down in Cincinnati back in Indianapolis. We had, we were, Debbie and I were in New York City last week to conduct the seminar that was scheduled to be there. They had about 89 or 90 people register online to attend the seminar before, and so we didn't know what to expect, but expected perhaps half of those numbers would show. So we flew in on Friday evening to be prepared for that, and then all of a sudden a big snowstorm came through that part.

They had about three to five inches of snow by the time we were ready to begin on Sabbath morning in New York City. So we didn't know what to expect. One of the members picked us up, we drove over to the hall, we were there quite early and waiting and waiting all by ourselves. Then about 15 minutes before the seminar was to start, we were still waiting with about a handful of members there, and then all of a sudden we thought, well, this is going to be an expensive trip just to have a chat and chew session with members and fellowship, but all of a sudden they started coming in.

We had wound up with 36 members, which is about half the congregation there, showed up, and then we had 35 new people attend. So almost as many new people attended as we had members in attendance. So they didn't let that deter them. We were very encouraged by that, and they stayed. We had a very good seminar. I conducted both of the presentations, and it went very, very well. They seemed very interested.

These seminars, this is the second round, we have at least two more that will be planned, and then we will reassess what we do. I expect that we will continue to do these seminars. But I think that God has given us a blessing in the Church right now by inspiring a focus upon the kingdom of God, which is really the heart and core of the message of the Bible.

However you want to slice it, it is all about the kingdom of God. God has called us to that. We are to be in preparation as kings and priests, and Christ is going to return to establish His kingdom forever upon this earth. And it is what we have all been called to. And as the Church is focused on that message through these seminars, and kind of slicing the message down and expanding it to explain it to not only new people, but even to the membership, we are going to, I think, see some fruits on several levels. I think the membership, all of us, are going to be energized and invigorated by a focus upon the kingdom of God.

You can't help but have have that focus. When you really look at what Jesus did in his ministry, the kingdom of God was on his lips wherever he went. He spoke about it continually to everyone that he engaged. His teachings, his parables, all were about the kingdom. And we can't say too much about it. We could speak every week about some aspect of the kingdom from here until that kingdom comes and not exhaust all that there is to it.

You'll note in the first chapter of Acts that for 40 days after his resurrection, Christ spoke to the apostles regarding the things of the kingdom of God. And John makes a little note at the end of his gospel that the things that he spoke and did, if they were to be fully recorded, there would not be enough room to do so. I would well imagine that the instruction that they received in that amount of time about the kingdom of God was even more than what could have been recorded in their own lifetime.

We will spend an eternity as part of that kingdom. And as we share that with new individuals God is calling and working with, then I expect, and we all do, expect God's blessing upon that. We are already beginning to see new people attend and come back for the seminars and in some cases as well begin to attend on a regular basis. So I expect that that will will happen.

Your prayers and support and encouragement of that are essential, but that's what we are called to. And as we move forward with this, I expect to see a lot of good fruit throughout the church as God's blessing will be upon these these seminars. So continue to to do that. And as you have planned for yours, your makeup seminar and the additional one you have in May, be praying that God's blessing will be upon it and those whom he is calling and working with will be able to come and to attend.

Our attendance figures are running about the same as they are on the we're on the first round back in September. More being held today even as we speak at various congregations and will be over the next one or two weeks even before we get through this round, the second round. And we expect that we'll probably have about the same numbers of people actually come and attend as we had on the first, perhaps a little bit more with the numbers that are beginning to come in.

So we are excited about that and we are, as we do beyond today programs, we are focusing upon that as well. And again, just making sure that we are putting that message into just about every aspect of the messages that go out from the church in print, television, public appearances of the ministry as we possibly can. So I'm sure you'll look forward to those as you go ahead. When I was 18, a few years ago, I worked for my dad. And when I was 18, my father sold the family business as it was. The family business was a Texaco service station.

We didn't call it a gas station, we called it a service station in those days because we did everything on a car in that location that you could do. We changed tires, sold tires, tuned them up, overhauled engines, pumped gas, washed cars. It's a complete service center as they were constructed in that day.

But after a number of years in the business, my dad decided that he had had enough of it. That actual business was beginning to change and he sold out and he went to work for a construction company that was one of his accounts, actually. We gas their trucks, change their tires, and changed the oil in their big trucks.

So he landed a job as an operator with this large construction firm there in our hometown. I was out of a job. Now, I was 18, I was getting ready to go off to college. It came time for the summer before I went off to college. I was going to Ambassador College and I had to scramble around and get some money together to be able to afford that. But I needed a job.

My dad said, well, maybe they can hire you for some day work at the company. The way it was set up in those days, they had their regular employees, but then because of the nature of the ebb and flow of their jobs, they needed a certain number of laborers through the week. Some days they didn't need as many because of the way the work was going.

But what men would do is they would show up at the construction site or at the headquarters, the office of the company, very early in the morning and the owner of the company would come out and he had a list of what needed to be done and he'd hire certain ones standing in the room to go out and do various jobs, carpenters, concrete work, laboring jobs that were needed.

I did not have the skills of a carpenter. I didn't do concrete work, but I could sure I was strong enough to handle a shovel and a pick and cart things around off of a construction site. So I thought, well, I'll be able to land a job at minimum wage doing that and get some work. So I went out very early with my dad and remember the first morning standing there and thinking, well, this, you know, I'll get a job. Well, the owner came out and he had a list that he called off this guy and that guy and this guy and another guy and pretty soon he said, that's all we got today, guys, gentlemen.

And I didn't have a job, so I went home. I thought, oh man, you ever get not picked for a team, you know, in grade school and get to have that feeling when you, you know, you're the only one left? Well, boy, I felt really left out. So I saw, okay, well, there'll be something tomorrow. So I went back the second day. Same thing happened.

Owner came out, had a list of work to be done, called everybody off. I didn't get picked. And about that time I realized, you know what? Just because my dad works here, just because they know my dad, there was no guarantee I was going to get a job.

And it taught me a really hard lesson, very early, an important lesson. And I realized, I don't think this is going to work out. And I could see the days going by and I needed money. I was going off to college.

Couldn't waste a lot of time. One thing my dad had taught me is that he had to work. He would kick me out of bed at some times very early in the morning to go to work working for him in my early years. And let me tell you something, working for a boss can always be a challenge, depending on how your boss is. But working for your dad can be something completely different. And I grew up working for my dad.

He didn't cut me much slack. He made sure I was there. And if he wanted to take off, he expected me to stay and do his part. And so he helped me to a higher standard. So I did. I learned to work. I learned the value of work very early. And so after the second day of rejection, I realized, you know, I better go out and take care of this myself.

So I started knocking on a few doors. And fortunately, I knew a few other businesses that had done business with us in my dad's service station. So I just went and talked to the men and said, I need some work. Get anything going. And within a day, I had two jobs. I had a job that I went to at eight o'clock till five.

And then I had a job from five thirty till eight or nine that evening. So I had kind of a first shift and a half of a second shift job. And for the summer, I made enough money to get on with what I needed to do for going off to college at that time. And worked at that. But I got the message that I needed to go out and find my own job. So I found them. And I learned a lot from that. I learned, as I said, that I couldn't just rely on my father's name and where he was.

That I had to make my own way. I learned you had to work. You had to ask. I learned a bit of resourcefulness from that. And you know, you stay with those things. And you will find work if you really work at it. They always say that sometimes it takes... you have to work at finding work. And make a full-time job of even searching for work. And in most times, most economies, you can do that. But I also learned that an owner can hire who he wants. The owner of the business is in charge.

He can hire and pay what he wants and what the job demands. And they're in charge. And you have to respect that and work with that. There are a lot of things that you do learn with work. And God teaches us, in our calling, a lot of things through the example of work and the ethic of work. In fact, when it comes down to our calling, we have to understand that in a sense, we're called to a work, the work of God. But we must work within that. And we must understand certain principles and certain things about that as we go about the calling God has given to us.

I'd like to take you through, here in a few minutes in my sermon with you here this morning, a parable that I think it's about work and it is about the kingdom of God. And it teaches us some very important lessons that we need to consider at this stage of our calling and development as individuals and within the Church of God at this moment in time in the world in which we live and with what we are doing. If you would, please turn over to Matthew 20.

And I want to take you through a parable of workers. It's the workers in the vineyard that begins here in verse 1 of chapter 20. And draw some lessons from this morning. The parables of Christ are rich in teaching and as we will see in this one, as in most of the parables that Jesus spoke, He is talking about the kingdom of God and they relate to the kingdom of God.

So let's begin here. This is a parable of the workers in the vineyard and a vineyard is one of the areas of work that Jesus used to describe certain aspects of our calling in the kingdom.

In the Gospel of John on the last evening before his death, you will remember that Jesus talked of himself as the true vine, drawing the analogy of a grape vineyard and the pruning and the work that goes on there in regard to understanding how we are to stay attached to Him and even be pruned back to bear more fruit. And so here we have a whole parable dealing with workers in the vineyard. Let's begin in verse 1 where it says, Christ went on, For the kingdom of heaven is like...

Now let's stop right there. This opens a number of parables. The kingdom of heaven is like, you will find as you turn to a number of parables. The kingdom of heaven or the kingdom of God, both the same thing, was such a concept that Christ had to relate it to something that people could understand from everyday life and the world around them to relate to understand this great concept of the kingdom of God. And aspects of it, as I said in my opening comments, the knowledge and the truth of the kingdom of God is so all-encompassing and so great that we would never exhaust opportunities and possibilities of describing and talking about the kingdom of God. And so Jesus here takes it down to the level of a vineyard. And he says it is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. You could imagine this setting would be that of a harvest time when work was to be done, but although the work of a vineyard goes on year-round, if you really understand how a vineyard has to be tended, cared for, pruned, and the ground kept up, workers in a vineyard would be working year-round, the greater part of the work would come toward the harvest, then that's true. But I think the sense of this parable is the ongoing, everyday year-round work of a vineyard that is being described here, and the need for people to work it. The owner goes out to find laborers. Now, as I was describing the example of my early experience going into this room full of laborers for construction work, that goes on even today. People who do day work on construction especially, or even temporary work, they will go to a center and they will find what's available for a day and be hired for a day or a few days, maybe a week or two at a time. What Jesus is talking about here is a common occurrence and a situation where a man would go into a marketplace or a town center where men who worked as laborers, minimum wage, what we might call a blue-collar job, would go to be selected and called by individuals to work. You'll find that even today in many other parts of the world, especially in Africa, I know one of our members who runs a sugar cane farm and a tea plantation, will drive a truck into a central location to pick up laborers to work his fields on a regular basis. The laborers will be gathered in a parking lot and he'll go in and pick them up and take them back each day. These laborers are gathering in a particular spot looking to be hired for work, and that's where the landowner knows he'll find what he needs. So he goes to hire laborers for his vineyard early in the morning. You can imagine well before sunrise. Now, in verse 2, when he had agreed with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard.

Whatever that denarius was at that time in the first century, let's just understand that we're talking here about a working wage, and we're talking, we could relate it to perhaps a minimum wage type of job, of a laboring job. It's not a salaried, high-paying role. We're talking here about people who work day by day, and they need that work. They don't get that work even on one day. They could be in some very serious straits, and so it's important that they are there, and that they work, and that they be paid by the end of the day as well. We could imagine that whatever the minimum wage is at this time is the amount of money that we're talking about, a living wage, but not one that one is going to get very wealthy on. So he agreed with his laborers, or he set him out for the entire day, and they were sent into his vineyard. Well, he went out about the third hour. Now, this would be about nine o'clock in the morning.

The day began as far as the counting in these parables at six is the first hour of the day.

The third hour then would be nine a.m. So he goes out at the third hour. The work continued, and it could be that he needed more than he thought he needed. It could be that some didn't stay with it. We're not told all the details of this, but he needed more so he goes out and he saw other standing idle in the marketplace. They were available for work. And he said to them, you also go into the vineyard, and whatever is right, I will give you. So they went. And so he made an agreement that, again, whatever is right, whatever your fair wage is, I'll give it to you.

And so they went. The work continued on. Again, he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, back at noon, and back at three o'clock in the afternoon. And he hired additional individuals to come and do the work in the vineyard. Again, you could surmise that either the work was greater and he needed more work to do it, or some didn't stay and it was too much for them. They got hotter, or they, you know, working in a field, working with your hands, out in the elements.

It's, you know, something you either love to do, you get used to doing it, or you endure.

Or if you don't like it, you just can put it down and walk away.

How many of you have worked laboring in a field or in some type of a hard, hands-on type of job like this over the years? I've done it. I've done it in my younger years. It's been a number of years. Other than my yard, in the yard work I get into, I don't do a lot of this. But it's taxing, taxing work. And sometimes people just get tired of it. And they may have walked away.

And so the work goes on through the day here. Now look down in verse 6. About the 11th hour, he went out and found other standing idle and said to them, why have you been standing here idle all day? This will be about five o'clock. Quitting time, late in the day. Now if it's in the harvest period or the summer months, there'd be plenty of daylight left. A lot of work could be done during that time, but it's late. And the day is at least you're beginning to see toward the end of the day. But there's still work to be done. Or it could be that, again, attrition has caused some to quit and to leave. But there's still work that has to be done and more laborers have to be found. The owner goes back and finds some who have been standing there idle all day. And they said, well, no one hired us in verse 7. And he said, you also go into the vineyard and whatever is right, you will receive. Now whatever is right is obviously the denarius, the set wage that he agreed to with the others early in the morning to work for all day.

So here he hires some at five o'clock and he agrees to them to give whatever is right. I will pay you. You will receive a wage for this. Now the work goes on. The vineyard is still being tended. And so when evening had come, the owner of the vineyard said to a steward, call the laborers and give them their wages, beginning with the last to the first.

And when those came who were hired, about the eleventh hour, they each received a denarius.

They received a full day's wage, the same as those who had come in early in the first shift.

And they each received a denarius. But when the first came, they supposed that they would receive more. And they likewise received each a denarius, which is what they agreed to.

Whatever contract they assigned on for it, that's what they got. Nothing more, nothing less.

But they got the same amount as those who had labored for a long, a short period of time than these who had worked through the heat of the day.

Verse 11 says, when they had received it, they complained against the landowner, saying, these last men have worked only one hour, and you made them equal to us, who have borne the burden and the heat of the day. And only anyone who's worked through the heat of the day, shouldering the burden of their work, can understand such a statement and what that feeling would be. So there's a little bit of discontent.

Labor strife. Labor disagreement here at this point in time.

And so they filed a complaint. They didn't have a union to file agreements with, but they filed it straight with the owner. That was where it all came in at this point. And he answered in verse 13, he answered one of them, and he said, friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what is yours and go away. I wish to give to this last man the same as to you.

Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with my own things?

Or is your I evil because I am good? So the last will be first, and the first last. For many are called, but few are chosen. Now that ends the parable of the vineyards here in verse 16.

The kingdom of God is like the story. The calling to the kingdom of God, he says, many are called, but few are chosen. The work that is involved with the kingdom is like the story. There are elements of this that we are to understand. There are other parables that tell other dimensions of the kingdom of God. The parable of the sword and the seed. It talks about the seed being sown of the gospel and how and where that falls. This one focuses upon the workers.

And workers who are called at the beginning and workers who are called at the end, all call to do the same work of working within the vineyard. Now there's a lot that can be said about the work of a vineyard. When I came in this morning, I stopped at the information table where Mrs. Walters was, and I noticed a book about the vineyard right there. I don't know whose book that is. It's a book that some of you ladies are reading or going through. I think it's a book I myself had looked at some months back, briefly, when it was on the shelf in my local library. And it's fascinating to go and read about the work of a vineyard. As I said, there's a great deal that goes on, even beyond harvest time, keeping vines tended. Christ talked about vines that have to be pruned and cut back in order to bear more fruit. Who's doing the work of pruning in a vineyard, like this parable shows, if it's not workers? Interesting lesson there. Sometimes God uses each of us as pruners, even as we get pruned ourselves. As people work together, sometimes people rub on each other. And in that rubbing, there becomes friction, or there becomes problems. And you can well imagine that. To keep a vineyard productive, the ground under the vines has to be kept clean. If you've ever gone to a vineyard, and we've gotten a number of them throughout Indiana and over here in Ohio of small vineyards, and if you ever go and just look down the rows, a well-kept vineyard, it's very, very clean right under the vines, so that the optimum growth can be developed.

It's a lot of work to keep that up. A good vineyard is not going to be throwing pesticides down there, so that's going to be done by hand. And in this particular parable, you can well understand that people are going to be doing that with an implement, and going down each row and keeping the weeds out, keeping it clean so that the vines are then strung just exactly the way they should be and pruned to the right length. You know, there's an ark to pruning a vine. There's an ark pruning a fruit tree, apple tree or cherry tree that we might have in our yards, and you have to keep them pruned if you're going to bear fruit. And at some point, if they get overgrown or whatever, the fruit will not be proper. In my home that I have over in Indianapolis, right now I have two homes, one in Cincinnati, and I haven't sold my home in Indianapolis, but I had two fruit trees in the back of my yard, an apple and a cherry tree. A few years ago, the apple tree got so overgrown, it just stopped producing. I said, well, I better cut it back. And I thought, well, I'll do the work myself and save some money instead of having somebody come in. So I kind of got out on the internet, read a little bit of how to prune a fruit tree, and thought I knew how to do it.

We got up and pruned it out. And the last two years, not a piece of fruit on the tree.

I obviously pruned it too much. Right next to it was a cherry tree, a sour cherry tree. And for every year I'd lived in that home, it always bore lots of cherries. Until last year, first year, we didn't have any cherries. And so I had it trimmed back, but this time I hired somebody who was a professional tree trimmer to come in and prune it back. And I won't be around to see if it works because hopefully, God willing, we'll sell it and someone else will come in there and they will receive the benefit of that. But I fully expect that it will come back. I hope my apple tree comes back. The lesson is you can prune things too much and it won't bear it. It won't come back. It can kill it. So you got to know what you're doing. But whether it's whatever the fruit is, and in this case we're talking about vineyards, people do that. People are employed to do that. And people work within the vineyards. And within this, you have to understand all of the human intricacies of human relationships that go on. This landowner went out and hired people throughout the day. God has hired us to be workers in his vineyard, the vineyard that is described here to be like the kingdom of heaven. We're working for God's kingdom. We're working toward that kingdom. We're called to be fellow co-workers and sojourners in that way.

And God has called each one of us. You know, God knows exactly when to call.

And just as this landowner went out early in one morning and he hired some, and then he went and hired some later on, God knows when it is best and optimum for that calling to be extended to those. For some of us, it was at the beginning of the day. For others, it was at the end of the day.

I turned 60 years old this past year. I've been part of the Church of God since I was 12.

48 years. That's not as long as some of you. Some of you have been around longer. Some of you have been around maybe not quite so long. But it's a long time. 30, 40, 50 or more years is a long time to be working for the kingdom of God, to be working toward the kingdom. I happened to come when I was a young man, 12 years old, because my mother was called and she accepted that calling and came into the Church. I wasn't born into the Church, but I was mostly raised within the Church and had been a part of it all these years. And yet others have been called in later times. As I said earlier, I see that God is beginning to call some people even right now.

Even right now. At a time when for many of us, we're getting up toward quitting time, so we think. Or toward the end of the day, past 3 o'clock. And yet God is still adding in to the Church those that He wills. Why? Because the work goes on.

The work isn't over until the end of the day. And workers are always needed within the work of the Church and the kingdom of God. One of the lessons this parable is telling us that God will continue to add workers for the harvest. As long as that harvest is being pulled and workers are needed, to make it happen. To bring in the fruit. And to see that it is properly harvested, tended, and cared for to the consumption. The work goes on. And one of the lessons from this parable is that it really never ends. And though there comes a time when a wage is given out, the wage is given out until at the end of the day. Or when the harvest, in terms of the kingdom, is finally done. In Acts chapter 18, we are told something here about Paul as he worked in his time and through the calling that God had given to him. In Acts 18, Paul was in Greece and he had his eye on the city of Corinth. And he was there and people began to respond to the message. Verse 1 tells us that he went to Corinth from Athens and he found certain Jews there, Aquila and Priscilla. He began to stay with them and work. Verse 4, he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath and people began to call. At the end of verse 8 it says, many of the Corinthians hearing believed and were baptized. And then in verse 9 we find an interesting statement here.

The Lord spoke to Paul in the night by a vision. And he said this, do not be afraid. He had been called up before a tribunal at this point. He said, don't be afraid here. Speak. Do your work. Preach the gospel, in essence. Do not keep silent. For I am with you and no one will attack you to hurt you. For I have many people in this city. For some reason, God had moved circumstances to place Paul right in Corinth and he wanted him to kind of put down a few roots for a period of time. And he brought in these other two, Aquila and Priscilla, who were going to be very key fellow workers with him to help found a church and to plant the church here.

And so God had already looked at Corinth. And Corinth was, for those of you that know a little bit of the background of Corinth, it was a large city. It wasn't as large as Athens, but it had a distinct reputation as being a rather body city. A great deal of immorality was part of the life of the city, both of a religious ritual nature with temple prostitutes and the great temple that was there. It was a port city on the waters, so it drew a number of certain types of individuals as well. And so there was a ritual immorality connected with the pagan religion and there was an immorality just with a normal way of life of the city. In fact, in the ancient world and first century among the Greeks, to Corinthianize was a term to be extremely immoral the way the Corinthians were. We could put our own modern cities onto it. We could put Bangkok there. We could put Las Vegas, if you will, as cities that kind of represent a very loose, immoral lifestyle. And yet in this city, God had determined that there were going to be people called.

He said, I have many people in this city. And it says, Paul continued there a year and six months, eighteen months, teaching the Word of God among them and a sizable congregation grew.

You never know where God is working, what God has in mind. We should never, ever say that the times are too bad or people are too distracted. They're caught up in the internet. They're caught up in games. They're caught up in work. They're caught up in entertainment. They're caught up in immorality.

And their attention span is too short. And people can't be called. We should never, ever say that in our own time. Because Corinth was one of the worst places that you would have ever thought to establish a church in its day and time. And yet God says, I have many people there. We bring this down to our time today. As we come back to this parable, we, we brethren, should look at what God is doing and these examples and understand that God will call whom he wants to when he wants to. And just because for some of us we have been at this for more than four decades or five decades in some cases and been through the experiences that we've seen in the church, the ups and downs, the coming and goings of people, ministry, leaders, situations, the challenges that we have had in all of our years. That should never discourage us from the work of the kingdom of God. Of preaching the gospel of the kingdom and letting God, sowing that seed and letting God determine who he's going to call. Because we know what the work is. A parable like this one tells us that the work goes on all day. And some are called early, some are called late. For some others, I guess I wasn't, I'm not among the earliest even that have ever been called in this church. There are many others still at the at the plow that have been here longer than me. But as time goes on, you know, 48 years in this becomes quite a figure.

I mean, in a couple of years, I will be able to say a half a century.

Believe me, I never thought I'd say that. Never thought I'd say that when I was a teenager in the church that I'd be at this this long, but I am. And every bit involved and engaged in it as I ever have been. Not to say that I haven't had my moments where you get, you know, you wonder and you get a bit frustrated and burned out. Yeah, sure. We all go through that. As you go through the heat of the day and the burden and the heat of the day. We all know, any of us that have been around for a few years, all of the interesting challenges that we have have had to the work, to the church, to our faith. And yet nothing has changed in terms of the truth of God. Nothing has changed in regard to the work of preaching the gospel. That work continues on and God is going to do His work. In this parable, God is like that landowner who goes out to hire people into the labor force. And the challenges come as the day goes along. There's the heat, the tediousness of the work, the attitudes of the workers, and the people. Come and go. I have to laugh at a story my youngest son, Ryan, when he was in his college years, he was going to Indiana University down in over in Bloomington and working during the summers. And one summer he had a job. The last minute things had been tight. He got on with a landscaping crew in the neighborhood. And that was hard work.

Digging out dirt, laying sod, hauling in trees. But he worked at it. He was up early every morning going out for it. It was hard work, hard manual labor. He was young, strong, had a strong back. All of that elements that were needed for that type of work. But as the weeks wore on, it got hot. And some of the people that he had to work with weren't always the easiest to get along with. He was trying to obey God. He had a different mindset than a lot of the other co-workers who came on every morning from a night of partying and carousing and other things. And chewing tobacco and smoking and dipping snuff and talk and all that goes on. And that just began to wear and grate on him over the weeks. And finally, I think it was late July or August. Actually, this was when ABC was just getting geared up. We had a week-long kind of a trial run on an ABC sampler in Indianapolis. It was going to be five days. And Dr. Ward came in for it, and I was doing part of it. And Mr. Antion, I think, was there. And we held this week-long seminar. And Ryan couldn't be there for it because he had to work. And after about the second day of the seminar, and I think on a Tuesday, I remember him coming in about one o'clock for the afternoon session. And I said, what are you doing here? He said, well, I quit my job. So I thought this would be more important coming in for this. He had basically laid down his shovel at about 10 or 11 o'clock. He just had it up here with the people that he was working with.

He didn't mind the hard work, but he said, you know, I thought I might learn more here at this ABC sampler. And he just got tired of the people. Well, right or wrong, he walked off the job, and he got kind of frustrated. And we would talk all day about whether he should have done that. But he at least he wanted to come and be a part of something that was going on with the church.

And he's still in the church and doing well. So I guess the decision had some good fruits to it. But you know, the point I'm going to get to is that the people we work with do grind on us at times. And we all have our challenges. We all put forth our own challenges.

And sometimes in the church, as we get to know each other and we get too acquainted with one another, we can kind of wear on one another. And strife breaks out. Problems break out. That too causes tension within the church, doesn't it? Over the decades.

We have to work through those. Hopefully with God's Spirit we work through more of those. But time experience also tells us that sometimes because of attitudes in certain situations, sometimes people have to part and go separate ways. Let God sort it all out in this work for the kingdom that that he's called us to and let the fruits speak for themselves.

But workers working alongside each other through the day can create our own challenges as well. As we look at these situations, we just have to realize that God knows what he is doing. He is the landowner. He's adding to the workforce. He's keeping it going. When we go back to this parable and we go back to the point where it came time to pay at the end of the day, and those who had worked all day got the same amount as those who came in and worked for one hour. That in itself created the challenge. The landowner says, look, we agreed for what we agreed and that here it is. I'm fair. You get what you agreed to. I give you what I said I would and the same for them. You can bring in a number of other principles, but imagine how the workers felt who had been there all through the day since the beginning. Then those that came in late, five o'clock, four o'clock, and still worked and got the same amount when it was a little bit cooler, and they stood in a sense on the shoulders of those who worked all day.

These Johnny-come-late leaves got the same amount. You know, today we're going to see, and we are already seeing, God begin to add new people to His church.

Brand new people who've never been a part of anything in our past. You mentioned certain names from 30, 40 years ago, and a new person walking through our doors today had no connection to that individual or to that event. They're hearing the truth.

They're hearing the gospel, and they're responding to it.

And they're going to come through the door. They're going to be fellow laborers for the harvest.

How will you and I, who had borne the heat and the burden of the day, receive them?

How will we respond to them? Well, it should be with a welcoming hand. I'm sure it will be.

But we have to understand that they're being called to the same reward that we are. The kingdom of God. And they're coming in fresh and exciting, and hopefully that will rub off on us and encourage us to say, hey, this is right. This is true. God's still working.

And to re-double our efforts and to work along with them, rather than to let it have any unsettling event. But I want you to stop and think for a moment. It has been a number of years, more than two decades, since we who are together in the church here, in the United Church of God, and what heritage has brought us to this point. It has been more than two decades, since there's been any sizable and appreciable influx of brand new people into our fellowship in our midst. I want you to think about that for a minute. So, as you're shaking, you're nodding your head, you understand what I'm saying. You would have to go back to the late 1980s, into the earliest, early 1990s, to find another period of time when there was an appreciable an appreciable influx of new people. We had that late 80s in the aftermath of Mr. Armstrong's death.

During that period of time, there were a number of new people. Maybe even some of you came in at that period of time. But as we got into the early to mid-1990s, and with the issues that we had to deal with in the church at that time and forward, it kind of dried up. And now, we are beginning to preach the gospel more vigorously and to reach out. I expect that God will add, as the church stabilizes, and he will add growth to that, to a stable environment. But as we see that, we will have some challenges that we will have to deal with at that time.

Even more than just what is brought out here in this parable. I certainly don't expect any of us to have any resentment toward anybody coming into the church brand new. But there will be other challenges because they don't have—anyone coming to the church now will not have the background we do. As I said, names of the past will not mean anything. Experiences that we've been through will not mean anything. They'll still have the challenge of overcoming, dealing with sin, putting not sin, and living a godly life in a righteous—in an evil world. And because of the nature of our society today, there probably will be some—maybe a greater incidence of challenges that people will be seeking to come out of. And we will have to help them. We will have to be patient. We will have to work with them. And we will have to see the Spirit of God working in a mind to convert and to bring them to understand the truths of the Bible and to becoming a part of the work of God. We will have to be patient, and we will have to help them as fellow laborers in the vineyard. That could present its own set of challenges that I'm confident we will be up to. But we've gone through a long period of time without any sizable influx of new people, and that will have an impact. And, you know, for some of us, as we look at a parable like this, for many of us, we need to realize that none of us have any entitlement to anything spiritually before God and through His Church. This is God's Church. This is His work. And, you know, no matter how long we've been a part of it, in one sense, it's still God's. And we have to have the humility to recognize that. We don't get merit badges for every five years or ten years of service. Who's the young man that's getting the Eagle Scout award here? Mr. Joseph. Is he here today? He's not? Okay. Well, to get into becoming Eagle Scout, you've got to all have a whole band of merit badges across your chest to get to that level.

I know I didn't get there. I admire any young person anywhere who becomes an Eagle Scout. So I take my hat off to Mr. Joseph and pass along my congratulations to him.

Because you have to work at that. But, you know, my point is, we don't get merit badges for every ten years of service, necessarily. And in one sense, we have to kind of just start new all the time each year at the Passover service and keep working. There's no sense of entitlement.

We, you know, no matter how many years you've made the coffee, set up the chairs, led the songs, or whatever, you should, we just keep doing it. I mean, I'm not too, I'm not too proud to set up a chair. I'm not, you know, last week in New York City, snow was three inches on the front step.

Nobody else was there. I grabbed a broom and went out and swept the front step of the meeting hall. So the people coming in to walk through it. You do what you have to do in the church to make the, get the job done. And it doesn't matter what your title is, how long you've been doing it, or how long you've been around. We are, you know, we are all going to make it into the kingdom by the grace of God. It'll reward us according to our work. But we make it into the kingdom by God's grace. And anyone else who comes along, no matter at what time of the day, they will be a part and they will receive that same reward.

When I was young, my teenage years in the church, I think I was about 16 or 17, I remember just getting out of high school, there was an individual who came into our congregation in Missouri where I grew up. He was a brand new person. This would have been the late 60s.

He was the brother of our next-door neighbor. I remember how excited we were that, you know, we thought, well, maybe God's calling our next-door neighbor too. He wasn't, but he called her brother.

And he started to attend services, became baptized. Within a few months after being baptized, he came down with cancer. And within a year he was dead. He was a very fine man. I remember setting, you know, in his bedroom talk, visiting with him with my mother one time on an occasion. And he only attended church for a few months after being baptized. And then he died in the faith.

He's going to get the same reward that you and I who've slogged on all these decades.

He'll get the same reward of God's kingdom. You know, what he'll be doing as opposed to your eye. That's God's business. We'll find that out later. But he'll be there. I'm confident. But he was only in the church a short period of time. Lots of situations like that. And then there'll be people who will come in as times get tougher and respond to the message. And they will be in God's kingdom as well. This is God's church. It's not ours. And those of us who are born the heat of the day have to take heed and be aware that we've got to endure to the end.

That is a very key principle. Back in Matthew 24.

And it's all of that prophecy. After going through the seals, or beginning in verse 4 of deception and of war and earthquakes and famine and the tribulation of verse 9, you will be hated of all nations for my name's sake. Then many will be offended.

Verse 10, will betray one another and will hate one another.

More and more I realize that this is being directed to the church. He was talking here directly to his disciples and this message is to the church. And we've seen betrayal.

We've seen anger and hatred rise up.

He said many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.

And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.

But in verse 13, I want to focus on here for this sermon, that he who endures to the end shall be saved.

It is he who endures to the end that will be saved by the grace of God. We who are born the heat of the day are the ones who will be prone to growing weary and well-doing.

But as the parable tells us, the harvest and the work continues till the end of the age.

There's always work that has to be done. And as you get closer to the end of the harvest, there's more work that has to be done. Because sometimes there's setbacks or delays and weather and then you've got to get it all in before the seasons turn.

And so you've got to work longer hours. We've had certain delays. We've had certain setbacks. Satan has done his work. But the work has to go on. God will finish his work. We must love to work.

And so as God calls others who are still standing around, we who are born in the heat of the day must continue on and have with a love for the work that is to be done.

In Galatians 6, verse 7, Paul writes, Do not be deceived, God is not mocked, for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the spirit will the spirit reap everlasting life.

And so we have to be careful what we're sowing, what we're doing, how we're handling ourselves in life. And he says, Let us not grow weary in well-doing, or grow weary while doing, verse 9. Don't grow weary. There is, perennially, that tendency to grow weary.

And there, that will always be with us. This is why we have certain admonitions like this, to endure to the end. Don't grow weary while doing good.

But people, we're all prone to be worn down by the years in the church, living righteously, trials of life, the day in and day out, and then the internal issues that will always be a part of the church that tend to wear us down as well. Satan is working at all levels, multidimensional efforts to wear down the saints. And he is relentless in that.

And God promises us to help. He says, Don't grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart. Don't lose heart.

Don't let your heart get ripped out. Don't let your heart get jaded. Always let the truth of God be giving you fresh insights, renewing you. If not day by day, certainly season by season.

As we keep the holy days, as we go through the aspects of God's plan of salvation, as we gather each week on the Sabbath, don't let your heart get ripped apart.

Don't let it get worn down. As we age, as we take on disease, as our friends get sick, as challenges like that hit, continue to pray for God's healing, for God's grace to comfort and encourage all who do suffer that they may deal with it by His grace and learn and grow closer to God.

Regardless of the outcome. Never cease to pray for God's healing. Never cease to pray for God's grace to help us all deal with the trials that come upon us, whatever they may be.

So we might reap and do season and endure to the end and grow in knowledge and grace.

Because it's going to be critical that we are all there at the time when the landowner dishes out the wages and pays up. And that parable teaches us that God is faithful, just as that landowner was faithful. He said, I agree for the same amount with you that came in at the beginning of the day is for this person who's coming at the end of the day. I'll give you the same amount. I am fair.

I am a righteous judge. But we have to endure to the end to accommodate that.

As I've been thinking about this parable and lessons from it in light of the work that God is doing and allowing us to be a part of in His great work preaching the gospel, His kingdom of God's seminars, and seeing people respond. I mean, as I was telling you with what we had in New York last week to set in front of a group of about 70 people, and half of them are brand new. I wish every minister and every member could experience that every week. Hopefully by God's will, we will in time. But you see that people are intrigued. And they're coming from all walks of life and for all different reasons, but they're seeing a television program, they're reading a magazine, they're finding a message on the internet, and they hear about the kingdom of God in a seminar where it's going to be explained. And they come and they want to hear about it.

So those of us that are that rise to that challenge have a few minutes to explain some aspect of the kingdom of God. It doesn't get any better than that.

And you see God beginning to work. And we step back and it is an amazing wonder for us to be a part of at this time. And so we see God calling and we see people weighing whether or not to choose what they're going to do. As a scripture, one final scripture I wanted to turn to and just elaborate on out of this parable, and that's in Revelation 17. Because you remember at the end of the parable God, the landowner said, many are called but few are chosen. Always an intriguing verse concept. Couple it with Revelation 17 and verse 14.

In the midst of the political religious deception through the beast and the false prophet at this time of the end, described here in Revelation 17, and an upheaval among the nations, all generated by Satan. This great power and authority that is concentrated. It's one final effort that Satan makes through religious political entities to destroy the work of God, to thwart the work of the kingdom.

They give their power and authority to a beast. Verse 13. But the ultimate laser-like load that is shot is toward the lamb. Verse 7 and 14. These will make war with the lamb, Jesus Christ, and the lamb will overcome them. All of this gathering of forces that Satan maneuvers at this time of the end is to do one thing, and that is to make war with Jesus Christ. To war with the lamb, and the lamb will overcome them. For he is Lord of lords and King of kings.

And those who are with him are called chosen and faithful.

I hope we're with him at that point in time. But those who will be, according to the Scripture, are those who are called chosen and faithful.

Now, a calling can go out. The seed can be sown.

Those who are chosen, well, God always gives us, every individual has the right to choose.

We're free agents, free moral agents. We can choose to obey, we can choose to disobey, we can choose God's calling, we can reject that calling. God knows when a person may reject that calling. That's his judgment, his business, and his perfect judgment, not mine or yours.

But called and chosen, many are called, few are chosen. Where does that fit in? Well, you've been called, you chose, you choose to stay with God. You choose to stay a part of his church. I do, too. Are we chosen? Well, I think we are. Not only chosen by God to receive a calling, but then we have to make a decision. Then we have to be faithful, according to this verse. Those who are with him at this moment in time, who are at the end, are also faithful.

They endure the burden and the heat of the day. They are faithful to the end. They endure to the end.

And they are with the Lamb when he prevails. Food for thought. Something for us all to consider. How many will remain faithful? That's yet to be determined for every one of us.

But if we do, we've all been called to be a part of the work of God. We've all chosen to become a part of that and to follow where God leads. Let's take heart from this parable, that God will be gracious and he will reward those who are there all the way to the end. Let's not grow weary in well-doing, doing well. Let's be faithful laborers and workers in God's vineyard. Let's be true to our calling, firm in what we've chosen, and faithful to the end.