A PENNY FOR YOUR THOUGHTS

In the parable of the workers, some were hired early and some later, but at the end of the day, they all received the same wages. So, it is with Jesus; He is the ‘Husbandman’ that pays the wages and the condition for payment is the same thing without regard for the duration of the work performed by the workers. Jesus explained Himself, “So the last shall be first, and the first last: for many be called, but few chosen” (Mat 20:16).

Paul wrote, “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom 6:23). Consider the penny in the parable a ‘gift.’

Jesus had said to the late arriving laborers, “Go you also into the vineyard, and whatsoever is right I will give you. And they went their way.” (Mat 20:4). For the first crew, Jesus had made a contract with them, “He had agreed with the labourers for a penny a day” (Mat 20:2).

Jesus saw men idle at the eleventh hour of the workday, He said, “Whatsoever is right, that shall you receive” (Mat 20:7). It was for Jesus to determine the wages for each of the crews without regard to the amount of time they worked. Each man got what was right, not in their eyes, but the eyes of the householder.

Compare that to salvation which comes at the end of the Day of the Lord. Zechariah the prophet saw it coming, “Behold, the day of the Lord comes, and your spoil shall be divided in the midst of you” (Zech 14:1). Malachi wrote about it coming as well, then there was silence for more than four-hundred years, “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord” (Mal 4:5).

In the Old Testament, the Day of the Lord was thought to be a terrible day (e.g., Amos 5:20). It is also written, “Hold your peace at the presence of the Lord God: for the day of the Lord is at hand: for the Lord hath prepared a sacrifice, he has bid his guests” (Zeph 1:7). The parable of the workers is a lesson about who He can invite to the Estate and their payment. For some, they will get their due and others get theirs by grace.

The ‘penny’ represents the reward at the end of the day. The householder paid all the workers the same at twelfth hour although some had worked all day and others one hour. The former group got what they contracted for, and the last group got whatever the master wanted to give to them; for them, it was not a contract but trusting the master would treat them fairly!

The Hebrews came first to the ‘Estate’ of God. God covenanted with them; their reward would be the land from the river to the sea; the same property that Palestinians still struggle with the Jews about.

On the Day of the Lord, the Jews will get their pay. It is God’s Estate and He contracted with Abraham about their payment thousands of years ago. Israel is what is left of their ‘penny’ after inflation, so to speak. That is because the Hebrews did not tend to the Garden as Adam’s kind were commanded to do. They were lazy and let the Philistines do what they contracted to do.

At the end of the day — the Day of the Lord — whatever hour that comes, the latecomers get the same pay. That is by the Covenant of Grace.

Jesus told the latecomers, “Whatsoever is right, that shall you receive” (Mat 20:7). There was no contract. They did not demand that they receive anything. They merely thought that the householder, Jesus, would be fair.

As it turned out with the late-arriving workers, Jesus was more than fair. He was generous with them. Note that the early-comers were paid their due, so why should they complain? They trusted the master to abide by the contract, and he did so. The same applies to the Abrahamic Contract for the Jews.

In the history of the world, Christians are the late-arriving workers. Coming late, they should be happy with whatever Jesus has in mind for them. Although not an official contract, as with Abraham, there was a settlement for not only the end of the day but the entire Estate at the end of the Age, to wit: “For by grace are you saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephes 2:8-9).

That was not really a Covenant but a promise. With Abraham, there would be grace because of the faith of Abraham, but by the time of Moses, the Covenant was made a contract by the Law of God, “I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be my people” (Lev 26:12).

The Mosaic Law was that His people would work until the end of the ‘day’ and they would receive their reward because it was due them. Their day would be longer, however. At the end of their ‘day’ 144,000 of them would be paid although they came to the ‘garden’ early (Rev 7:4). For those who fail to make it, it will be a terrible day and for those who do make it, a great day. Of all the Jews who ever existed without knowing their Messiah, none will make it. Add to those who were dead in the Messiah, only 144,000 more would have the grace of God.

Messianic Jews such as the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were ‘grandfathered’ in because they walked with God, or at least the righteous ones did. They were kept safe in Abraham’s bosom (Luke 16) until the Lord’s Day after which they will be saved in the Bosom of Jesus.

The ‘Great Day’ for the Jews will be when the first to come, finally get their pay promised by the Abrahamic contract.  The 144,000 since the Law was abridged will get their underserved reward by the grace of God for what they do not do! That is to refuse the mark of the Beast.

The prophet Joel wrote, “The Sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord come” (Joel 2:31). That day was for the Jews after that event. John saw that terrible day, “I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the Sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth” (Rev 6:12-13).

That surely will be the “terrible day of the Lord’ when many are destroyed, and true to form, Elijah did come before that time (at the transfiguration). However, even after Elijah had come and even after the crucifixion, the “great and notable day of the Lord,” had still not come (Acts 2:20). The great day and the terrible day were not on the same day. They were possibly millennia apart.

The terrible day of the Lord is described in the letter to Peter, “But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up” (2 Pet 3;10). That corresponds with John’s Revelation as well.

For the ones puffed up by the spirit of fornication, Paul wrote that he was, “To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the Spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus” (1 Cor 5:5). He would deliver the flesh to destruction, but the Spirit would be saved at the end of the day. When is that day? That implies that the old flesh is never saved but born again with an engendering by God above.

For those who came late to work, it was too late to do much work, but they will receive the same wage, “Be it known therefore unto you, that the salvation of God is sent unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it” (Acts 28:28). What shall the Gentiles do? Just hear it and ostensibly to understand what they hear.

Paul also confirmed the parable of the workers, “I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek” (Rom 1:16). The Jews so far have had to earn their wage, so they thought anyhow, except for the patriarchs. The Greek (Gentiles) are ‘grandfathered’ in, not because of what work they have done, but that a Christian is a Jew inwardly, to wit: “He is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God” (Rom 2:29).

A Jew has had someone do the work of circumcision at the beginning of the ‘day.’ For a Christian no work is performed; God Himself circumcises the heart. Again, Jesus has the right to do that because He is God!

Salvation is for those who endure to the end, both Jew and Gentile, as God is not a respecter of persons. The questions are to endure what and until when? The answer is the tribulations of the world, and the when is when the souls of the righteous are saved.

The salvation of the living souls occur when Jesus comes again, “The Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first” (1 Thes 4:16). It is the soul that gets saved; the flesh undergoes a change, “to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord” (1 Thes 4:17).

Thus, the Great (Noble) Day of the Lord is when Jesus comes from above to save the souls of the saints, both the living and the dead, without regard to time! Those who came last — the living — obtain their ‘pay’ without regard to their time following Jesus.

Neither the amount of work, nor the time involved, saves the otherwise damned. The end of the day is when the Lord really comes the second time… “at the coming of the Lord” (1 Thes 4:15) to save the saints that have endured to the end. The dead had to endure the world much longer than the living, but in the end, their rewards are the same. That sounds unfair, but it eliminates the competition — who worked harder and longer.

I remember when many of us built a new church building. It split, primarily because of who worked more and who paid more toward the building. Those who felt they were worth more wanted a special crown, and when it was not received, left the church.