Matt 20:1-16
Why Stand Ye About Idle?
The title of the message comes out of \\#Matt 20:6\\. The Lord asked
a question in this parable that all Christians are going to have to
answer. When it comes to working for Jesus, why have we been idle?
Why aren’t we working?
This story we are reading is a parable. A parable is an earthly story
with a heavenly meaning. In order to understand a parable, we need to
know what the different elements mean. There are three elements in
this parable.
1. There is a vineyard
a. The vineyard is the lost world, the lost people..
b. God grows many things: crops, trees, animals, but while
He lets most things grow wild, God cultivates people!
2. There is a householder or a goodman of the house - There is
only One who really cares about the vineyard that God loves;
and that is God.
a. God is the householder.
b. I think specifically it would be Jesus the Christ.
3. Then there are the laborers - These are the people God calls
to care about the lost people.
a. In today’s economy, that would be the Christians!
b. Imagine that. This parable is over 2,000 years old, but
you and I are in it!
So the lost are in the vineyard while the saved are in the village.
This parable is about God attempting to get the "village people" into
the vineyard.
I. From this parable, the vineyard is the Lord's.
A. Remember that the vineyard represents the lost world, and God
is the One who is in charge.
B. This parable is telling us that God not only owns the saved.
He owns the lost too.
Eze 18:4 Behold, all souls are mine….
C. We can see some things about God and His ownership over the
lost.
1. God cares for the lost.
a. One of the main thoughts to this parable is that God
cares and wants a harvest of lost souls. That is what
the harvest of this parable is about!
b. This world may not care much for God, but God cares
much for this world.
c. For several years I worked as the nigh auditor for
three different hotels. Every hotel had a lost and
found. On a regular basis, things were found and
left at the desk—-sun glasses, flip flops, cell
phone chargers. Most of them are never claimed.
The items get tagged, bagged, and put into a box to
be held for 30 days and after thirty days—or whenever
someone took a notion to clean out the lost and
found—most of it ended up in the dumpster.
d. Not so with God. God has shown up and wants you back.
He is here today to lay claim to your soul, because
He cares for you.
2. And God has invested into this field.
a. Vineyards don’t just spring up. Someone must break
the ground, bring the water to it, cultivate the
earth, and work the fields.
b. Friend, you may be lost and you may stay lost, but God
is working hard for your soul!
(1) God has invested and labored for your soul.
(a) He sent His Son to die for you.
(b) He built churches and scattered them across
the world to preach to you.
(c) He called preachers to go from community-
to-community and door-to-door to tell you
about Jesus.
(d) He put friends and family in your life
to love you to Jesus.
(2) You may well go to hell, but I am here to tell
you that God is working in His vineyard.
II. From this parable, I see that God cares about the Christians.
A. Remember, the vineyard is the lost world but the laborers are
God’s pool of servants.
1. In this dispensation, that would be the Christians.
2. As much as the goodman cared about His vineyard, He spent
his time repeatedly going into the village to get the
Christians to do what they were supposed to be doing.
3. This is a picture of the church.
a. God does not go into the vineyard to do the work.
b. Instead, God deals with the Christians about going
into the fields to do the work.
B. Why does God do it this way?
1. First we need to remember, God does not need us.
a. God could harvest the field Himself.
b. If God can create all things with nothing but a word,
If God holds everything together with nothing but a
thought, if God knows everything that every being
does or thinks, He does not need us!
c. Why does He seek it then?
2. God seeks our help not for His benefit but for ours!
a. MAIN POINT - God does not give His best to those who
SIT for Him, but to those who SERVE Him.
b. God wants to give every one of us His best.
c. Look how many times the householder went back into the
city looking for workers! It wasn’t for Him. It was
for them!
3. God’s plan is for people to help people and them to be
rewarded for it!
a. You cannot beat God’s compensation plan.
b. He saves you, cleans you up, puts you into His family
(God is a Nepotist - He shows favoritism to His
family), then He puts you on His payroll, fills you
with His Holy Spirit, does all the work Himself, and
then pays handsomely for the nothing you did!
4. Consider this parable.
a. These villages were small.
b. All the workers needing work should have been in the
marketplace first thing that morning.
c. Why didn’t all these men get work the first time the
householder went? or the second? or even the third?
(1) The answer is they didn’t want the work.
(2) Maybe they wanted something easier.
(3) Maybe they were waiting to do as little as
possible.
(4) But by \\#6\\, the eleventh hour of the day and
the goodman’s fifth visit, I’m sure the goodman
has them figured out but he wanted to hear it
from their own mouths, "Why aren’t you working?"
(5) While they probably had many excuses the obvious
answer is that were just plain lazy.
5. But the householder was still willing to hire anyone who
would serve!
a. Why?
b. Because God knows something that He wants us to know:
God gives His best not to those who sit for Him but
to those who serve Him!
c. Too many Christians are working too hard not to have
God's best!.
III. From this parable, I see that the time of serving Jesus is
short.
A. In this parable, the work in question lasted but a day.
1. I know this is a parable.
2. I understand that the harvest on a farm last more than
a day.
3. But we should all likewise understand, the opportunity
to serve Jesus is limited.
B. The whole dispensation that we are in is considered but a
day in the Scriptures.
John 9:4 I must work the works of him that sent
me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no
man can work.
Romans 13:12 The night is far spent, the day is
at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of
darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.
C. The opportunity to serve Jesus is short by the most gracious
standard.
1. The opportunity is short because Jesus could come very
soon.
2. The opportunity is short because you die anytime.
3. The opportunity is short because this world is becoming
increasingly hostile to God.
IV. From this parable, I see that it is never too late to start
serving Jesus.
A. \\#Matthew 20:6\\ The householder was going out at the
ELEVENTH HOUR.
1. The Jewish clock started at 6 AM and the twelfth hour
would be 6 PM.
2. That eleventh hour would be about 5 PM.
3. Needless to say, that is pretty late to get started
working an outdoor job.
4. The point is, "It is never too late to start serving
Jesus."
B. I do not say this to get you to put off starting to serve
Jesus, but to impress upon you that you still have
opportunity to serve.
1. You are not too old.
2. You are not too dumb.
3. You are not too bashful.
4. You are not too inept.
5. You are not too late.
6. If you have life in your body, answer Jesus’ question,
"Why aren’t you working?"
V. From this parable, I see that God will reward you what is right.
A. This parable does not get preached too much.
1. In looking for notes and thoughts, I found very few.
2. Most don't understand why God, the goodman of the
vineyard, would reward the way this parable suggests.
3. To us, like to the characters in the parable, it is
unfair.
B. What we don’t understand is that you and I are never
rewarded…
1. …according to our labor.
2. …according to our accomplishments.
C. God rewards us on three things:
1. obedience
2. willingness
3. effort
D. That is why a person in a small vineyard can expect as large
a reward as a person in a large vineyard. That is why the
person who can only tote a small basket can expect as large
a reward as a person who can told a big basket.
E. Those eleventh hour workers may have been late in getting
started but when they got started, they were just as obedient
and willing as the early arrivals.
1. When I was first called to peach, I felt as though I
needed to get to work fast. I didn’t want to go to Bible
college. I didn’t want to be anyone’s associate. I
wanted to get at it. Thankfully, God used others to give
me some education and guidance, but it was against my
will. The reason I was so anxious to get to work was
that I feared the Lord would return before I got to do
anything for Jesus. I had a wise professor at college
who one day explained the truth that Jesus is revealing
here. It is not what you do. It is how obedient you
were and how willing you were that God sees. I may
pastor at Green Pond, but I am willing to anywhere and
do anything that God wants me to do. That means I can
get as big of a reward as anyone and everyone else.
2. By-the-way, you may not preach at all, but if you are
willing to go where ever God tells you and you do
whatever God tells you, your reward will be every bit as
big as mine.
3. You say, I don’t like God’s payment plan.
4. That is the reason for the parable. Jesus answers you in
it.
Matt 20:13 But he answered one of them, and
said, Friend, I do thee no wrong: didst not thou
agree with me for a penny?
14 Take that thine is, and go thy way: I will
give unto this last, even as unto thee.
15 Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with
mine own? Is thine eye evil, because I am good?
Here is the close.
If you are lost, God cares about you. He brought you here today to
save you. Would you surrender to Him today?
If you are a Christian, there is too much to be done and the time is
too short for us to be standing around idle. Let’s get busy in the
field for Jesus!
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