F.I. Reunion ‘08

  Amazed by God’s Gratuitous Generosity (Mt 20, 1 – 15)

In our spirituality, we understand the Spanish word “GRATUIDAD” as total, selfless generosity or service on the part of the giver whose only motive is for the good of the other, without expecting any recompense at all. And when we think of doing things for the good of the other, our way of thinking should be as much as possible along the line of the Gospel, and not the way our secular world sees it, like philanthropy.

In the gospel according to Matthew, the parable of the laborers of the “last hour” follows the encounter between Jesus and the rich young man: an honest, upright fellow who faithfully followed the Mosaic Law, the commandments of his fathers. He probably earned his wealth through honest, hard work, and so it was not just easy to follow, nor was it logical to do what Jesus told him: Give away your possessions to the poor if you want to follow me. As the end of the story tells us, the man went away sad.

Let us enter ourselves in the scene of the vineyard (Mt 20, 1 – 15). Since dawn, the first laborers toil; by nine o’clock, when the sun is rising higher, other men hired by the Master come to start working. And the hiring did not stop there. At noon another batch of workers comes, followed by another group at three o’clock and finally, the last workers arrive at five o’clock, when the afternoon sun is much less severe. How would the Master apply the principle of “just wage for just work”?

Imagine the incredulous faces of the disciples of Jesus upon learning the conclusion: the Master (alluding to God) offers no other justification for his action than: Am I not free to do what I wish with my own money? Are you envious because I am generous? (Mt 20, 15).

In settling complaints by the rabbis in the time of Jesus, when those of the first hour protested in receiving the same salary as those of the last hour, they would receive this reply: “In an hour, those men worked more than you did during the whole day.” Sounds very logical and reasonable, isn’t it?

Imagine yourself belonging to the group contracted by the Master at the last hour, and you received the same wage as the workers who spent the whole day working. Would you not come much earlier or arrive ahead of the rest on the following day, not to gain merit, but simply out of pure gratitude, because the Master’s goodness has caught you up in a “whoop” of gratitude?

Or would you be thinking along this line: “If I had been one of those who earned a whole day’s wage by working only one hour, I could arrive the following day at the latest possible time because my wage is assured and the Master is so good”…?

Or would you not even think the way the first-hour workers must have probably murmured: “Since this is what will happen tomorrow, I’d better come as late as possible… After all, everyone receives the same pay, regardless of how long or how well one works.”…?

The Word of God always tries to push us beyond the limits which we have imposed upon our ways of thinking and acting, and if we allow it to work in us, it overwhelms us with its “newness”: what for us is “reasonable”, he challenges with strange proposals that break through our narrow horizons and give us a glimpse of unheard of possibilities. The Word continually transforms our ideas about God in order to make them coincide with his, even though we find it difficult because we tend to think in terms of practical judgment or reason and logic.

Just like the clumsy and resisting disciples who had a hard time adjusting to the novelty of this God, and the laborers who experienced what absolute gratuity is, we will need much time and patient insistence to get rid of our old ideas about the God which we have in our imagination and to be able to accept that God is always far beyond what we think about him.