This week BibleWorm reads Matthew 20:1–16, often called the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard, in which the kingdom of heaven is said to be like a landowner who pays the laborers a full day’s wage no matter how long they’ve worked. We wrestle with the abject unfairness of this wage system and empathize with the workers who have labored a long day in the hot sun. Yet we also marvel at the generosity of the vineyard owner, who gives everyone what they need for the day no matter how much work they’ve done. Maybe, we think, in the kingdom of heaven people are not rewarded for the labor they provide but rather receive what they need to live a full and abundant life. If we read ourselves as the landowners, this becomes a lesson on how we should conduct our own economic practices, not only paying fair wages but giving generously until everyone has enough. And if we read God as the landowner, then this becomes a parable about God’s radical and endless generosity that welcomes more and more people into the kingdom and treats us all as people of dignity and worth.
Episode 522 Healing Interrupted (Mark 5:21-43)
Episode 521 Making the Demons Tremble (Mark 5:1-20)
Episode 520 The Parables of Jesus (Mark 4:1-34)
Episode 519 Their Faith Has Made You Well (Mark 2:1-22)
Episode 518 Following the Call (Mark 1:1-20)
Episode 517 The Christmas Story (Luke 2:1-20) SPECIAL EPISODE
Episode 516 The Birth of John the Baptist (Luke 1:5-25 & 57-80)
Episode 515 Rebuilding from the Ruins (Ezra 1:1-4 and 3:1-13)
Episode 514 Comfort, O Comfort My People (Isaiah 40:1-11)
Episode 513 Hope Against Hope (Jeremiah 33:1-18)
Episode 512 Finding the Torah (2 Kings 22:1-20 and 23:1-3)
Episode 511 The Song of the Vineyard and the Stump of Jesse (Isaiah 5:1-7 and 11:1-9)
Episode 510 God as Parent (Hosea 11:1-9)
Episode 509 Elijah and the Prophets of Baal (1 Kings 18:17-39)
Episode 508 The Division of the Kingdom (1 Kings 12:1-17, 25-29)
Episode 507 Praising the Lord (2 Samuel 5:1-5, 6:1-15, and Psalm 150)
Episode 506 Where You Go I Will Go (Ruth 1:1-17 and 4:13-16)
Episode 505 Listen, O Israel! (Deuteronomy 5:1-21& 6:4-9)
Episode 504 Responding to the Call (Exodus 1:8-2:10 and 3:1-15)
Episode 503 Jacob Wrestles with God (Genesis 32:9-13 & 22-30)
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