The First Last the Last First

The first will be last and the last will be first. That is the paradox of God’s kingdom, which makes it like no other. It is a kingdom worth giving up everything for, yet all its wealth and glory is received by grace. It is a pearl of great price. On the other hand, it is often misunderstood by those whose values and ways come from another world. We, therefore, must abandon the ways of this world in other to find the other.

The qualification to all these blessings is “many who are first will be last; and the last, first” (19:30). This is the great reversal of all. It is not about who becomes the greatest, but how God looks upon the least, lost, and lowly. It is a paradox founded upon the graciousness of God. Jesus illustrates with this parable:

For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. When he had agreed with the laborers for a denarius for the day, he sent them into his vineyard. And he went out about the third hour and saw others standing idle in the market place; and to those he said, “You also go into the vineyard, and whatever is right I will give you.” And so they went. Again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did the same thing. And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing around; and he said to them, “Why have you been standing here idle all day long?” They said to him, “Because no one hired us.” He said to them, “You go into the vineyard too.” When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, “Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last group to the first.” When those hired about the eleventh hour came, each one received a denarius. When those hired first came, they thought that they would receive more; but each of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they grumbled at the landowner, saying, “These last men have worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden and the scorching heat of the day.” But he answered and said to one of them, “Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what is yours and go, but 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 what is my own? Or is your eye envious because I am generous?” (20:1-15)

In this parable, a landowner hires day laborers to work at 6 am, 9 am, 12 noon, 3 pm, and 5 pm. The twist of the story is all the works received the same pay for a day’s work—a single denarius. There’s nothing wrong with this per se, as any employer can negotiate the salary of an employee. Yet, one can say he was eccentric in the differences in what he paid each worker. The workers who spent the longest hours naturally felt miffed. Yet the landowner reminds them that this was the pay that each person agreed upon, and it was his prerogative to do whatever he wished with what he owned. To the landowner’s credit, the parable suggest the times were lean wherein unemployment was high, so rather than seeing able bodied men standing around unemployed, he decided to be gracious with his wealth, and gave them jobs.  

The point is to remember that in the many blessings of life in the kingdom of heaven, all things are ultimately by God’s mercy and grace. It is neither earned nor deserved. “So the last shall be first, and the first last.  (20:16).