Gospel Reflection 2019/2020

25^TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

20 Sep 2020

[Matthew 20: 1-16]

“God, this is not fair!”

This Sunday’s Gospel reading comes as a rude surprise for many of us: the late comers receiving the same wage as the first comers. While the landowner is ‘technically correct’ that the first comers received what they have agreed for, still something is ‘wrong’ somewhere: this seems like a ‘great injustice’! Yes, God’s justice can be mind-boggling and incomprehensible. “The last will be first, and the first, last” is a direct contradiction to our commonly-known mantra, “the early bird catches the worm”!

We often feel that God ‘owes’ us a great reward for all the years that we have believed, for all the good that we have done, for all the prayers that we have said, for all the service that we have rendered, and for all the things that we have sacrificed. While God does promise abundant grace and blessings, we often forget that God’s offer of love, light, life and salvation is pure gift from Him who loves us. In all honesty, none of us has done anything worthy enough to deserve God’s gifts. Still we are tempted to feel we are ‘more worthy’ and that we have ‘earned enough’ from God, and thereby we can look down on those we think are less worthy.

“Why be envious because I am generous?”

While we are still clouded by the human ideals of deserving, Jesus is directing our focus to the uncalculating generosity of God. The gift of eternal life is the same for all. We are not more saved than the others.

Just like the parable of the Prodigal Son [Lk 15: 11-32], Jesus calls us to rejoice in God’s generosity, to be happy that even those whose repentance comes late in the day are received by the loving Father. If God is generous to others, we should rejoice too, for God has also been generous to us.

Let our fervent prayer be:

“Lord, thank you for Your generous love!”