Avi, May, Gao, and I recently returned from our roadtrip to Tennessee. Normally, food militant that I am, I don’t allow them to drink soda pop, but in my largesse I deemed our vacation a special occasion during which the rules could be bent. Accordingly, at our first restaurant stop, I ordered them all a soda pop. I waited to hear their expressions of delight, and even more so their expression of gratitude for my freewheeling beneficence, but I waited in vain. “Why does Avi have so much more ice than me? It’s not fair,” May began. I glanced at their glasses. That waitress must not have kids, I thought to myself, because Avi had tons of ice and May just a few melting pieces floating pathetically at the top of the glass. “Avi, share some of that ice with your sister,” I requested. “But that’s not fair,” protested. “On our last vacation when we were allowed to have soda, May had more ice than me, and you didn’t make her share it.” “But that’s still not fair to me this time,” May quasi- reasoned. Gao, a quick study, caught on to the dynamic in no time. “Why is my straw orange?” she complained. “Theirs are purple and pink. Why did I have to get the orange one?” “Well there you have it,” I pronounced. “May has little ice; Gao has an ugly straw color….Life has been, in different ways, equally unfair to both of you, so that’s fair.” At that point, they weren’t quite sure what I was talking about. I wasn’t even sure at that juncture what I was talking about, but it halted the momentum of the conversation. Before Avi had the chance to realize that she had gained the high ground over her sisters, a little girl walked by with her mother. As she passed by I heard her say, “Why do they get soda when I had to have apple juice. No fair.” The other mother and I exchanged knowing glances. Misery really does love company. Perhaps I am serving some kind of penance of just desserts, because I remember having like conversations with my parents when I was about their age. More likely though, it is probably safe to generalize that children have a keen sense of fairness, albeit one driven by self-interest. But I would submit that really they are little different from us adults. We too have a keen sense of fairness, ours too driven by self-interest. We just give expression to it in an adult manner, a manner more discrete and subtle. It is a measure of our character, I suppose, the extent to which our sense of fairness is not driven by self-interest. The poet Thomas Grey recognized something like this when he wrote, “Each to his suffering, all are men, condemned alike to grown -- the tender for another’s pain, the unfeeling for his own.” Yes, child or adult, self-interested or not, we all share a sense of fairness. The philosophers, naturally, have argued over where it comes from. As far as I can make out, they argue that it is either a posteriori, or subsequent to experience – something we learn from our environment; or a priori, prior to experience – something which preexists our environment. And of those who argue that it is a priori, they argue further over whether it derives from our nature or derives from that which transcends our nature. Being a Christian, I believe it’s the latter. But again, regardless where it comes from, we all share it. This accounts for the fact that Jesus’ parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard is one of his least popular parables. Quite frankly, it offends our sense of fairness. The owner of a vineyard went to the marketplace at first light to hire laborers for the day. He agreed to pay those he found there one denarius, a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work. At nine he returned to the marketplace and encountered more laborers waiting to be hired, so he hired them too, promising to pay them what was right. He returned again to the marketplace at noon, three and even at five, an hour before the workday ended. Each time he hired the laborers he encountered there. When the workday was over, he ordered his manager to pay the laborers in the reverse order in which they arrived. To those who had worked just an hour, he gave one denarius. They must have been overjoyed to have earned a day’s wage in an hour, but no less overjoyed than the laborers who had worked all day, for they having worked ten times longer were now entitled to nearly ten times that wage. But as it turned out each laborer, regardless of when he arrived, received just one denarius. So the laborers who had worked all day complained. “It’s not fair.” But the owner of the vineyard merely responded in effect that he was within his right. It was his money, and he could do what he wanted with it. The owner of the vineyard perhaps was within his right, but he wasn’t fair. I wonder what would have happened it I had taken that line with my sons, “It’s my money and I can do whatever I want with it.” I too would have been within my right, but I wouldn’t have been fair. Is Jesus teaching us that it’s this way with God? No wonder it’s an unpopular parable. But in fact, it is an unpopular parable because it is a misinterpreted parable. Everyone seems to miss one point, but it’s the key point. Jesus is teaching not about the marketplace but about the kingdom of heaven. “The kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers.” Jesus is teaching about the age that he would soon inaugurate by his Holy Spirit, roughly but certainly not perfectly manifested by his church. And what Jesus is teaching is that our sense of fairness in the marketplace, which he so very brilliantly evokes so that we may be en guarde against it, does not apply in the church. It doesn’t matter how late in God’s salvation history you join the church. When you join, you receive the same benefit. You receive the Holy Spirit – a spirit of unity and equality in him, a spirit that rejoices the more that are included, a spirit that is as generous and loving as he was. What is in fact unfair is when those who joined the church earlier in God’s salvation history lay claim to special benefits, even the right to exclude or subordinate latecomers. Yet despite Jesus’ teaching, this has happened from the beginning. The very first members of the church, the Jewish Christians, claimed special benefits and attempted to exclude then subordinate the gentile Christians. And it has happened ever since. Anywhere, within the church, you see one type or class of person laying claim to special benefits and excluding or subordinating another type or class of person, usually a type or class of person different from their own, then by one pretext or another, and insidiously, it’s usually an appeal to scripture, then this unfairness is likely funding it. And it’s ironic, because those who perpetrate this unfairness overlook that they are too latecomers to God’s salvation history, whatever type or class of person they are. We are all latecomers to God’s salvation history. Look at the date. Jesus is teaching that the church simply does not work the way of the marketplace, that we must be aware of this and adjust our perspective so the church will be more fair, thus more happy and harmonious. And if you think about it, there is another place this applies. It applies to our nation. Again, we are all, at least most of us, latecomers to America, latecomers to citizenship and participation in the American dream. Yet often we who have nothing more than two or three generations on others, again because they are a different class or type of people, lay claim to special benefits and attempt to exclude or subordinate them. American belongs equally to all who want to be citizens and to participate in the American dream, to everyone American can possibly accommodate. And when we become aware of this and adjust our perspective, we and the nation will be more fair, thus more happy and harmonious. Amen.