Whetstone Opening Service

On Tuesday evening June 26, our Whetstone Conference 2007 opened with a preaching service. The preacher that night was Tony Payne, veteran missionary to South Africa. Preaching from the Parable of the Landowner in Matthew 20:1-16, Brother Payne revealed and corrected the basis on which man naturally tries to conduct his dealings with God.

The parable our Lord gave was in response to a question that Peter asked at the end of the previous chapter. The Lord had just dealt with a rich young man who came to Him asking Him what good thing the rich man could do to inherit eternal life. The man rejected the Lord’s counsel to forsake his idol (wealth) and follow Jesus. Choosing his riches rather than Christ, he went away sorrowful. Jesus then taught His disciples that “it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 19:23). Then Peter said to the Lord, “Behold, we have forsaken all, and followed thee; what shall we have therefore?” Peter was thinking in terms of merit, just like the rich man.

Christ acknowledged that His disciples would have a unique place in the kingdom, but he taught them this parable to correct the notion that they could deal with God on the basis of merit. God deals with us on the basis of grace. We are to respond to Him by trusting, not bargaining.

The parable builds on the practice of the landowner going to the marketplace and hiring a group of men for each day’s work. The first group bargained with the landowner for a denarius (translated “penny” in the KJV), the typical day’s wage for an ordinary worker. The landowner went to the marketplace three more times and each time hired more workers, including some who worked only the last hour of the day. The man told each of the later groups that they would receive what was right, and they went to the field without bargaining. Why did the landowner keep hiring more laborers, especially near the end of the day? Was he that desperate? He wasn’t the one desperate; it was the ones who had waited all day for someone to hire them. The landowner wasn’t desperate; he was generous.

At the end of the day all the workers each received a denarius. The ones who had worked all day grumbled at the landowner because he had made the last group equal to them. They thought they should’ve received more since they had borne the heaviest burden. The landowner reminded the first group that they got what they had bargained for and that he had done them no wrong. He also told them, “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?'’

Tony Payne brought out two important truths about God from the story of the landowner: God is absolutely sovereign, and He is always good and generous. We tend to think that God should bless our ministries with visible results because we have faithfully labored for so long with so little results, as though God owed us something. This is especially difficult for us when we see Him blessing others with the results we wanted to see. The temptation is to grumble. We think God is angry with us or that He loves the other more that He does us. The implication is that we think God is unfair.

But God is acting according to His own attributes. He is sovereign and can do whatever He pleases. He is also good in everything He does. If He uses us at all, that is grace. He doesn’t have to use us to get His work done. If He uses someone else in a greater, more public way than He does us, that doesn’t mean He cares more for that person or that He is necessarily displeased with us. He is good to relate to us in any way other than judgment because of our pervasive sinfulness.

Peter’s problem was that he wanted to be first. Jesus said that the last would be first, and the first last. In Luke 17 He told His disciples that when they had done all they were commanded, they were to consider themselves as “unprofitable servants.” We naturally want to think of ourselves as profitable and deserving of reward. When someone else gets what we think we deserve, that brings out the envy in us. And the Lord has to deal with that.

Brother Payne began his message by asking which group in the parable we identified with. We probably think of ourselves as belonging to the group that worked all day and should be blessed with much success. Since this was preached at a pastor’s conference, the message was geared mainly toward men in the ministry. But this has application to all God’s people. I know it hit me, and I’m not in the ministry. I must admit that at times I’ve felt jealous when God blessed others in ways that I was looking for. And the Lord dealt with me.

If we would have a closer walk with God, we must deal with Him on the terms He has set: grace rather than merit. God is both sovereign and good. He doesn’t owe us anything. He is right in all that He does. He can be righteous and “bless” some more than others. How many Spurgeons have there been in history? How many Hudson Taylors or G. Campbell Morgans? Our right response to God’s sovereign dealings in grace is faith. Unbelief will distance us from God, and He will deal with his own in correction.

Tony Payne’s theme that opening night was “A Closer Walk through Trusting God.” When the Lord crosses our purposes or seemingly blesses others more than us, do we trust that He is good and is doing right? Or do we complain and imply unworthy thoughts of Him. Brother Payne said that it took him fourteen years to learn this lesson. I admit I still struggle with it sometimes. How about you?

Whetstone Opening Service