Issue link: http://denverseminary.uberflip.com/i/583785
francescomoufotografo/iStock Do you ever talk to your Bible out loud? I do. Now, before you start sending me contact information for a good mental health professional, hear me out. Reading the Bible ought to be like a conversation. If we believe the Spirit of God speaks through the inspired text, why not speak back to Him? (I don't recommend this approach when you're reading the Bible on a plane or bus—although it might spark an interesting conversation with the person in the seat next to you!) Some stuff in Scripture just doesn't make sense to me. And it's when I encounter those passages that I typically talk to my Bible. For example, after the first time I read the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard in Matthew 20:1–16, I slammed my hand down on the table and said, "That's not fair!" (If you haven't read that passage lately, why don't you take a moment and do so now.) This parable begins with a common scene in first- century Palestine: A vineyard owner needed help gathering his harvest, so he went out at 6:00 a.m., when the workday started, and hired day laborers to get the job done. Many peasant families depended on this kind of work to survive, so the workers gathered each morning to wait for a landowner to hire them for the day. The vineyard owner in this parable agreed to pay the workers one denarius, the common wage for a twelve-hour workday. Evidently, the vineyard owner's harvest was so abundant that this first set of workers was not enough to get the job done. So he hired more of them at 9:00 a.m. He did the same at 12:00 p.m., 3:00 p.m., and 5:00 p.m., just one hour before the end of the workday. The vineyard owner promised the workers hired in these later three groups that he would pay them what was "right" or "just." No doubt the workers hired at 5:00 p.m. assumed they would get one-twelfth of a denarius since they would only work one hour of the twelve-hour workday. At the end of the day, the owner instructed his foreman on how to pay the workers. Those hired last would be paid first. Surprisingly, each worker in this group received an entire denarius! With the first-century equivalent of big dollar signs dancing before their eyes, the rest of the workers lined up expecting to receive a denarius for each hour worked. What a bonanza! Now, here's when you will need to talk to your Bible. In verse 10b we read, "But each one of [the workers who had worked twelve, nine, six, and three hours respectively] also received a denarius." Go ahead and say it out loud: "That's not fair!" That's exactly how those workers felt, too. And the landowner's explanation is far from satisfying. He reminded the workers that they had agreed to work twelve hours to earn a denarius, and that was exactly what they received. Their wage was just. If the vineyard owner wanted to pay the same wage to those who had worked fewer hours, he was within his rights. The fact that some received a higher wage than they deserved was nothing other than an act of generosity and grace. GRACE DOESN'T MAKE SENSE Grace violates our sense of justice. It disturbs our equilibrium. When we come face to face with the disruptive nature of God's grace, we feel like the rules have been changed. Over 35 years ago, I met Alina. She was a Polish university student majoring in English who had been recruited to translate a series of talks I was giving at youth camps in the mountains of southern Poland. For six weeks, five days a week, four hours a day, Alina translated messages about the gospel of Jesus Christ. She was very reserved, and we seldom interacted outside the framework of those talks. On the last day of my time in Poland, Alina and I joined the campers on a hike through the beautiful Tatra Mountains. At one point, she pulled me aside and, with an intensity in her face I had never seen before, blurted out, "Mark, I have a question for you." "Sure. What's up?" She pressed on: "If Adolph Hitler had believed in Jesus the moment before he died, would God have welcomed him into heaven?" "Yes," I answered instinctively. Quivering with anger, she growled, "I will never believe in a God like that." Those were the last words we ever exchanged. I later discovered that eight members of Alina's family had been murdered by the Nazis.