Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 133
First Reading: Isaiah 55:6-9
Seek the LORD while he may be found,
call him while he is near.
Let the scoundrel forsake his way,
and the wicked his thoughts;
let him turn to the LORD for mercy;
to our God, who is generous in forgiving.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD.
As high as the heavens are above the earth,
so high are my ways above your ways
and my thoughts above your thoughts.
Responsorial Psalm: Ps 145:2-3, 8-9, 17-18
R. (18a) The Lord is near to all who call upon him.
Every day will I bless you,
and I will praise your name forever and ever.
Great is the LORD and highly to be praised;
his greatness is unsearchable.
R. The Lord is near to all who call upon him.
The LORD is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and of great kindness.
The LORD is good to all
and compassionate toward all his works.
R. The Lord is near to all who call upon him.
The LORD is just in all his ways
and holy in all his works.
The LORD is near to all who call upon him,
to all who call upon him in truth.
R. The Lord is near to all who call upon him.
Second Reading: Philippians 1:20c-24, 27a
Brothers and sisters:
Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death.
For to me life is Christ, and death is gain.
If I go on living in the flesh,
that means fruitful labor for me.
And I do not know which I shall choose.
I am caught between the two.
I long to depart this life and be with Christ,
for that is far better.
Yet that I remain in the flesh
is more necessary for your benefit.
Only, conduct yourselves in a way worthy of the gospel of Christ.
Alleluia: Cf. Acts 16:14b
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Open our hearts, O Lord,
to listen to the words of your Son.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel: Matthew 20:1-16a
Jesus told his disciples this parable:
“The kingdom of heaven is like a landowner
who went out at dawn to hire laborers for his vineyard.
After agreeing with them for the usual daily wage,
he sent them into his vineyard.
Going out about nine o’clock,
the landowner saw others standing idle in the marketplace,
and he said to them, ‘You too go into my vineyard,
and I will give you what is just.’
So they went off.
And he went out again around noon,
and around three o’clock, and did likewise.
Going out about five o’clock,
the landowner found others standing around, and said to them,
‘Why do you stand here idle all day?’
They answered, ‘Because no one has hired us.’
He said to them, ‘You too go into my vineyard.’
When it was evening the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman,
‘Summon the laborers and give them their pay,
beginning with the last and ending with the first.’
When those who had started about five o’clock came,
each received the usual daily wage.
So when the first came, they thought that they would receive more,
but each of them also got the usual wage.
And on receiving it they grumbled against the landowner, saying,
‘These last ones worked only one hour,
and you have made them equal to us,
who bore the day’s burden and the heat.’
He said to one of them in reply,
‘My friend, I am not cheating you.
Did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage?
Take what is yours and go.
What if I wish to give this last one the same as you?
Or am I not free to do as I wish with my own money?
Are you envious because I am generous?’
Thus, the last will be first, and the first will be last.”
Reflection
Today’s theme is about generosity and how the Lord shepherds His people out of the charity and mercy of the His heart. We are all called to be generous, merciful and compassionate like our Lord Jesus. The common understanding about generosity is the giving of money, material things or possessions to others who might have use for them. But let us not forget that with regard to generosity and for it to become perfect and holy, it must be able to bring Christ from the giver to the receiver. In all that we do and say, it must always be to share our Lord Jesus with others, especially to those who have not yet known him or those who have turned their backs on him. Without Jesus, every generous act becomes meaningless, common and routinary, and may even be suspicious and done only for some vested interest.
Therefore, for our acts of generosity, to be imbued with redeeming value and impact, have to be done with the end goal of bringing Jesus to others and it starts by making sure that He is present in the hearts and minds of the giver. A person who does not have Christ in him simply can’t bring our Lord to others based on the principle that you can’t give what you don’t have. Surely, Jesus can bring Himself to anyone who has an open heart to receive Him because He is God. But we are duty-bound to share Him with others through our participation in evangelizing the world because we are part of the one Body of Christ and we are all brothers and sisters in the faith.
Like love and mercy, generosity is what made it possible for each and every one of us to be born on this earth. There may be many reasons why God created us into existence but they boil down to generosity and mercy because our God is love personified and He chose to share His divine life with us.
First Reading
In the First Reading, we read this: “Seek the LORD while he may be found, call him while he is near” (Is 55:6).
This is not a case of God having a daily schedule and because of it, he is not always available. Remember, our God is Omnipresent. He is present all the time and anytime – past, present and future. This is also not a case of God playing hide and seek or God playing hard to get. In other words, God is always available to us like a loving Father is to his children who seek him for anything, so long as it is according to the wishes (commands) of the father. God’s wish is never for His sake, it is always for our sake. He will do everything to keep us in communion with Him and in fact, He has already kept His promise by giving us His very own life in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is who God is, a Father who gives His life for the sake of those who love Him.
God is and will always be with those who love him. Such is his generosity, mercy and compassion. But the moment sin gets into the picture and there is a decision to persist in a path of evil, He leaves the sinful man to his evil ways because He doesn’t impose Himself on anyone who turns his back on Him. Sin is turning away from God because it is against His will. He is a jealous God – it is either Him or not and He doesn’t play favorites. The verse “call him while he is near” means that we must constantly pray for guidance and strength to walk along the righteous path because the latter is never easy. In fact, the path to perdition becomes very easy once we set aside God from our lives. However, the instruction of our Lord is clear on this matter: “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and those who enter through it are many” (Matt 7:13).
The road to righteousness may be filled with difficulties because this unforgiving world is being governed by human standards instead of God’s. But fear not, for the Lord is generous to those who obey Him: “Do not fear: I am with you; do not be anxious: I am your God. I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my victorious right hand” (Isa 41:10).
God is the prize. To be with Him now and for all eternity is the highest manifestation of generosity and that is why Jesus became incarnate so that we’d all realize that our Lord is not only the fulfillment of the promise of salvation but He is also the gift of life to mankind. To live in God’s company forever is the realization of our salvation and the very reason why we were created and all these are rooted on the fact that He is indeed a generous Father.
In going back to the verse “call him while he is near” in this Sunday’s First Reading, let us be reminded of St. Paul’s warning about persistence in a life of sinfulness. He said: “…God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions” (Rom 1: 24-25).
Though St. Paul was talking about sins of lust which is attendant to the bigger sin of idolatry and the cultic rituals that follow, the Apostle to the Gentiles used this very revealing but cryptic phrase: “…God gave them up”, which basically connotes that there is that point in a life of persisting in sin that God abandons the sinner, and that is straight up the most scary thing in the world – when God abandons a sinner for persisting in sinfulness because the latter has indeed abandoned his covenant with God.
Every sin affects and impacts the Body of Christ – the Church. What is not very well known is that every sin also affects and impacts the body of the individual sinner which was intended to be offered holy and clean before our God. In fact, in the Second Reading, St. Paul said: “Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death” (Phil 1:20). Our minds and bodies have to be holy and were intended for holiness because we were created as vessels of the generosity and mercy of God. By being instruments of mercy and generosity, we help in making Christ known to the world and we help in building up the Church. In our acts of generosity and mercy, we magnify in our bodies our God who is generosity and mercy.
To round up our First & Second Reading reflection, let us take heed to Isaiah’s words: “Let the scoundrel forsake his way, and the wicked his thoughts; let him turn to the LORD for mercy; to our God, who is generous in forgiving” (Is 55:7).
There is no sin and no sinner, no matter how horrible the sin is, that is beyond the forgiveness of God because He is generous, merciful and slow to anger. And when St. Paul says that “Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death.”, he means that all of us have to be open and active to our Christian obligation of being vessels of God’s generosity, mercy and love because with this, we become witnesses to Christ’s resurrection and his Church.
In the era of the New Testament, our Lord’s invitation to “seek the LORD while he may be found, call him while he is near” (Is 55:6) could not be more true and real with Jesus’ real presence in the Eucharist. Christ, the God of the universe, and our Lord and Savior is present in each consecrated host distributed during communion and in the sacred hosts inside every monstrance exposed for adoration in all churches and adoration chapels all over the world. And, whenever two or more are gathered in Jesus’ name, He is there present with them. In the New Testament, God made Himself “more accessible” or “more available” to those we seek Him in love and obedience. There are no more excuses to refuse being closer to Jesus who is lord of all.
Gospel
“Thus, the last will be first, and the first will be last.”
In the story, the vineyard owner gives the same daily salary to all his workers, without regard to the hours that each individual spent working. Of course, the ones who worked longer complained to the owner as to why they were receiving the same salary considering that they worked longer than others.
The owner’s straightforward reply was: “Did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage? Take what is yours and go. What if I wish to give this last one the same as you? Or am I not free to do as I wish with my own money? Are you envious because I am generous?’”
First, the vineyard owner emphasizes that both parties agreed to a specific rate and he complied; he was not violating anything in the agreement. Second, the vineyard owner pointed out that if he wanted to be generous with his money, and give the same rate of salary to all who worked on that particular day without considering the hours of service, he should be free to do so and that is what he did.
Notice that it was, as a matter of fact, a story of a one-day or a one-time only contract for labor between the vineyard owner and the laborers. By day’s end, everybody gets paid the same wage. The “labor contract” in the story represents our Covenant with God our Father—it is a one-time contract which rewards us with everlasting life in heaven if we keep our side of the Covenant.
Thirdly and most importantly, the vineyard owner represents God our Father. The workers who came to work at different times of the day represent all of us who are duty-bound to spread the word of God. The salary is eternal life which cannot be equaled, quantified, divided and given in tranches and this explains why there is only one rate of salary. Only God can gift the reward of everlasting life and it goes only to those who love Him. In the end, it is either salvation or doom. But the Kingdom of Heaven is already here, truly alive in those who love and share Christ, in those who gather in the name of Jesus, and in the Eucharist.
Therefore, when the vineyard owner invited the workers to work in his vineyard, he was going to give them equal salary and it does not matter what time the workers were called to work. Salvation and everlasting life is offered to everyone—all the time, until the time when Jesus comes back to judge the living and the dead. There are no second prizes; there is only one prize and that is all that matters. Today’s Responsorial Psalm is so true: “The Lord is near to all who call upon him.”
Everybody is called to embrace God’s salvation and it does not matter who comes in first. What does matter is that those who want to be first in the Kingdom of God must think of themselves last and put others ahead of themselves. It is in thinking of others first before ourselves that we truly become generous and worthy of salvation.
A blessed Sunday to everyone.
– Gospel reflection by Kuya Rommel Cecilio of SLRP Bible Apostolate Ministry