"Written in large blood red letters, is one word: Forgiven" Septuagesima 2025

16. February 2025

Septuagesima

Matthew 20:1-16

But when the first came, they supposed that they would receive more; and they likewise received each a denarius. 11 And when they had received it, they complained against the landowner, 12 saying, ‘These last men have worked only one hour, and you made them equal to us who have borne the burden and the heat of the day.’ 13 But he answered one of them and said, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? 14 Take what is yours and go your way. I wish to give to this last man the same as to you. 15 Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with my own things? Or is your eye evil because I am good?’ (Mt 20:10–15).

This is the Word of the Lord that came to me, so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have life in His + Name. AMEN.

Jesus’ story about the vineyard and day laborers is a parable of grace and judgment. It’s about God’s grace, which works by raising the dead rather than rewarding those who deserve it. It’s also a parable about judgment, which falls hard on those who object to God’s indiscriminate gift-giving. 

According to Jesus’ gracious math, everyone receives the same pay at the end of the day. But there’s judgment for anyone who wants to argue with Him about what’s fair. So He asks: “Is your eye evil because I’m good?”

It’s the evil eye that does us in, not Jesus’ accounting. Our eye loves the darkness of its bookkeeper’s black ink. Our eye cannot stand the red ink of unsuccessful investments and debt. Our evil eye loves bookkeeping. But Jesus says that bookkeeping is the only punishable offense in heaven. 

So faith looks at Jesus because He calls himself the Book of Life. In that book, all the ink is erased from the ledger. There are no entries for what’s owed and what’s been paid. In the Book of Life, there are no outstanding debt entries. Only one word is written across the page in large, blood red letters: Forgiven. 

There is no minimum balance below which God’s grace is withheld from you. There is no black ink. The Lamb whose blood covers your debts has gone deaf, dumb, and blind on the cross to the whole topic of debt, allowances, math, investments, and who’s been paid and who’s still owed. 

And yes, Jesus says the last will be first, and the first will be last, but that’s so that he can make his point. Everyone of you is given an unlimited line of free credit. Everyone of you gets a full day’s pay before you even get out of bed. Nobody is kicked out of God’s good graces except those who insist on keeping accounts for God, demanding He let them mark up the Book of Life with uncollected debts that Jesus already paid off on the cross. 

If we could save ourselves by bookkeeping, we would have already saved ourselves a long time ago. If that were true, Moses, not Jesus, would have been our savior. The Ten Commandments and not the Cross would be our hope and peace. Debts paid instead of debts forgiven would be our way into the kingdom of heaven. But that didn’t work for Moses and won’t work for us. As the apostle Paul wrote: No one is righteous. Not even one. Jews and Gentiles alike are under the power of sin. 

God doesn’t do salvation by accounting. In the death of Jesus, He cancelled everyone’s debts and rewarded all of us, equally and fully, with a new creation in the resurrection of the dead. So judgment only falls on the people who insist on taking a stand on a debt God has already paid off. Only those who insist God owes them something end up losing everything. 

Our evil eye only sees the world in categories of reward and punishment. That’s how we’ve ended up with so many goats and so few sheep. We demand that God keep a record of goats and sheep when He’s already done that. It’s just that we don’t like the final count. We don’t like Jesus on the cross shedding blood that only covers goats because it turns out that that’s how He converts goats into sheep. And that’s why we must give up keeping count, because only the sore losers who insist on keeping non-existent records for God will feel his judgment fall hard on them. 

And one last thing, and it’s really the main point Jesus is making in his parable. We are fascinated by guilt. And yet, the New Testament isn’t about guilt at all. It’s about forgiveness. The Lamb of God has taken away the sin of the world. He hasn’t laid sins on us like a coat of tar. When we are baptized, we are fitted and dressed in a suit of forgiveness. That’s why we don’t celebrate our guilt every Sunday. Instead, we celebrate forgiveness of sin, which is why we confess the absolution in the Nicene Creed: we acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.

Notice what a remarkable statement that is: it proclaims that by the grace of God, we live all our lives in an irremovable suit of forgiveness. It tells us that every sin we ever commit will be committed inside that suit, and so every sin in our lives is forgiven before, during, and after our commission of it. We don’t need to get forgiveness. We need to hear from God’s preachers how to cheer up and enjoy the forgiveness of sin that we’ve had all along. That’s why the apostle Paul writes, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1)

And yes, there must be repentance, but even repentance is a time to celebrate. Repentance isn’t about bargaining with God to con Him into putting up with us. It’s not even turning from sin to faith. Instead, repentance is what happens when God sends His preachers to announce that all our works, bad as well as good, have been done in God. 

Jesus doesn’t run away from our sins or from the sins of anyone. He meets us in sin with His Word that takes hold of us, invades every pore of our being, and reawakens trust in him. We don’t have to feel guilty about sin. We don’t even have to overcome sin. It’s more than we could ever do anyway. Instead, we admit that, yes, we are sinners, and we need God’s amazing grace to cancel our debts. And Jesus pouring out his blood on the cross proves that He does just that. 

That’s Jesus’ parable of grace, where judgment only falls on those who insist on keeping a count of who deserves what at the end of the day. With Jesus, you never have to wonder if you’ve done enough to earn a day’s pay for a hard day’s work. You never have to wonder, “What do I deserve?” You never have to ask, “Will I get into heaven?” 

In Christ, your answer is always the same: You don’t have to measure up. Your debt has been paid in full by the blood of Jesus. Your name is written in the Book of Life, and over the black ink that spells out your name, written in large blood red letters, is one word: Forgiven. 

This is the Word of the Lord that came to me, so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have life in His + Name. AMEN.

Rev. Christopher R. Gillespie
St. John Ev. Lutheran Church & School - Sherman Center
Random Lake, Wisconsin