Work ethics, socialism, capitalism and Jesus.

This subject was inspired because I was pondering on a biblical parable. It seems most of my life's "truth" has been grown and garnered from the pages of the Holy Bible.

I was thinking about the parable where Jesus taught of a wise merchant that had three workers. One worker in the morning, one worker at midday/noon and one worker arrived late in the afternoon who he employed also.

Each of these workers the merchant ultimately paid the same amount. One might argue that by the merchant paying them the same amount he was endorsing some communistic ideal…

Yet when we delve deeper into the logic it seems contrary.

The merchant chose the price he was willing to pay each person. If the person agreed he would hire them.

The merchant was free to make what ever agreement he wanted. He did not have to stick to a certain price for each worker but he was free to do is if he chose to. His stipulation was that the worker agree upon the deal.

When we go to God for justification we all have different needs that vary in degrees of longevity of sin but we still receive the same salvation.

So lets examine this a bit more.

First from the merchants view. The merchant only wants his work completed. His concern is not whether if some are given an easy task in life or an arduous long day/life of serving. He is concerned that all are paid in full and let to go on their way to the next day of service. For the next day. The two workers who toiled nearly all day they both showed up in the afternoon expecting to be paid as the worker before them and the merchants ship had already sailed…(speculation)

Our choices is not that we work but that we keep our eye on with the merchant. That we watch the merchant and that we know the merchants will and favor.

The merchant will give a price and we can barter until we either agree with the merchant or we disagree. If we disagree with the merchant we can either look for another source of employment or go without.

Here is where workers unions come in. The merchant ultimately has only so much gold to work with. He has to pay for his merchandise and make enough of a profit to go back home and stare at his spouse in the face and say it was all worth it.
So the merchant employed a sliding scale. He says, if I find a person who will work all day for a little, then it ensures the work. At noon I will have enough to pay a noon time worker a more generously. Now these two men will be tired by mid afternoon and not of much use anymore hence the third worker. This worker has probably not toiled all day and been fed and is fit to resume the merchants labor until the merchant is ready to make his journey back to the market.

Thus in essence the merchant is paying each worker a different wage. Some are making a sacrifice.

Yet the underlying message is THE AGREEMENT we all make with the merchant be it morning noon or in the afternoon of life we all are needed by the merchant.

Consider this. Had the merchant paid the morning person allot and the afternoon person a little less then by the time afternoon rolled around the merchant would have only had a small amount of money to barter with for the third employee…

The afternoon worker could have refused the money offered and left the merchant in financial ruin.

Worker ethics.

We are all raised in a society where the boss decides what he is willing to pay. He decides if he wants to pay more than the minimum. Yes we have a minimum wage but beyond that, if the boss has a deadline he can bring in other teams and specialists to finish the project. These people he may pay much more than the initial team that began the project.

The ideal that all people are entitled to the same treatment in every situation and that we are somehow unsocial if wealth is not distributed equally across the board is not at least fundamentally biblical according to this parable.

In this case one man was receiving much more money for much less time than his counterpart worker.

Is this not a violation of the communistic ideal? Isn't communism argued to have come out of the Bible by some?

The same can be considered for different levels of health care.

With capitalistic health care some, some remain on oxygen and life support all day while some only come in in the afternoon and need a tongue depressor and to say ahhh!

The world consumes the cost and labor of the doctors in a good portion of those cases. And yes it is usually the ones who work all day who pay.

Jesus spoke of rich men and camels yet this afternoon worker made out like a bandit that day for some reason. What would have prompted Jesus to illuminate a story of what seems like wage inequality in the world, though also this story seems to highlight the honor of a pledge.

What was a worse infraction? The merchant paying them on the sliding scale or them breaking their pledge in mid afternoon?

I comes down to the merchant's insurance of a days work and a pledge.

So when the worker can expect a certain amount of money for everything they do then there is no incentive to stay.

Did the merchant pay the morning worker too little or the afternoon worker too much? Well it did not seem that way when they all agreed upon the price.

Was the price within the merchant's budget?

My observation is that had this been a communist system hence each person would have gotten the same amount for the same hourly wage.

In a society where we have no choice in what we agree upon but the wage is decided then people sometimes have no incentive to stay and work. So a good market is one that has a sliding scale and allows for a lower class worker, a middle class more educated worker, and an upper class specialist.

We don't all pop out of the womb as Einstein… Some people are high achievers and some are not. Yet we all deserve a job that pays respectively.

Possibly the morning person showed up needing to bathe and eat breakfast this may have been at the merchants expense. The noon person may have also needed to eat and receive refreshments. The afternoon person may have needed nothing and was ready to commence work immediately. The afternoon person may have been skilled in mapping a safe shipping/travel route and may have known how to say tie up the carts and care for the animals.

This all seems to be a parable that illuminates the virtues of a sliding scale. A scale that is geared toward the work ethics of a pledge and skilled workers being on hand at the time needed. All to make a tripe like this worthwhile for the merchant and his crew.

Perhaps the more skilled workers only showed up in the afternoon? Perhaps the poorer people showed up in the morning like many do at the urban city shelter work programs. Perhaps the merchant was fairly poor too?

For we are bought and paid for with a high price.

This price would not have been so high had our sins not been so egregious.

Will there be low class people in heaven? Not that anyone will ever be able to notice.

Yet we will all be there by grace and not of our works.

We can take this story in light that God always pay us the same amount for God pays us in our life by salvation and rescuing our souls from damnation.

So it is always the same amount God has to pay out. God pays out wholeness…

God repairs what is broken and gives hope. Yet those who have had to toil all day in trying to forget their own tribulations can they pass judgment on those who have only had to confess their few small infractions and receive the same salvation and position in the church (position in society)?

Are we judged by our scars or by the lack thereof?

It is more to recognize that God meets us on our level wherever we are at and offers us new life. When we are scarred, broken and bruised and even when our scars are not as evident.

Often when we are scarred by the adversary it only informs us that evil is real. So for one to find God in pure faith without having to know evil is even of more value to God.

Regardless we are still paid the same amount. Who is to say which is better. In the end God will be all in all to all things.

I think it is better to look at life with the understanding the different people and matters need different approaches.

To pay the morning people more may jeopardize the ability to attract the right skill and expertise in the afternoon to make the journey a success. If the venture is not a success all around and the books do not balance the merchant may not come again and there will be not money to be made at all next time.

Now feed your family on that!