From: "Phil Rembleski" <PHIl@rescuechurchofchrist.org>

To: "1111RESCUEMEMBERS"

Cc:

Sent: Tue, Mar 12, 2024 at 6:11 AM

Subject: 3-12-24 THOUGHTS

3-12-24   THOUGHTS

A vineyard owner hired some workers at different hours of the day so that some worked longer than others.  In fact, a few only worked an hour.  We pick up the story at pay time.  Michael’s most recent sermon focused on our having a “good eye”.   Good was “loving and generous and compassionate.”   It was a positive view of life that saw potential in all.   In Matt 6, the good eye was focused on the things of the kingdom of heaven!   Matt 6:22-23   "The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light.  23  "But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!”  The teachings of Jesus always turned things upside down. It is so in the last verse of our reading.

Matt 20:8-16    "When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last group to the first.’ 9  "When those hired about the eleventh hour came, each one received a denarius. 10  "When those hired first came, they thought that they would receive more; but each of them also received a denarius. 11  "When they received it, they grumbled at the landowner, 12  saying, ‘These last men have worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden and the scorching heat of the day.’  13  "But he answered and said to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for a denarius? 14  ‘Take what is yours and go, but 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 what is my own?  Or is your eye envious because I am generous?’ 16  "So the last shall be first, and the first last."

My Prayer:
O God, may our eyes be clear with wisdom from above,  as we discern between good and evil.  May we be focused and centered as we seek You with power and all of our might. You have adopted us and placed us in the blood bought Church.  Help us to overcome the stories we have made up in our own minds about the Church, and seek Your view of the Saints in fellowship.  May we fellowship and commune and bear fruit in the Kingdom, building it up.  Bind us together in love, O God.  Give us light in our lives, O Father.  
In the name of our Savior,    Amen.