THE LAST SHALL BE FIRST AND THE FIRST LAST
[p. 225] THE LAST SHALL BE FIRST AND THE FIRST LAST
Matthew 19: 27 - 30; Matthew 20:1-16
It is a great thing to be rightly impressed with the One with whom we have to do, that is Christ. We often want to accommodate Him to our ideas of right and wrong, but He has His own thoughts and His own way of looking at things. He will not judge according to our thoughts, and we have to take that into account. We shall see this coming out in a remarkable way in this parable.
The parable is one of a series of four. You will find one in chapter 18, this one in chapter 20, another in chapter 22, and the last one in chapter 25. In the gospel of Luke you get a remarkable series of three parables, that is the creditor with two debtors, the good Samaritan, and the prodigal; and there is a great contrast between the character of these two sets of parables. The parables in Matthew to which I have referred are more or less on the ground of responsibility. The parables in Luke are on the ground of grace. The creditor forgave both debtors. The Samaritan had mercy on the man that fell among thieves; and the father expressed his own joy in the prodigal. Here, on the other hand, you get a succession of similitudes of the kingdom of heaven, and from the very fact of the kingdom of heaven being in view — things are taken up more on the footing of responsibility. In chapter 18 we get the order or rule of the kingdom. That is, that I have to act as I have been acted to on the part of God. Man’s idea is retaliation. If a man is struck, he will strike again, but the divine principle is to act as God has acted to me. If I have been forgiven ten thousand talents, I have to go out in the spirit of forgiveness. I have not to take my debtor by the throat, and say, “Pay me that thou owest”. The principle of [p. 226] responsibility comes into the parable, for the Lord adds, “So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses”. The man that owed ten thousand talents probably represented the Jew, and in visiting man, as God did in Christ, He forgave him the ten thousand talents; and yet the Jew was not affected by it, he went on the principle of legality and exaction to his own debtor, and hence he has to pay all his debt. God’s provisional dealings are all as was the case with the Jew when Christ was presented. If man does not answer to those dealings, there will be the same result in christendom. Christendom is enjoying enormous benefits at the present time through the gospel, but if it does not answer to the goodness of God it will come under the whole weight of its debt, the wrath of God. There is no doubt that such will be the end of christendom, but the present moment is one of great privilege. Even the material advance that has occurred in christendom has, to a very large extent, been the effect of the light of christianity coming into the world. But there will be a dark day, for undoubtedly the general spirit of christendom is not according to the grace in which God has been pleased to visit the world. That is the first parable.
Then the second parable shows the dispensation of the kingdom, I mean the way in which the Lord deals things out. Then in the third parable is the marriage supper, in which we see the king’s right of inspection. There again you get the thought of responsibility. There was a man which had not on a wedding garment. He had no right to come in to the supper without such a garment. Then you get the climax of these parables in the ten virgins, and that brings in the bridegroom. These four parables are peculiar, and you will do well to study them, for we have to face these things.
I think I have said enough to show that these four parables as similitudes of the kingdom of heaven all go on the ground of responsibility, just as the three [p. 227] in Luke go on the ground of grace. Both are true. You see our responsibility to continue in the light of grace, and when people get away from that light they fail in responsibility. Our responsibility is to continue in the faith and not to be moved away from the hope. As long as we continue in the faith we are in the light of grace.
Now as to this particular parable, there is just one word prefatory which I would like to say. Some people raise a difference between the kingdom of heaven and the kingdom of God. It is an interesting point because the distinction, and there is a distinction, what I might call a nice distinction, is important enough to be understood. I understand the kingdom of God to mean support. None of us can do without it. It is connected with the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God maintains in us the moral sway of God, and that furnishes moral support. The heart of man is a feeble vessel, and there is no heart but wants divine support down here. We are maintained here by the kingdom of God, which is righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.
The kingdom of heaven presents another thought, and the best illustration that I know of it is the sun in heaven, we all require the sun in order that we may walk down here. It is a difficult thing to find your path here if you have not light. We can walk very well on a bright moonlight night, but the light of the moon is only the light of the sun reflected; in a general way we walk in the day because we want the light of the sun so as not to mistake our way and stumble over this and that thing. And the value of the kingdom of heaven to us is that we walk now in the light of the day, in the light of that luminary which God has been pleased to establish in heaven. In Genesis God set a great light to rule the day. God has now set in heaven a great moral light so that man here may not walk in darkness, but may have direction and guidance in regard to his way. Everyone will understand to what I allude. God has set Christ in heaven, to be light down here upon earth, so [p. 228] that man may walk under the sway and in the light of that which God has been pleased to establish in heaven. If a christian does not walk in the light of Christ in heaven he will not do the right thing. People in the present day are trying to build something upon earth. Some will build up an institute, others a missionary society; all kinds of organisations are built up by people in the world. I think it to be a mistake because in the question of our service we ought to maintain the principle of individuality. We are not to combine to form some great institution. If a man has a gift to preach the gospel, he might go out with a fellow, for God may approve of two going together, but any man who goes out in the way of service has to go out on his individual responsibility, and has to walk in the light of the sun in heaven. He does not want to get his direction from institutes or missionary societies or churches or anything of that kind. It is contrary to the spirit of Scripture. An apostle went and did his own work without conferring with any one else. Paul did not confer with anybody. The same was true with Peter and John. They took their direction from heaven, each one for himself, and so it was with all the workers of whom we read in Scripture. Apollos did not confer with the apostles where he should go or what he should do. He took his direction from Christ. The same principle holds good at the present time, and where the appreciation of Christ is, as a great luminary in heaven, you will get real guidance as to your pathway down here. It is a great thing to be delivered from the combinations and organisations which men have formed and to understand one’s own responsibility as to service, and that is made effectual by light from Christ. There are many who seek to serve the Lord. They need not go and consult with other people what they should do or where they should go. I suppose there is not one here who is not capable of some kind of service, even if it be small and not of much account. You have to maintain the principle of individual [p. 229] responsibility. You stand or fall to the Lord. Take your guidance for service from the Lord. Let it be a matter between you and Him. There is a great light in heaven, and in that light a man has to walk down here.
Now I will tell you one first principle in regard to that, because I want to make the truth practical if I can. You will not get much light from heaven if you disregard that which belongs to Christ down here, and that is the church of God. The church is not to direct me in regard to service, but if we disregard that which Christ has built, and which is of extreme importance in the eye of Christ, we will not get very much light from the luminary in heaven; and the reason is this, not that there is not light for you, but you have a kind of scales over your eyes which prevent your seeing what is important in the eye of Christ. I pity people who are looking to some great organisation down here. That is not the church of God. Christ builds nothing that the eye of man can see; anything which the eye of man can take account of is not the building of Christ. You can only apprehend Christ’s building by the Spirit of God, and it is a great thing to have your eyes anointed with eye-salve so that you can apprehend Christ’s work down here. What He builds is inconsiderable in the world, but it is perceived by those who have spiritual intelligence. And if you apprehend what Christ is building and seek to walk in the light of the church, of what is according to Him, you will find yourself in very real light as to your individual pathway of service.
Now I come to our parable, verses 8 - 16. It is called out by what occurred in the latter part of the previous chapter. Peter began to say, “Behold, we have forsaken all, and followed thee; what shall we have therefore?” Jesus said unto them, “Verily I say unto you, that ye which have followed me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And every one that hath forsaken houses, or [p. 230] brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life. But many that are first shall be last; and the last shall be first”. The parable is brought in to emphasise what the Lord said, “many that are first shall be last; and the last shall be first”. That is, that in the dispensation of Christ in the vineyard, all man’s thoughts are overturned. The first in nature becomes the last in grace. And on the other hand, the last in nature may become the first in grace. Everything is reversed, for the whole footing is changed. Now I want to make this plain if I can. First you get those hired at the outset and they come under agreement. Of course I am speaking of the principle; it is a parable and you cannot construe a parable too literally; those who were hired at the outset represent a class of people who come in on the ground of agreement. It is a kind of bargain. They bargain to labour for a penny a day. I will tell you what I think that class represents, looking abroad in christendom. I look upon it as consisting of the official people who take up the work of the Lord as a profession and expect a certain consideration. I have no doubt if they are really godly they would expect to get fruit of their labour, and they enter in that way into bargain. They have taken up the service in that way, but they will find that though the Lord will be perfectly faithful to the bargain, it is not a ground which the Lord cares much about. There is plenty of it abroad. I have come across a good many of the official class who have taken up labour in that sense, and the Lord has never deceived them, they have got that they bargain for, but not much more.
But there is another class, what I may call a sort of worthless vagabonds, men good for nothing, who have never fitted in. A good many of us would belong to that class. There is nothing into which we can well fit. There are great and very respectable institutions in the world, bodies which have a place in the estimation of [p. 231] man and which God may have used, but one is such a poor thing that you cannot fit into any one of them. One is like a man that cannot find work. There have been and are people of that kind. Now the Lord tells such to go into the vineyard and they shall receive what is right. They never bargained for a penny, but they find themselves as well off as those who have borne the burden and heat of the day. The bargaining never came to much. I do not see that the official men are the men who are really being used in christendom. They do not get much more in the way of wages than the idlers who have gone into the vineyard on the bidding of the Lord and have trusted Him as to what He saw fit to give them. The reckoning time comes and they get their penny. The Lord will take up people of that description. He is not very fond of a bargain. He would rather have to do with people who come in as worthless as far as the great organisations of this world are concerned. Those who come in in that way come in trusting the lord of the vineyard, and they get their result. I have seen people who have made a good deal of sacrifice for the sake of the truth and have come into the vineyard, but I never saw that, in their thought, they gained good commensurate with the sacrifice. Who of us ever made a sacrifice at all? Suppose I have had to leave friends or kindred, I have made no sacrifice. It is deliverance. What we thought to be a sacrifice was God’s way of deliverance for us, and therefore the ground of bargaining is all a mistake. The Lord will not appreciate it. We have to take things up in an entirely different spirit, and where we think we have made sacrifices, there has been the Lord’s hand delivering us from entanglements that we might be free to labour in His vineyard. It is a great thing to understand what He appreciates. Peter was looking at things from man’s side, and you will blunder if you look at things from that side. The thing is to see things from Christ’s side, then you will see that everything is right. He will do right. He will certainly give [p. 232] all that He agreed to give, but He does not like agreement. Agreement is really legality. He likes you to take your place as worthless down here, fit for nothing in the world. If anybody asks me why I do not attach myself to this organisation or that, my answer must be I am not good enough. I am not good enough for the camp and that is why I have gone outside the camp. I do not feel that I can take any place religiously upon earth, I have forfeited all here. If other people think themselves good enough I do not object to it, but I am not good enough. The thing for us is to go outside the camp where you get the worthless people. Then you get the Lord on that ground, because He can have mercy on the worthless. You do not talk of what you have given up and forsaken, the sacrifices you have made. But on the other hand, you see the good hand of the Lord setting to work to deliver you from associations and entanglements which would have hindered you, so that you can work in the vineyard, and you find yourself as well off as those who have borne the burden and heat of the day. It is a great thing to understand the Lord’s way, to accept His dispensation. The way He deals with things will not accommodate itself to man’s thoughts, but it will always be right. He loves righteousness and hates lawlessness. But who of us is fit for anything here by nature? We are not fit for anything in the light of God. We are poor worthless things without light or power to guide ourselves, and had much better take the position of labour answering to the appeal of the Lord to go into the vineyard, on His word, ‘whatsoever is right that will I give to you’. That is the Lord’s way, the first shall be last and the last first. No one finds his true level morally in the world. We often see people of little character and moderate ability successful in the world, while men of ability and character make a failure in the world. But as soon as people come into the light of God and into the truth of the church, they find their level. The first are last and the [p. 233] last first, not naturally but spiritually. Who will be first? A person like Mary of Bethany; one who had a great appreciation of Christ. John is first, he had great affection for the Lord. Christ has rights and He has accomplished redemption. What have you accomplished? You have done nothing but add to the confusion in the world; that is all that you and I have done. We found a world of confusion and have added to it. Christ, on the other hand, has accomplished redemption, that out of lawlessness He might bring order. Do you want to be first in the economy of Christ? The way is to appreciate Christ, and if you do you will be content to carry out any labour with confidence in Christ. You will be content that He should give you what He sees fit.
Now that is the dispensation of the kingdom and we have to face it, and the sooner we face it the better. The sooner we give up all idea of sacrifice on our part the better. We had a part in the confusion of the world and it is no sacrifice to give that up.
May the Lord give you better understanding than I can attempt to help you to! It is a great thing to understand the principles of the kingdom, and when we do understand them we shall be prepared to admit that they are right.