It's Not About You!

Exodus 16:2-15

Matthew 20:1-16

Philippians 1:21-30

Everywhere you look these days you see the message, “It’s all about you!”.  It’s all about what YOU want, it’s all about your desires, and your interests.  I think this started way back in the day when Burger King advertised that they would make their Whopper burgers just the way you like it.  BK was the place where you could have it made your way.  As a kid I was completely sold on this idea because I didn’t like tomatoes and onions on my Whopper.  I learned that you could get your Whopper with cheese, hold the onions and hold the tomatoes.  I learned at an early age that, when it came to fast food, it was all about me.

Dr. Kenneth P. Landon, director of the Center for South and Southeast Asian Studies at American University, makes this autobiographical comment: I grew up in an era when it was still respectable to say, 'Lord, I believe. Help thou my unbelief.' Now it is more in style to say, 'Lord, I don't believe much. Help thou my use of cybernetics in determining my probabilities and options.’  All too often we discover ourselves placing our faith and trust in material things and human endeavors rather than in the God of all creation.  We may pray when it is convenient for us.  Most of us are more likely to skip more than anything else our prayer time and scripture reading on a given day when we feel pressured and stressed by our earthly responsibilities.  It’s all about you and me.

There was a group of people in the Bible who thought it was all about them.  Recall with me the story of Moses, Aaron and the Israelites escaping from slavery in Egypt and crossing the Red Sea with God’s mighty hand.  They have traveled for about a month now and have entered the wilderness of Sin.  There is nothing there for them to eat and they are hungry, so they complain to Moses and Aaron about the situation.  It’s all about them and their needs.  Don’t they remember?  Did they forget about God’s mighty deeds?  For they cry out they want to go back to their days as slaves in Egypt where they had plenty to eat and drink and were fairly comfortable besides the fact they were whipped, beaten and enslaved to do the Pharaoh’s bidding.  The Israelites are fickle.  They forgot what God has done for them.  They can’t see the big picture.  They are unable to look beyond their own selves and simply trust in God.  They only trust what they think they know and remember from “the Good Old Days”.  What the Israelites failed to see was that it’s not all about them, it’s about God.

Despite their whining and complaining, God meets their needs.  God is not stingy with his people, for God is a generous God, a giving God, and a gracious God.  God provides them with quail to eat and bread or manna from heaven to eat each morning. 

Our God is a sovereign God.  God is powerful, creative, and decisively-present in all creation.  God is the creator and master of the universe.  Who we are as creatures of the Most High God is freely given to us from God.  We are completely and utterly dependent on God for our abilities, our gifts, our every breath, and our entire lives.  And what God is testing and teaching the Israelites and us, too, is that the only reason we are alive and exist is because of the gracious, generous, loving hands of the one who brought them out of the land of Egypt from slavery to freedom.

Unless I’ve missed my guess, there is someone here today who is trying to do it all, trying to be all things to all people, striving for perfection and constantly falling short, and doing so all on their own.  Is there someone here today who thinks it’s all about them?  Is there someone here today who perhaps is looking for some help, some strength, some healing, some grace, some relief?

Our God is sovereign and generous.  He meets our needs not our greeds.  The laborers in the vineyard learned this the hard way, for they too lived their lives as though it were all about them.  Jesus tells our story in Matthew in an effort to describe to us what the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God is like.  The owner of a vineyard hired workers for his vineyard one day at five different times throughout the day.  He agreed to pay all of them the usual daily wage or “whatever is right”.  In those days the usual daily wage for a day laborer was a silver coin or a denarius.  A denarius was about enough to feed a large peasant family for one day.  So peasant families are completely dependent on wealthy landowners for work and wages to survive from day to day.  No matter how hard or long the laborers work, everyone is getting the same deal.

Now hold on a minute!  That’s not fair, is it?  Any lawyer will tell you this landowner is guilty of unlawful labor practices.  It’s not right to pay the same wage to someone who worked 12 hours as someone who worked only one.  It just doesn’t add up!  And the laborers who worked all day didn’t think so either, so they took up this issue with the landowner.  Did you catch what the laborers said?  Here it is again,

“These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.” 

Made them equal to us, they said.  What does this say about who God is?  We know God is sovereign and God is generous, but now we know that God is impartial and gracious.  Like God, the landowner chose to treat all the laborers equally.  He shows no impartiality and demonstrates what amazing grace is all about.  The Grace of God is always amazing.  It can’t be calculated or expected.  If it could, it wouldn’t be grace to begin with.  So in the eyes of God, through his loving and gracious and impartial eyes, God places each of us on equal footing.  It’s not about you, it’s not about me.  It’s about God.

The Apostle Paul expounded on this in his letter to the Philippians.  He says, “Live your life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that…I will know that you are standing firm in one spirit, striving side by side with one mind for the faith of the gospel…” 

In other words, because God has given us everything and blessed us beyond measure, our response requires that we move our focus off of ourselves and focus on God.  It’s not about you and it’s not about me.  It’s about God in Christ Jesus and showing the world what it’s all about.  Through countless joys and sorrows, we are to live together, striving side by side with one another with one mind, one focus, and one faith.

Whether we live or whether we die, we belong to God.  So it’s completely ridiculous to try to ignore God, to put God in a corner, to pretend he’s not even there.  We are absolutely, positively dependent upon God for everything.  The Israelites didn’t get it.  They didn’t understand.  One minute they’re praising God for delivering them from the Egyptian army and the next they are complaining against him.  They didn’t get it.  The laborers in the vineyard didn’t get it either.  The first shall be last and the last shall be first puts all of us on equal footing with God so we may experience God’s grace together.

It’s not about you.  It’s not about me.  It’s all about our sovereign, generous, impartial, gracious and risen Lord.  For it was the sovereign God of the universe, who created us and gives us life, who meets us at our point of greatest need, our sinful nature.  And God in his gracious and loving way, in an extreme effort to show us that it is not about us, that we can not save ourselves from sin, sent us his son Jesus so that we could know the truth of who God is and know who we are meant to be and be set free by it.  In John’s gospel, chapter 3 verse 17 it says, “God sent Jesus his son into the world not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.”  It is through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, not our own actions, not our own abilities, not our own intelligence, not our own efforts and not our own work, that we are saved from the bondage of sin and set free to live for Jesus Christ. 

You can’t save yourself on your own.  Ask anybody who has been saved from drowning.  Ask anyone who has ever been plucked up from a rooftop while flood waters surround them what it means to be saved from death and destruction.  Like the Israelites and the laborers, I had to learn this the hard way, too.  In high school I thought I was indestructible.  I thought I knew everything.  I thought that I made such great achievements in high school and college based on my own hard work and effort.  But through my 20s, through various personal life experiences, my parents’ divorce and my grandma’s death from cancer, I realized there is so much that is beyond my control.  And I’ve come to realize that it’s okay.  I’ve learned that there is more to life than what I can control, what I can get my hands on, direct and order.  I’ve learned that I need to let go, take my hands off the wheel sometimes, and let God do the driving, for God is the one in control.  God is the one driving this finely-tuned sports car.  I gave him the keys awhile ago and what a crazy, exhilarating, exciting ride it has been and continues to be.  It’s not about you.  It’s not about me.  It’s about God in Christ Jesus.

My friends, we need to allow God to be in control, to save us from ourselves and our sinful nature.  We must be able to push our pride aside and allow grace and forgiveness and love to fill our hearts, minds and souls.  My prayer for each of us and I believe its God’s prayer, too, is this: Live your life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.  Choose to put your ego aside, let Christ make a home in your heart, and let us work together, striving side by side with one mind in mission and service to one another and to a hurting world.  It’s not about you.  It’s about God in Christ Jesus, and He will not let you down or disappoint you.  Amen.