If I did the math correctly, I figure I flew on 16 different airplanes over the course of my last four months of this summer’s sabbatical. (Lots of trains, boats, buses and automobiles, too. And I know many of you travel quite a bit, but 16 planes is a lot, for me, in that short span of time.) And, do you know what one of the things is that has the potential to stress me out as much as almost anything else? Yeah…flying in an airplane. Specifically, waiting to get off of an airplane. (I’m talking about anxiety and stress, here. Not a fear of flying.)

It’s small and petty, inconsequential in the grand scheme of things and I’m aware of this, even as it’s happening. But it ranks right up there, for me, with stubbing a toe, or installing car seats (especially the ones with that little metal clip), or with the feeling I get when I open the door that leads from the garage into my house after someone has left the pantry door open – that sits just beyond it – in a way that stops me in my tracks with a sharp, loud bang. It’s an annoying, frustrating kind of design flaw in our kitchen that both doors can’t be opened at the same time. It’s especially maddening when I’m holding onto an armload of groceries for dear life.

Anyway, these things – the toe-stubbing, the car seat installing, and that god-forsaken door – small and petty and inconsequential as they are in the grand scheme of things, can make my blood pressure shoot up and my frustration peak, in an instant. And I think and feel and say very un-Christian things in those moments, if you know what I mean.

And the same thing happens more often than I’d like to admit almost every time I get off of an airplane. And it’s all because of those people who don’t wait their turn. Do you know what I’m talking about?

Common sense and common courtesy and a simple ability and willingness to pay attention should tell any traveler that the people at the front of the plane get off first; that row two follows row one; that row three follows row two, and so on; that you wait your turn; that you are patient; that everyone is anxious to be out of that floating metal tube no matter how long or short the flight has been.

But there always…always…always seems to be that person – those people – seated at the back of the plane in row 37 who think they need to…that they HAVE to…that they DESERVE TO…get up and muscle their way off of the plane before it’s their turn. And more than once this summer – because of my predilection for stress and frustration on airplanes in the first place, remember – I let these knuckleheads get the best of me. By that I mean, when my blood pressure shot up, as my ears started steaming, I thought some things that weren’t very Christ-like.

I even said some things… I even DID some things… on more than one occasion that weren’t very nice, or pastoral, let alone anything like what Jesus would do.

To one woman who barreled her way past me as I tried to stand, I said, with as much snark and sarcasm as I could muster, “Oh, you just go right on ahead.” She turned around, completely unaware of her transgression and simply, genuinely said “Thank you.” And after another long flight, I pretended not to notice the passenger or their suitcase that had snuck up beside me as I waited to stand up, and I kicked it (the suitcase, not the passenger), pretending to trip on it, hoping they might get the point. Jesus would be proud, don’t you think? What’s funny is, they just apologized and hurried on past, so that they ended up getting off the dang plane ahead of me anyway!

I didn’t think it at the time, but when I read our parable for this morning, I couldn’t help it: “The last will be first and the first will be last.” That’s the lesson we learn from those workers in the vineyard, right? Most of us have heard this story before. It’s a good one for Lutherans, because it paints such a clear-cut picture of what grace is supposed to look like in God’s kingdom.

No matter how much time you put in, or not… No matter how hard you work, or not… No matter what you think you or him or her or “they” deserve, or not… everyone gets the same pay, the same reward, the same forgiveness, the same seat at the table, the same fullness of God’s love. And, in fact, in some cases because of what some have done or left undone – the last, the least, the most prolific of sinners, I mean – their measure of grace and mercy and peace and reward is even greater than those you and I might believe have earned the blessings we all desire.

“The last will be first and the first will be last.”

And that may be hard to wrap our hearts and minds around, but we can’t deny the simplicity of it. The parable is clear, confounding as it may be. And we can smile and nod our way through it, familiar, at least, with that moral to the story: “The last will be first and the first will be last.”

What worries me though, to be honest, is that if I struggle to honor it when I’m getting off of the airplane, what will it look like when and where it really matters?

Can I stop keeping score enough to forgive others – or at least enough to suggest that God can forgive when I can’t manage it? (The last will be first and the first will be last.)

Can I stop protecting my own self-interests to let the refugees in? (The last will be first and the first will be last.)

Can I stop justifying and judging enough so that I don’t have to take sides in Ferguson, or Israel, or Palestine; in Egypt or Syria or Iraq? (The last will be first and the first will be last.)

Can I stop quantifying and qualifying and comparing sins in ways that would let others in and keep others out? (The last will be first and the first will be last.)

Again, I’m afraid – because of all the snark and sarcasm and luggage-kicking on airplanes – that I’m not equal to the task. My hope, though… Our hope – thanks be to Jesus – is that God is better at all of this than we can ever be.

This is not an excuse to leave it up to Jesus. This is not a cop-out that lets us keep on kicking and screaming and snarking our way through life as we know it – holding grudges or keeping score or laying low and letting God sort it out in the end.

This is an invitation to remember that we have all been – and will all be – allowed to pass, with full benefit of God’s grace and mercy and love, whether we earn it or deserve it or work for it, or not, in the end. And the truth of that calls us to let go of the hard work of judgment – all of that score-keeping is hard, destructive, life-stealing work. And God’s grace – like the Landowner in the parable – means to release us from the wear and tear and stress and destruction that it pours into our lives. (“Take what belongs to you and go. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am so generous?”)

Our invitation, then, is to let God’s love be God’s love and to start practicing that kind of love and generosity, here and now – on airplanes, at the grocery store, in our classrooms, at the kitchen table, around this altar – to reverse the order of things right where we live; to forgive the sin; to drop the scorecard; to make room for the other; and to get out of the way so that the last will be first, for a change, for a CHANGE, trusting that we are already and that we will all one day be right where we belong: in the arms of God’s amazing, abundant, all-consuming, all empowering, all-loving grace.

Stop by my house and you’re likely to hear a lot of apologies. You would hear us apologize for the dog hair on the floors. You would hear us apologize for toys being strewn about like shrapnel from an explosion. And if you watched us as we supervise our boys interactions, you’d likely hear this sequence of phrases:

“Stop that; we don’t take toys away from someone else. What do you say?”
“Sorry”
“OK, go tell your brother you are sorry.”

There’s a lot of apologizing that goes on in our house. On one level, the apologies are efforts at admitting fault, repairing the damage of past offenses, and re-establishing trust. But on another level, the apologies are merely the next step in an established pattern of behavior: step 1–rip the toy out of your brother’s hand; step 2-get caught doing it; step 3-apologize because mom or dad says so; step 4–repeat.

I can imagine either of my children saying to me, “How many times do I have to forgive my brother when he takes my toys?” It’s a question they are right to ask, because they know that despite the apologies, the behavior isn’t going to stop (at least anytime soon; but I don’t know, I’m an only child and I never had to share! At what age to siblings stop taking things from each other?).

“How many times should I forgive someone who sins against me?” asks Peter. “Seven times?”
“No, not seven times,” replies Jesus; “But seventy-seven times”

Notice, however, what is missing from Peter’s question. It’s rather remarkable; because what we typically assume Peter is asking is this: “How many times must I forgive someone who sins against me when they ask my forgiveness?”

That’s what we assume Peter is talking about, right? We assume he’s talking about forgiving people who are seeking forgiveness. But that’s not the question. The question is how many times to forgive someone regardless of whether they feel remorse or not.

So imagine it like this, “Lord, how many times should I forgive someone who has hurt me but refuses to admit he or she did anything wrong?” When you ask it like that, seven times seems incredibly generous. Jesus’ response of seventy-seven times just sounds ludicrous.

My wife and I tend to role our eyes when the boys apologize to each other in a way that clearly demonstrates the apology is less than whole-hearted; but perhaps the most profound thing that comes out of these encounters is the opportunity to practice forgiveness, regardless of whether the apology is sincere.

Because what are the alternatives? Sulking? Anger? Distrust? Self-righteousness? Waiting for the offender to suddenly realize the error of his ways? Dwelling on the infraction so that it becomes an emotional, spiritual, and physical barrier to your well-being? That sounds like torture; which might be what Jesus’ point was in that strange parable about the unforgiving servant – the servant who failed to translate his own forgiveness into a force of grace and ended up in agony.

“How many times should I forgive someone who has hurt me but refuses to admit he or she did anything wrong?” Well, that depends on how much forgiveness you have to share. Jesus seems to think you’ve received enough forgiveness to go and forgive others a ludicrous number of times. After all, what’s the alternative?

I am reminded of a man named Bruce Murakami, who one day received the terrible news that his wife and daughter had been killed in a car accident. The accident was caused by a young man named Justin Gutierrez, who was street-racing. A distraught, angry Murakami fought for justice and sought a conviction and long prison term for the young man.

Eventually, however, Bruce found that his desire for retribution was destroying himself. He realized that he needed to forgive Justin so that he and the remainder of his family could find healing.

Bruce received permission to meet Justin one-on-one, and this confrontation resulted in mercy in the courtroom.

At the end, Murakami and Justin, as part of his community service sentence, joined forces on the school lecture circuit to promote safe driving among young people. (The nonprofit organization Safe Teen Driver Inc. has a Web site at www.safeteendriver.org. )

In an interview, Bruce is quoted as saying, "If I hadn't forgiven him, I would have been the third victim of the tragedy.

"Early on I was deeply mired in my own grief. Later, I would actually practice saying out loud, 'I forgive you, Justin.' And that helped me to slowly take baby steps out of the darkness that I was in. On the day that we finally had our heart-to-heart, I put the theory of forgiveness into action. I knew in my heart I'd forgiven him."

There are a lot of incredible parts to this story, but what really strikes me as profound is that that Bruce began the process of forgiving Justin before he had any way of knowing whether Justin was at all sorry for what he had done. Before the two men met face-to-face, Bruce had already forgiven the man who killed his wife and daughter.

This forgiveness was so powerful and life-giving that it rescued Justin from a life behind bars and instead put him in front of crowds of young people so that he could encourage them to make safe driving decisions.

Restorative justice can be a beautiful thing. Second chances can be a beautiful thing. Forgiveness can be a beautiful thing.

May you know in your heart that you are completely, utterly, entirely forgiven. May you have the strength to accept this forgiveness. And may you be inspired to share that forgiveness with others, no matter how many times it takes.

Bruce Murakami quotes from Jim Heinrich, “Crossroads: A Story of Forgiveness” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, April 19, 2007

"Snarks on a Plane" – Matthew 20:1-16

"The Force of Forgiveness" – Matthew 18:21-35