Logout
Lectionary for Sept. 20, 2026
17th Sunday after Pentecost
Jonah 3:10–4:11; Psalm 145:1-8;
Philippians 1:21-30; Matthew 20:1-16
We’ve been talking a lot about forgiveness recently. Good! I think that is a distinctive in following Jesus—we are always forgivers. There is to be no end to the times that we refuse revenge and payback. What’s more, we are to want God’s mercy and compassion for everyone, even our enemies. This week the lectionary readings present stories of God responding to humans who think God has been a little too gracious and forgiving.
The first story is from Jonah, and it is brutal. Context is essential for understanding what is going on here. Jonah was a prophet of Israelite greatness (even under wicked kings: 2 Kings 14:23-25). Nineveh became the capital of Assyria around 700 BCE, only after the destruction of the Northern Kingdom of Israel in 722. Sennacherib made Nineveh a great city using the looted treasure of Jonah’s home. Not only did the Assyrians wipe out the Northern Kingdom of Israel, but they laid siege to Jerusalem and burned many cities in the Southern Kingdom of Judah. You are supposed to know this before you read the book. The reader/hearer is assumed to be retroactively furious with the Ninevites alongside Jonah here.
After Jonah’s measly preaching job (speaking one day in a city that takes three days to cross), all the people, from the lowest to the king, repented in sackcloth and ashes. Then God repented of the evil that God and Jonah had said was going to happen (Jonah 3:10).
But Jonah wanted to watch the city burn. He made himself a shelter and got his popcorn to watch those who had destroyed his people meet the same fate. That’s exactly what didn’t happen. Instead, the 40 days that Nineveh had left came and went. Jonah was furious! “Why couldn’t I have stayed home, God? I knew you’re gracious and compassionate! [I’ve read Psalm 145!] I’d rather die than live in a world in which you are compassionate to my national enemies!” Jonah said.
God took Jonah’s offended sense of injustice seriously and decided to respond with an exercise in empathy. God sent a plant, a worm and a hot wind in turn to help Jonah recognize that life is precious, even if it’s the life of an enemy. Have we learned the point of Jonah? The big fish is the least interesting part of this book. Instead, the message is learning to want God’s forgiveness and grace for the people who burned your home and killed your family.
We need to shut evil eyes and view the world through compassion and grace.
Turning to the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus tells the parable of a generous vineyard owner who hired workers throughout the day. At the end of the day, the foreman paid everyone the same—those who had worked all day and those who had worked only one hour. The early hires balked! “How is this fair? We’ve been with you all day. They just arrived, and you have made them equal to us?”
The vineyard owner insisted that he paid them what they had agreed upon and that there was no cheating. Instead, the all-day workers had developed an evil eye toward their fellow workers who arrived later. They simply wanted to earn more than others. Or, perhaps more to the point, the early hires wanted the latecomers to earn less than they did.
These two stories are about evil eyes. The evil eye looks through a lens of jealousy and hatred. “That person did evil to me, so I want God to do evil to her, even if I’m not allowed to do it directly myself.” “I’ve been faithful to God and my community for so long, and that person has wrecked his own life and other lives besides. God can’t possibly love him as much as me.” “Hey! We 99 sheep have never run off. Why is there a party now for the one who went astray?” Grace and compassion aren’t fair—that’s explicitly the point. We don’t get to tell God who to love, because we don’t want our enemies to tell God that we shouldn’t be loved.
Look, God is going to be gracious and compassionate. That’s simply who God is. The work for us is to understand and come alongside God in offering that same mercy to our fellow humans. We need to shut evil eyes and view the world through compassion and grace.
