The Last Shall Be First

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The Last Shall Be First

Herb Montgomery | September 18, 2026

If you’d like to listen to this week’s article in podcast version click on the image below:

Our reading this week is from the gospel of Matthew:

“For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard. 

About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’

So they went.

“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’

“‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.

“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’

“When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’ 

“The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’ 

“But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’

“So the last will be first, and the first will be last.” (Matthew 20:1-16)

Jesus’ parable of the workers in the vineyard is traditionally read as a lesson about God’s grace. Those who come late receive the same reward as those who have worked all day. But the parable also raises profound questions about economic justice, human dignity, and the unequal distribution of resources. Jesus tells of a landowner who repeatedly goes into the marketplace to hire workers, some at dawn, others at nine, noon, three, and finally five in the afternoon. At the end of the day, everyone receives the same wage, and those who worked all day complain that those who worked only one hour have been treated as equals.

The crucial detail is that the workers hired later were not necessarily lazy. They had been standing in the marketplace because no one had hired them yet. Their inability to work was not a personal failure; it was the result of an economic system in which their ability to survive depended on someone else giving them an opportunity. For a day laborer, one unemployed day could mean an empty table for the family. So the landowner’s decision to pay them a full day’s wage provides more than mere generosity. It also provides the workers with economic dignity and ensures that their families will have what they need to live.

This parable challenges the idea that justice means giving people exactly what they have earned according to a narrow calculation of productivity. The workers who labored all day believe fairness requires them to receive more than those who worked less. But the landowner responds that they have received the wage they had agreed. His generosity to others doesn’t diminish what they have received. Their sense of injustice arises not because they have been deprived, but because someone else has been given an opportunity to live with dignity.

The story also challenges a deeply rooted social assumption that human worth can be measured by economic contribution. Modern societies often distinguish between the “deserving” and “undeserving,” rewarding people for their productivity while blaming those who cannot find work, cannot work, or have been excluded from economic opportunity in any way. Jesus’ parable turns that logic upside down.

The landowner asks the early workers, “Are you envious because I am generous?” Can justice be reduced to competition over scarce resources? If everyone has enough, must someone else have less?

The parable ultimately imagines an economy organized around human need rather than human competition. It suggests that justice is not simply about rewarding the strongest participants in an economic system but about ensuring that those who have been left standing in the marketplace are not left without bread.

“The last will be first, and the first will be last” is therefore more than a spiritual slogan. It is a challenge to systems that rank human beings according to their wealth, productivity, status, or privilege. Jesus presents a vision of community in which dignity is not earned by being the most productive person in the room but is something every person deserves.

On a related note, fairness is often described as giving everyone an equal opportunity to compete in our economic system. At first glance, this sounds fair: establish the same rules, open the same doors, and allow each person to succeed according to their ability, effort, and choices. But equal opportunity to compete is not the same thing as justice. A race can have the same starting line and still be profoundly unjust if some runners arrive already carrying burdens that others do not.

A society organized primarily around competition inevitably creates winners and losers. When everyone is told that the rules are fair simply because everyone has been given the same opportunity, that puts responsibility for success and failure almost entirely upon each individual. Those who succeed are celebrated as deserving, while those who struggle are often blamed for not trying hard enough. Yet people do not enter life with equal resources, equal health, equal education, equal safety, equal social connections, or equal freedom from discrimination. Treating unequal circumstances as though they were equal does not produce justice. It often disguises injustice.

In our parable this week, justice asks a different question: What does each person need in order to flourish?

This is not an argument for treating people unequally because some are more valuable than others but precisely the opposite. Every person possesses equal worth, and because they do, justice takes their particular needs seriously. Equality says, “Everyone gets the same.” Justice says, “Everyone matters enough to receive what they need.”

A child who comes to school hungry does not only need the same opportunity to learn as a child who has eaten breakfast. They also need food. A person without access to healthcare does not just need the same opportunity to purchase it as someone with abundant resources. They also need care. A community historically denied investment might finally be given the same invitation to compete for resources. But it may also require restoration and repair.

The vision of justice in our reading this week moves us away from being a society obsessed with winners and losers and toward becoming a community concerned with whether everyone has enough. We would not ask, “Who won?” but, “Who was left behind, and what do they need now?”

The gospel’s vision of justice repeatedly moves in this direction: justice isn’t merely the absence of discrimination at the starting line. It is also the active work of removing barriers, repairing harm, sharing resources, protecting the vulnerable, and creating conditions in which every person can flourish. True justice won’t simply make competition fairer. It challenges the assumption that human flourishing should be a competition at all.

Throughout history, human communities have experimented with economic arrangements that challenge the idea that justice requires everyone to receive the same amount or that everyone should simply compete for resources. Although few historical societies perfectly embodied the principle of “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need,” many developed economic practices in which people contributed what they could offer while community resources were distributed according to what members required.

Some of the earliest examples can be found in traditional communal societies. Many Indigenous communities organized significant portions of economic life around reciprocity, communal responsibility, and shared access to essential resources rather than individual accumulation. Hunting, fishing, farming, childcare, and other forms of labor were frequently understood as contributions to the wellbeing of the whole community. Those who were unable to contribute because of age, illness, or disability were not necessarily regarded as economic failures. Community survival depended upon caring for people through the different stages of life.

Early Christian communities also provide an important historical example. The book of Acts describes believers sharing their possessions and distributing resources so that people within the community received what they needed. The point was not that everyone possessed identical property but that material abundance was used to address material need. Wealth was understood relationally, and having more created an obligation toward those who had less.

Monastic communities later developed another form of economic commonality. Benedictine and other religious communities often held property communally, assigned work according to members’ abilities, and provided food, shelter, healthcare, and other necessities. Individual monks did not generally accumulate wealth as independent competitors. Their labor instead supported a shared life in which the community assumed responsibility for its members.

In the modern era, cooperative movements have offered another important example. Worker cooperatives, mutual-aid societies, and various forms of communal ownership have sought to organize economic life around shared responsibility rather than maximizing individual profit. Members contribute labor, skills, or resources while receiving benefits through collectively established arrangements.

The kibbutzim of Israel provide a particularly notable modern example. Many early kibbutzim practiced communal ownership, shared labor, and collective provision of housing, food, education, and other necessities. While these communities changed considerably over time, their early organization deliberately attempted to replace competitive individualism with economic solidarity.

We shouldn’t romanticize these examples. Each community experienced conflicts, inequalities, exclusions, and practical difficulties. Yet they demonstrate something important: the competitive market is not the only way human beings have organized economic life. Across history, communities have repeatedly recognized that people possess different abilities and also different needs.

Justice, therefore, can mean more than giving everyone an equal chance to compete. It can mean creating an economy in which people’s differing abilities, including whether they can work all day or not, contribute to the common good and the necessities of life are treated as responsibilities we share with one another.

Discussion Group Questions

1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s podcast episode with your discussion group.

2. How does our reading this week inform your own justice work, today? Share and discuss with your group.

3. What can you do this week, big or small, to continue setting in motion the work of shaping our world into a safe, compassionate, just home for everyone? 

Thanks for checking in with us, today.

I want to say a special thank you to all of our supporters out there. And if you would like to join them in supporting Renewed Heart Ministries’ work you can do so by going to renewedheartministries.com and clicking donate. 

My latest book Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political and Economic Teachings of the Gospels is available now on Amazon in paperback, Kindle and also on Audible in audio book format.

As always, you can find Renewed Heart Ministries each week on Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram and Meta’s Threads. If you haven’t done so already, please follow us on your chosen social media platforms for our daily posts. 

If you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.

Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.

I love each of you dearly,

I’ll see you next week.

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New Episode of The Social Jesus Podcast

A podcast where we talk about the intersection of faith and social justice and what a first century, prophet of the poor from Galilee might have to offer us today in our work of love, compassion and justice. 

This week:

Season 3 Episode 39: The Last Shall Be First

Matthew 20:1-16

Throughout history, human communities have experimented with economic arrangements that challenge the idea that justice requires everyone to receive the same amount or that everyone should simply compete for resources. Although few historical societies perfectly embodied the principle of “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need,” many developed economic practices in which people contributed what they could offer while community resources were distributed according to what members required. Our reading this week challenges the idea that justice means giving people exactly what they have earned according to a narrow calculation of productivity. It doesn’t ask who is deserving or undeserving. It’s asks, “Who got left behind? And what do they need to also thrive?”

Available on major podcast carriers and at:

https://the-social-jesus-podcast.simplecast.com/episodes/the-last-shall-be-first

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Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political & Economic Teachings of the Gospels.

 

by Herb Montgomery

Available now on Amazon!

In Finding Jesus, author Herb Montgomery delves into the profound and often overlooked political dimensions of the gospels. Through meticulous analysis of biblical texts, historical context, and social discourse, this thought-provoking book unveils the gospels’ socio-political, economic teachings as rooted in a profound concern for justice, compassion, and the well-being of the marginalized. The book navigates the intersections between faith and societal justice, presenting a compelling argument for a more socially engaged and transformative Christianity.

Finding Jesus is not just a scholarly exploration; it is a call to action. It challenges readers to reevaluate their understanding of Christianity’s role in public life and to consider how the radical teachings of the gospels can inspire a renewed commitment to justice, equality, and compassion. This book is a must-read for those seeking a deeper understanding of the social implications of Christian faith and a blueprint for building a more just and inclusive society.

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