Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - What Are You Entitled To? | New Testament | Matthew 20

Episode Date: January 27, 2023

Do you always get what you deserve? What do you feel like you're entitled to? Is entitlement a generational issue? In today's episode, Patrick uses Matthew 20 to discuss how entitlement plagues all people. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Join the TMBT community in reading the entire New Testament in 2023. Get your FREE reading plan here. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it with others, so others can find it too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter@TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Matthew 20

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Patrick Miller. Normally, if you go to a holiday meal, you bring some food with you to share. At least in the Midwest, you do that. But I recently read a story about an aunt who came to every family holiday meal with empty Tupperware. Don't worry. She wasn't trying to offer everyone imaginary food.

Quite the opposite. At the end of every meal, she'd pull out her Tupperware and take significant amounts of leftovers from the host and everyone else who brought food. She never really asked to do it. She just did it. She pulled out the plastic and went to town while everybody else was cleaning up. Now, there are much worse things to do in the world, but this aunt clearly felt entitled. She felt entitled to show up without having done any work, to leave before doing any cleaning, and to leave with enough food for days to boot. She never said thank you. It was just a given. chances are that you're not that extreme.

But let's be honest, we all feel we are entitled to some things, even if we never say it out loud. If a friend gets a raise, we feel entitled to get a raise too. If you go to college, you feel entitled to have someone else pay for your education. If you go to a store, you feel entitled to have everything you want in stock always. Kids feel entitled to treats after dinner. Maybe you feel entitled to respect and deference. of the people who are lower on the org chart than you are. Entitlement isn't a generational issue.

It's a human issue. And when it comes to God, we're really no different. I've seen people lose their faith or backpedal in their faith for the simple reason that God didn't give them the job or spouse or bank account or house or child or friendships or reputation or fame that they wanted. Why do we all struggle with entitlement? Well, I think for most Americans, it's because we work in a market economy. We get what we pay for, whether that's stuff or the people we pay to do work for us.

We have a sense that everything costs something, and that's something better deliver. But is that how grace works? Is that how the economics of the kingdom of God function? Is the kingdom of God an entitlement program? Jesus tells an amazing story in Matthew 20. Let's pick up in verse 1. 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.

That was a day's wage. 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 other workers 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.

And 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 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 to the first. The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. That's a full day's wage. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive a lot 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 in 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 paying 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'm generous? so the last will be first and the first will be last. How do you feel when you hear this story? To be honest, I can't escape a twinge of injustice. It's not fair. The landowner should have paid the people who worked more,

way more than the people who worked little. But that's not how we should feel. We should feel relief. Why? Because the truth is that if we got what we deserved from God, it wouldn't be pretty. We deserve his justice, unjust anger, not payment for services due.

We are entitled to nothing. And yet he gives to all of us anyway. He doesn't just give us any gift. He gives us the gift of his son. If you approach God like an entitlement vending machine, you'll destroy your relationship with him. God's not transactional. You're entitled to nothing.

But if you approach him as a wise and generous giver of exactly what you need, then you'll draw near to him. You'll have no need to compare what you get to what other people get because you'll trust that God has given you exactly what's best for your life. Ironically, this makes us less entitled in general. If we know that God's got us covered, we don't have to worry about what other people get or what we want. He's got everything you need. Today, I want you to pray and thank God for the undeserved gift of his son. I want you to confess the ways you've been entitled toward God and toward others. I want you to ask for the gift of thankfulness and give thanks for

everything that you have. Before you forget, sign up for the 10-minute Bible Talks newsletter. Hit the link in the show notes and you'll get an email every Wednesday that's going to help you beat that midweek slump and go deeper in your walk with Jesus. Thanks for listening.