Bible Commentaries
Matthew 20

Verses 1-34

1 Many of the explanations of this parable ignore the fact that it illustrates the kingdom of the heavens, and not at all intended to be applied to our service for God. If so applied, it can hardly encourage aught but idleness in the hope that a little labor at the end of life will bring an equal, if not greater, reward than a long career suffering service. The vineyard is Israel. Those who agree for a denarius a day were under law and got what was their due. The others were recipients of various degrees of grace. The third hour workers were under promise. Though they made no contract, yet they received more than they had a right to expect, because they had mixed their work with a little confidence in the householder. In the sixth and ninth hour we have the same circumstances, but less deserts. The eleventh hour workers do not seem to have had even a promise on which to base their expectations. They trusted the householder completely, and had very little of their own works to offer him. At this point we must insert another class, who do not appear in the parable, for the very good reason that they do nothing at all and are not associated with the kingdom. So far as salvation goes, our works have no part in it. We are the twelfth hour “laborers”, who have done nothing (Romans 4:5), yet receive much more than those who toil under law. This is because we do not depend on our own efforts whatever, but upon the favor of the great Householder. We were lower than the last in the parable, and have become higher than the first. Such is the nature of grace. May we never seek to make a bargain with God' Let us work without a contract or any assurances, but rest wholly on the innate graciousness which He delights to display when His creatures give Him occasion. Even in the kingdom, it is not the amount of work which determines the reward, but the amount of faith which is blended with it (Hebrews 4:2). Since those who worked the full day are displeased with His goodness, and have a wicked eye, and are last, we may well believe that they will have no part in the kingdom. They are not of faith but of law works. They stumble on the Stumbling Stone (Romans 9:32-33):

Lo! I am laying in Zion a Stumbling Stone and a Snare Rock, And the one believing on Him will not be disgraced.

8 See Leviticus 19:13.

16 See Matthew 19:30.

17-19 Compare Mark 10:32-34; Luke 18:31-34.

17 Though the Lord is blinding the eyes of the people by parables, He is seeking to open the understanding of His disciples and to engage their hearts with His great sacrifice. It seems strange that they, who had been accustomed to the thought of blood propitiation all their lives, could not entertain His teaching concerning the great Antitype of all their offerings. He did not perplex .them with parables, but spoke to them plainly and persistently, and still they do not seem to have grasped His meaning until all He foretold had occurred, and He was roused from among the dead.

20-28 Compare Mark 10:35-45.

20 See Matthew 4:21.

20 James and John were the sons of Zebedee (Mark 10:35). Our Lord called them “sons of thunder” (Mark 3:17), to indicate their tempestuous and violent disposition. The gentleness and love of John's writings are not the reflection of his character, but of the restraint of the inspiring Spirit. They certainly were the most ambitious and selfish of all the apostles. The request of their mother shows how little fellowship they had with His downward path to the shame and humiliation of the cross. They could not comprehend that this was the only path to glory. Only those who drink His cup can share His honors. So He grants them the boon of a sip of His sorrow. James was the first to follow his Lord. Herod put him to death by the sword (Acts 12:1). But John seems to have lived longer.

21-23 See Matthew 19:28, Matthew 26:39-42; Luke 12:50; Acts 12:2.

24 It is evident from the resentment of the rest that they also coveted the highest place, even if they could not follow Him to the lowest. So He gives them a sorely needed lesson on the true path to greatness. It consists in service, servility, and suffering, the very opposite of the course they were accustomed to associate with human honors. His own example was their cue. Only those who suffer are qualified to reign. The greatness of His glories finds its source in His service as a slave, and the sorrows of His soul, of which He spoke to them in vain.

25 See Luke 22:24-27.

26 See Matthew 23:11; Mark 9:35; 1 Peter 5:3.

27 See Matthew 18:4.

28 See John 13:4; John 11:51-52; John 14:5; Philippians 2:5-7; Isaiah 53:10-12

29-31 Compare Mark 10:46-48; Luke 18:35-39. See Matthew 9:27-31.

32-34 Compare Mark 10:49-52; Luke 18:40-43.

29 The restoration of two blind men was in itself a marvelous manifestation of His messiahship, but we must not miss the deeper current of thought which lies beneath. He was going out of Jericho, the city of the curse. Does this not speak of His resurrection, the exit from the curse of the cross? Two is the number of testimony. He sent the seventy-two in pairs. He was accompanied on His journey by His apostles, who were to testify concerning Him, but they were blind! They could not see the great central sight of all testimony, the cross of Christ. Hence they could not follow Him in spirit, though they accompanied Him in flesh. When shall their blindness be moved? When He emerges from the curse. And so it was. Not till then did He open up their mind to understand the Scriptures (Luke 24:45).