A 2006 Barna Group poll found...
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Object:
A 2006 Barna Group poll found that Americans have a good opinion of themselves. Nearly every American polled (97%) said they were good citizens, and 90% said they were generous. The last decade has surely not eroded our high estimate of ourselves. We feel about ourselves like the laborers who had worked all day and like them we probably feel we deserve more than others. The parable does what it can to erode such insidious self-esteem. About the day-long laborers (and we hard-working, "decent" Americans) Martin Luther writes:
Thus the ungodly and arrogant men, although they are sick before God, seem most healthy to themselves. Therefore they not only reject God as their physician, but they even regard him as a fool and liar.
(Luther's Works, Vol. 25, p. 203)
If we consider the landowner unfair in this case, if we churchgoers think ourselves more righteous and more deserving of God's blessings than the C & E Christians or the unchurched, we are regarding the Lord as a fool and liar. Luther made this clear in another work: "For a person cannot praise God unless he understands that there is nothing in himself worthy of praise but that all that is worthy of praise is of God and from God" (Ibid., Vol. 11, p. 144).
You don't go to a doctor (to Jesus) until you are convinced you are sick (not deserving of God's favor by what you have done).
Thus the ungodly and arrogant men, although they are sick before God, seem most healthy to themselves. Therefore they not only reject God as their physician, but they even regard him as a fool and liar.
(Luther's Works, Vol. 25, p. 203)
If we consider the landowner unfair in this case, if we churchgoers think ourselves more righteous and more deserving of God's blessings than the C & E Christians or the unchurched, we are regarding the Lord as a fool and liar. Luther made this clear in another work: "For a person cannot praise God unless he understands that there is nothing in himself worthy of praise but that all that is worthy of praise is of God and from God" (Ibid., Vol. 11, p. 144).
You don't go to a doctor (to Jesus) until you are convinced you are sick (not deserving of God's favor by what you have done).
