11/15/2026: Twenty-Fifth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 28)

Open Hands: One Master

Try holding a coin in a tight fist and receiving a gift with the same hand. It can’t be done. A clenched hand has no room for anything new. Scripture says our hearts are often like that clenched fist. By nature we grip our money, our security, and our future.  To us, that’s called being responsible.

Jesus says plainly that no one can serve two masters.  He even calls out the rival: money. He doesn’t only scold clenched hands. He opens them with a gift. Everything we hold was put there by him, and he bought us back from every inferior master with his own life.

Open hands are the posture of people who have been redeemed. Over four Sundays, listen to Jesus describe the one Master we have and the lavish care he extends to his children.

The Denarius Nobody Earned    

Fairness is deeply human. We track who worked longest and who got paid for what. So when the vineyard owner pays the last workers the same as the first, it feels wrong.  That reaction reveals how we think about God.

The Master’s economy runs on grace, not wages. Every denarius is a gift, and nobody in that vineyard earned theirs. Neither did we. Forgiveness, life, and heaven come to us as the same gift, placed in open hands.

In your hands this week: Look at your open palm at some point each day and remember that everything you’re holding, from breakfast to breath, was handed to you. Then thank the Giver, who never asks you to earn it.

God bless your worship.

Pastor Mueller preaches on Matthew 20:1-16

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