Luke 1:5 - 25

"The Lord that values the Last"

　

by: Pastor Hironori Furuya

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　 "I just want to pay this last person as much as I did you."

This is what Jesus answered to the people who got angry and complaint about their payments, i.e., the same 1 denarion for the persons who worked hard all day long under the hot sun and those who worked for the remaining one hour only.

V. Frankl, a Jew psychoanalyst who wrote "Man's Search for Meaning" was advised by his companion, when he is accommodated in the concentration camp by the Nazis during the World War II, to shave his beard even with the broken glass when he comes appear in front of the Schutzstaffel, - SS (Because if a man has expanded beard, he is deemed sick and highly likely to be sent to the Gas Chamber.) and never give up until the last minute.
In the Auschwitz, the signboard on the front gate showed "Labor is a road to Freedom", which indicated that a man’s value was measured only by his labor force there.

Yes, as long as only the labor force and the productivity concerns, it could be true that it is unfair to pay the same 1 denarion in exchange for the whole day labor and just one hour labor.
However, when reading 1 denarion essential for a person to live, we find that the Lord Jesus saw us not as mere labor force, but the "Life" itself.
You know the maximum luxury is a way of living where the Life, per se, is put in the center with the highest priority.

Reportedly, the average expected lifetime of Japanese people will be up to 79.1 years old for males and 85.8 years old for females till 2025.
With this regard, Yujiro Nakamura, a philosopher, once told that we should think our age 20% less than real age in these days.
Well, if it makes people feel positive, I see it excellent. Amid the time when people persist in youth and see elder people negatively, i.e., 3Ks - Kusai (smelling), Kitanai (dirty) and Kurai (gloomy), however, the Lord Jesus advocates that his Church to pay attention to the last person. This is an important thing.

Ms.Machi Tawara a Japanese Poetess made a Tanka (traditional short poem), when she was a young high-school teacher, that is,

"It makes me somewhat anxious
that the 'kanji' (Chinese characters)
for 'adolescence'
contain many 'yokobo' (horizontal lines, which in Japanese are regarded as a metaphor for 'evil mind'),
though I do not know why".

For sure, the fact that a man has too many bars in his human relationships does not necessarily make his faith and mutual trust down to the robust ground. Growing up from adolescent youth to a matured adult, one will be able to come matured from the religious perspective only after connecting himself/herself firmly to the Absolute being, in other words, himself/herself and God. That is to say, he or she must carry the Cross of Jesus.

If the Kanji (Chinese character) meaning the Lord falls down, it might look like the another Kanji meaning despotic and recklessness. Indeed, whenever one can put the brakes (conscience) vertically on the axle that keeps rolling powerfully, it is because he or she considers God.

If one forgets God, thinking that nobody watches him, however, he will never be able to take advantage of God’s work. The Lord Jesus wants us to become a person who “values the last one person" and brings hope (= who does not forget God) even in desparate situations"

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