Unsuccessful Workers In The Vineyard

How successful have you been with your vineyard, your business, your institution, your parish, your family, and your relationship? If you have been achieving good amount of success, here is a warning for you—read Matthew 21: 33-46. It is story of workers who refuse to give the owner of the vineyard the share of the produce. Apparently, it is the story of successful workers in the vineyard, in truth, it is the story of the tragedy of shallow success.

When the vineyard made profit, the workers began to assume ownership, they misappropriated the vineyard, and treated disrespectfully and violently the servants of the master, and treated brutally his own son. People who refuse to acknowledge others and their role and input becomes dangerous to peace and running of society.

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A master, who was so very generous a while ago, perhaps would not mind that he is not getting fruits and grapes from his vineyard, and the workers are keeping it for themselves. Instead he definitely would have been more eager to see what have the workers become with what is given to them. Parents entrust their children with inheritance, not for making more profit, but with the hope that it would help in their greater becoming. The purpose of success in not the outcome, but what one becomes in the process. The master is at the transformative power of creation, and not just outcomes. This is also about leadership; transformational leaders love the people they lead and not just success and outcome.

While we humanly and naturally focus on achievements and outcomes—the painting, the invention, the business, the vineyard—there exists a deeper truth in the creative process: we ourselves are the ultimate masterpiece being shaped. Nelson Mandela's 27 years of imprisonment became its own creative act. In his autobiography, he describes how he used this time to refine his political philosophy and personal character. He entered prison as a revolutionary and emerged as a reconciler, having created within himself the capacity for forgiveness that would transform a nation. His most important creation was not a free South Africa, remarkable as that achievement was, but the man he became who could lead such a transformation.

The artefacts we create may stand as testaments to our efforts, but they remain external to us. What we become through creating—more resilient, more skilful, more compassionate, more wise—becomes integrated into our very being; in other words, humanity evolves though every creation.

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