THE ANSWER WE LIVE! (MATTHEW 21:28-32) | KAIROS GLOBAL | NOVEMBER 2026

Author: Dr Joseph Sebastian

Audio

Intro: How does the Parable of the Two Sons relate to our Christian lives? Dr Joseph Sebastian helps us learn. 

There is something rather uncomfortable about this little parable in Matthew 21. Not because it is difficult to understand. In fact, it is almost embarrassingly simple. A father asks his first son to go and work in the vineyard. The son says, ‘I will not.’ But later he changes his mind and goes. The father asks the second son the same thing. ‘Yes, sir, I will go,’ he says. But he does not. Jesus then asks the obvious question: ‘Which of the two did the will of his father?’ The answer is equally obvious. ‘The first.’

The son who initially said ‘no’ eventually changed his answer. His first response was not the final word. What mattered was what he eventually did. There is something comforting about that.  It tells us God is not standing there waiting to remind us of every ‘no’ we have ever given Him. We can change, turn around and begin again.

But Jesus takes it further. He turns to those listening and says, ‘The tax collectors and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you.’ And then the sting: Even when you saw it, you did not afterwards repent and believe him (Matthew 21:32).

That changes the whole feel of the story. The problem is no longer simply about saying ‘no’ and later saying ‘yes.’

The problem is about seeing the truth and still refusing to change. It is a stage in our spiritual life when we are very good at giving the right answers. We know what to say. God is good. Prayer is important. We should: forgive, care for the poor, not judge, be honest, love our neighbour, put God first…

We know the answers. Some of us have known them for decades. But Jesus seems to be asking a much harder question: ‘Yes. But do you live them?’ That is the uncomfortable territory of this parable.

The second son knew the right answer. Not just a ‘Yes,’ but he even gave it politely: ‘Yes, sir.’  Perhaps he had learnt the language of obedience so well that he could say the right thing without actually obeying.  And that can happen to us too.

We can become very accomplished Christians. We know the prayers. We know the Scriptures. We know the Church teachings. We attend Mass. We go for confession. We can speak beautifully about faith. Yet, somewhere between what we profess and how we live, a gap can exist, at times a surprisingly large one.

Jesus is not impressed by the answer we know. He is looking at the answer we live. Perhaps it is time to grow up.  St Paul uses a rather striking image when speaking to the Christians at Corinth. He tells them he had to feed them with milk, not solid food, because they were not yet ready for it (1 Corinthians 3:2).

The Letter to the Hebrews goes even further. It says: ‘You have become dull of hearing.’ And then: ‘Though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles.’

But notice what the writer says maturity actually looks like. It is not simply knowing more theology. It is having our faculties trained by practice to distinguish good from evil (Hebrews 5:14).

That is a very different definition of spiritual maturity. Perhaps growing up in Christ is not primarily about collecting more knowledge about God. It is about letting what we already know about God change the way we live.

• A child may need to be told, ‘Share your toys.’ An adult need not be reminded about sharing.

• A child needs to be told to say sorry. An adult learns to recognise when pride is preventing reconciliation.

• A child asks, ‘What do I have to do?’ An adult begins to ask, ‘What is love asking of me here?’

That is the movement from milk to solid food. Not from simple faith to complicated faith. But from being told to being transformed. 

The uncomfortable truth is that we can remain children for a surprisingly long time.

There is another danger here. We can become adults in almost every area of life while remaining children in our relationship with God.  We can manage teams, businesses, families and finances. We can make difficult decisions. We can carry enormous responsibilities. And yet, when God asks something uncomfortable of us, we can still behave like spiritual children.

‘I know, Lord. But…; I will do it later; This is not the right time; Once things settle down…; When I retire…; When the children grow up…; When my work becomes less demanding…; When I have more time…; Perhaps one of the most dangerous phrases in the spiritual life is: ‘Later.’

Because ‘later’ feels responsible.  It sounds as though we are not refusing God. We are simply postponing our response. But sometimes ‘later’ is simply a more respectable form of ‘no.’ The second son did not say no.  He said yes. But he never went.

Be Warned: The Eleventh Hour Is Not Guaranteed

We love stories of last-minute transformation. And rightly so. The thief on the cross reminds us that God's mercy can reach a person even at the very end. The prodigal son can come home after years of waste. The first son can change his mind and go to the vineyard.

Grace is wonderfully patient. But perhaps we sometimes misunderstand this patience. We begin to think: I have time; I can change later; I can forgive later; I can become serious about my faith later; I can repair that relationship later; I can stop this habit later; I can give God more of my life later; I can respond to that call later; After all, there is always the eleventh hour.

But what if there isn't? Not because God stops being merciful. But because we do not know when our eleventh hour will be. Jesus tells us again and again to be awake, ready and watchful. Not frightened. Not anxious. Awake. For you do not know the day nor the hour (Matthew 24:42; 25:13).

And perhaps that is the point. We are not called to wait for the last moment to change. We are called to live now.

There is something tragic about reaching the end of our life and discovering that we spent much of it waiting to begin living the life we already knew we were called to live. The Christian life is not a rehearsal. Real Christian life does not begin somewhere in the future. It begins today.

What does your ‘yes’ look like?

The Catechism says something very beautiful about conversion. The call of Christ to conversion does not end after baptism. It continues throughout the Christian life. The Church describes this as a ‘second conversion’; an ongoing work of returning to God, continually. (CCC 1427–1428)

And the Catechism is even more concrete about repentance. Interior conversion means a reorientation of our whole life, accompanied by the desire and resolution to change how we live. It is not merely feeling sorry. Conversion eventually takes visible shape in our choices and actions. (CCC 1430–1432)

That brings us back to the two sons. Perhaps the question for us is not: ‘Am I a good Christian?’ That question can be surprisingly easy to answer. Perhaps the better questions are:

• Where is God asking me to change?

• What have I already understood but not yet acted upon?

• Where have I repeatedly said ‘yes’ with my lips but ‘not now’ with my life?

• What is the next step of obedience I already know I need to take?

And perhaps the hardest: What am I waiting for?

We sometimes imagine that conversion means making one dramatic decision that changes everything. More often, it is much quieter.

• It is the decision to make that phone call.

• To apologise without explaining ourselves.

• To stop gossiping.

• To tell the truth when a lie would be easier.

• To give generously when we would rather keep.

• To make time for prayer when the day is crowded.

• To go to confession instead of endlessly promising that we will.

• To stand with someone who has no power.

• To change the way we speak to the person closest to us.

• To finally obey something God has been gently asking of us for years.

  
  

These things may look small. But perhaps this is precisely where the answer we live is formed.

The danger of being right

There is one more uncomfortable thing about this Gospel.  The people Jesus was confronting were not necessarily people who had never heard God's word. They had heard it. They knew it. They considered themselves faithful. And that was precisely the problem.

They had become so certain that they were already right that they could no longer recognise their need to change. The tax collectors and prostitutes, on the other hand, knew they were sinners. When John came preaching repentance, some of them listened.

The people who thought they were far from God were able to move towards Him.  The people who thought they were already close were unable to take another step.

That should make us pause. Sometimes the greatest obstacle to spiritual growth is not our sinfulness.  It is our certainty that we have already grown enough.

The Catechism reminds us that forming our conscience is a lifelong task, and that the Word of God must not only be assimilated in faith and prayer but put into practice. (CCC 1783–1785)

So, which son are we?

Perhaps the beautiful thing is that we are not permanently one son or the other. At different moments, we can be both. There have been times when we said no and later went. There have also been times when we said all the right things and quietly stayed where we were. The good news is that Jesus is still speaking. The Father is still asking.

‘Go and work in the vineyard today.’ Not tomorrow. Not when everything is sorted. Not when we feel ready. Today.

And perhaps this is the real movement from childhood to maturity: not that we stop needing God's mercy, but that we become increasingly willing to respond to it. We do not wait to become perfect before we obey. We obey, and in the obedience we are changed. The first son changed his answer. The second son did not change his answer (or life).

And Jesus leaves us with a question that is simple enough for a child but demanding enough for an adult: What will my answer look like today?

Because, in the end, perhaps the best answer is not the one we give first. Perhaps it is not even the one we say most often. Perhaps the best answer is the one we finally live.

Dr Joseph Sebastian is a social development professional with nearly three decades of experience working across countries, cultures and communities. He enjoys connecting grassroots realities with strategy and leadership, while engaging with Boards and mentoring young people. Together with his wife, he runs Living Life Trust, serving older persons through day-care and assisted living spaces.