Cumberland Presbyterian Ponderings: February 2022

Thursday, February 24, 2022

The Parable of the Talents & Children

You have heard many perspectives on this parable from me over the past years. This will not be a recap. You might get a little review in the next service.

I will pose the question that I always offer.

What did you do with what God gave you?

I have charged you to examine your time, talents, and treasures. These are standard stewardship categories. I have challenged you to answer this question in the context of what did I do with the commission or the gospel that God gave me?

We have looked at how fear can debilitate if you take your eyes off of the Master and look at the storm. We have talked about how people overcome great obstacles when they set their fear aside.

This morning, I ask that you consider the question of what did I do with what God gave me in the context of children, both your own and those who somehow have been entrusted to us.

We are counseled to bring up a child in the way he or she should go—let’s call that God’s way. The promise is that later in life they will still be living in God’s way.

The promise doesn’t say that somewhere along the way they won’t venture into the everything else, but that later on, they will be living God’s way. That later on is when they are making just about all of their own life decisions.

But what about now? Did we put our Master’s trust in us to work?

Did we bring up our children in the way they should go so that they would produce a return for the Master?

What return? Will their lives bring glory to God?

Let’s phrase it this way? Did we bury the talent that God gave us—the gift of being parents—in the ground? Who buries such a gift in the ground?

Let’s put it this way? Did we ever have a day or two or a week or a month that we just needed to get through? We just needed to survive.

Did we ever live a day where we didn’t teach our children something about God’s love and from his holy word?

Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

Does that cover what we should do?

It’s the option that the third servant might have taken. He could have put his master’s money on deposit with the bankers and at least received a little interest from it. It’s the minimum.

Anything less is burying our Master’s trust in the ground.

As parents, we look for the gifts and talents that God has placed in our children. Mostly we look for all-star athletes, sometimes for academic gits, and sometimes for something in the arts.

It’s good that we know our children well enough to see what gifts and talents they have, but our charge is to bring them up in the way they should go—in God’s way.

What if you are blessed with a kid who will be the next Michael Jordan or Olga Korbut? Will they know how to handle being blessed with such gifts? Will success lead them into the everything else?

Our job as parents is not to make sure that our kid gets an athletic scholarship to OU or an academic scholarship to OSU, to get a real education.

Our job is to make sure that they know the Lord and his ways and that they seek him and his kingdom and his righteousness above all things.

If they are doing that, their God-given gifts will be manifested in such a way that brings glory to God.

That doesn’t mean that you stop coaching the baseball team or football team or helping out with the academic team. It means that every day you invest God’s word in your children and every day you are an example of God’s love.

That goes for your own children and those that we get to borrow from time to time. Our Wednesday night investments in setting children on a path that leads to God’s way is so important. That small amount of time may be the only time they hear about God’s love and his ways.

It also means that when the world has taken everything we have for that day and we just want to collapse into our beds, we ask ourselves if we invested in our children today.

Children, contrary to popular belief, you do not have to make this a difficult task for your parents. That can mean do your chores and homework without being asked, but it also means more.

When they are so very tired and perhaps stressed and even frazzled, ask them to share something about God with you.

Ask them to help you with the memory verse.

Ask them to tell you about God’s love.

Don’t worry, God will give them the strength that they need to make this investment in you.

Amen.

The Parable of the Talents & Wisdom

Read Matthew 25:14-30

We have completed a journey of about 8 months through the Proverbs. During that time, I have also acquired some wisdom from my life experience. Here are two things that I have learned.

I don’t remember the first one, but the second one is that I should write things down.

We are about to begin a course through four of Paul’s letters: Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians. I am bookending these epistles with the Parable of the Talents. Long ago, I told you that this parable had so much packed into it, that I needed to preach it at least twice a year. I expect to continue that trend until you run me off.

Over the years, I have given you the same acronym that I came up with about 14 years ago. I like this acronym so you are getting it again. It’s TURN.

T is for trusted. The master trusted these servants. They were entrusted with large sums of money. That trust was based upon their ability. There was not equal distribution. They were trusted with what their abilities could handle.

Even the third servant who only buried his talent in the ground was trusted with one talent—perhaps $100,000 or perhaps more.

Each servant was entrusted with money in accordance with his ability.

The U is for urgent or urgency. The first two servants put their master’s money to work at once. They acted immediately.

Notice that we are told these two servants put their master’s money to work. It doesn’t say they went out and got an extra job at McDonald's. They put money to work. They were the master in their relationship with money and made the money work for them, and they did it without hesitation.

That does not mean they did it without deliberation. I suspect that these first two servants had been contemplating what they would do if they were entrusted with more than they had been so far. The deliberation had been done in advance so they could act upon receipt of the trust.

We are not told that the third servant acted immediately, but I suspect that he did. The last thing that he wanted was to put his master’s money to work. I think he buried his single talent soon after receiving it.

R is for Return on Investment. Each of the first two servants produced a huge return on investment. Their master expected a return.

They had to be skilled in their investments. They had to be focused on telling their money what to do. This was their work—to produce a return on what their master gave them.

The third servant produced no return. He could have put his master’s money in a money market account and at least made a little interest, but he did not, which brings us to the final letter in the acronym.

N is for No Fear. The third servant was governed by fear. Money became the master in this relationship because of fear. The first two surely had to deal with fear but fear did not debilitate them. Fear may have been a factor but the first two servants behaved as if they had no fear.

A couple decades ago, Spencer Johnson wrote a book called Who Moved My Cheese? It is essentially a book on dealing with change, but in the course of the story, the decision-makers were asked a question. What would I do if I was not afraid?

Most often, the answer to this question was the best course of action. How many times does God’s word remind us not to be afraid?

Over the years, I have asked you to look at what fear does. The example of a football team that has led the entire game but plays the last two minutes not to lose instead of sticking to what has been working often finds themselves upside-down on the scoreboard at the end.

The team that was behind the whole game throws fear out the window. What difference does it make? We’re losing anyway. Suddenly, things start going in their favor. They are fearless and seemingly unstoppable.

We don’t see this as much as we used to because coaches got wise to the dynamics of fear and stopped playing not to lose and continued with what got them the lead in the first place.

There you have the acronym TURN—Trusted, Urgent, Return on Investment, and No Fear. We could leave the parable there, but there is a powerful question that was never asked by the master, but each servant answered this question in turn.

For those of you who have heard me preach this parable 30, 40, or 50 times, you know the question. I phrase it as if the master is asking it.

What did you do with what I gave you?

That’s the question answered in the parable. I changed it a little so we could apply it to ourselves.

What did I do with what God gave me?

Over the years we have examined the answer to this question in terms of time, talents, and treasure. These are the customary categories for stewardship. A few years ago, I added another category for our consideration—the gospel.

What did we do with what God gave us? What did we do with our commission? What did we do with the gospel?

Did we put it to work at once and produce a return for our Master? Did we bury it in the ground?

Did we take the good news to our next-door neighbor or the people down the block or someone on the other side of the world or were we afraid and we kept the gospel to ourselves?

Did fear interfere with our delivery of the good news?

Today, I add another category for consideration as we continue to answer this question.

What did I do with what God gave me?

That category is wisdom. What did I do with the wisdom that God gave me? What did we do with the wisdom God gave us?

James wrote that God gives wisdom generously to those who ask and do not doubt. God does not disqualify our request because we have done poorly in the past. He gives wisdom to us and he gives it generously.

But what will we do with his wisdom?

But, I’m not going to college or graduate school or designing space stations or nuclear power plants. Do I really need wisdom?

If you have ever wrestled with a decision, you need wisdom. The proverb that we all know tells us to trust in the Lord even when our own understanding tells us to do something else.

God has already figured out the consequences and sequels of every choice and has set the best choice before us. Wisdom says trust God over our own understanding.

The parable teaches us to put God’s wisdom to work and to produce a return for our Master. We trust him and do not doubt. We follow his wisdom even when it seems crazy—crazy like building an ark when it has never rained in the history of the planet.

Putting God’s wisdom to work requires urgency. God’s wisdom is our first choice, not the last resort. We do things God’s way and we do it without second-guessing him. We trust and do not doubt.

James reminds us that if we doubt, we are like a wave tossed about the sea. We have no direction, no course to stay. We are adrift.

When we trust God and put the wisdom that he gave us to work right away, that’s our first step towards overcoming doubt.

We don’t ask God for wisdom, then analyze his direction for soundness when we receive it. We don’t do a cost-benefit analysis or an estimate of supportability on what God has told us is the best choice. That doesn’t mean that we don’t seek to understand God’s ways. It means we don’t reduce his direction to being just one of many options.

We put his wisdom to work at once. When we analyze God’s infallible directions to us, we give doubt and fear a foothold.

We are blessed that we have God’s wisdom available to us all of the time. Most of you have at least one Bible. Many of you have quite a collection of God’s words written on your hearts.

We must put God’s words to work now, without delay. We must help each other live as wise people. We sharpen each other.

By trusting God and putting his words into practice, we produce a return for our Master. That return is most often manifested in love for each other and for those whom we barely know.

And when fear tries to bring doubt into the equation, we take every fearful thought captive and make them obedient to Christ Jesus. We live as if fear was not a factor.

Fear is always a factor, but we give it no weight in our decisions. Fear does not have veto power over our sound minds. The only fear that comes into play is the fear of the Lord for it is the beginning of our godly journey towards perfect love.

There are countless applications of God’s wisdom in our everyday decisions. I’m not going to attempt to make a never-ending list as a reference. We know so much of what God desires.

Honesty

Integrity

Industry

Generosity

Harmony

Peace

We saw those in the Proverbs time and again. We are to be known by our love. We are to share God’s love and his invitation to live in good relationship with him forever.

We are to put his words into practice and the parable reminds us to do it right away, without delay.

We are to produce a return for the Kingdom of God and the Body of Christ.

We are to trust in the Lord and kick fear to the curb.

I leave you with the same question as you have heard for years.

What did I go with what God gave me?

Now ask yourself the same question in the context of wisdom.

What did I do with the wisdom God gave me?

Did I put it to work right away or did I let fear and doubt persuade me to bury God’s wisdom in the ground?

What did I go with what God gave me?

Amen

Thursday, February 10, 2022

Pushing Through Proverbs

We have completed our journey through the Proverbs. Use the links below for review or begin your own journey. Wisdom is worth it!

Proverbs 1

God’s way and everything else

Listen to mom and dad

How I Hated Discipline

In Full View of the Lord

Proverbs 6

To the ant, work is wisdom

7 things in the Everything Else Category

Proverbs 7

Easy Targets

Deer in the headlights

Proverbs 8

More Precious than Rubies

Quite a Package

Wisdom as the Ultimate Plank Holder

Proverbs 9

Leave Your Simple Ways

Stolen Water is Sweet

Proverbs 10

Blessings for now and for eternity

Breaking up is hard to do

Proverbs 11

Wealth is Worthless on the Day of Wrath

The Hope of the Unjust

Proverbs 12

The Prudent Overlook an Insult

Don’t be Stupid!

Proverbs 13

Money for Nothing

Leaving an Inheritance

Proverbs 14

Sin Condemns Any People

Hard work brings a profit

Proverbs 15

Wise and Foolish X7

God’s Way—It’s for our own good

Proverbs 16

Half Way There

Pride Precedes Destruction

To answer without listening…

The Name of the Lord is a Fortified Tower

Proverbs 19

Mammas, Don’t let your Children grow up to be Lazy

The Poor Can’t buy a Friend

Proverbs 20

Man in the Mirror

Do we really understand our own understanding?

Proverbs 21

Don’t complicate the simple

We are an example to the vulnerable

Proverbs 22

Slave to the Lender

The Generous will be Blessed

Proverbs 23

Sayings of the Wise for the Wise

Cigarettes, Whiskey, and Wild, Wild Women

Proverbs 24

Times That Try Men’s Souls

Folly is Sin

Proverbs 25

Clean Hands

Bring Glory to God and Enjoy Him Very Much

As Iron Sharpens Iron

What a Day may Bring

Proverbs 28

The Wicked Flee Though No One Pursues

Walking in Wisdom

Proverbs 29

Blessed is the One who heeds Wisdom’s Instructions

Genuine and Urgent

Proverbs 30

Every Word of God is Flawless

Living by Daily Bread

Proverbs 31

Listen to my Mom

Who can find such a woman?

Ephesians 5:15-16

Proverbs Review

Read Ephesians 5:15-16

Let’s try this in the New King James Version.

See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.

Why this version? It seems that the words pack a lot more into them than some translations. What does it mean to walk circumspectly? That’s a term we don’t use much, but perhaps we should.

It is to live considering all factors, consequences, and sequels. You remember look before you leap, right?

Paul’s counsel is to look, consider, analyze both consequences and sequels, and be sure—let’s go with fully convinced in your own mind—that the course you are embarking upon is the one directed for you by the Lord.

To walk circumspectly is to have considered the full biblical witness, the leading of God’s own Spirit that resides within you, and to have held every thought captive until it is obedient to the Lord. Then you discern where God is directing you.

What dichotomy does Paul proffer? Foolish and wise are the two choices. There is God’s way and there is everything else. Paul says stay out of the everything else and live God’s way and do it every day.

Now we come to another interesting phrase—redeeming the time. Other translations say making the most of the time or most of every opportunity. Those are good translations, but consider what it is to redeem.

It is to make good out of something damaged or broken. What could be broken? The days are evil.

Evil abounds in this age. It’s here in our presence. It’s in our face. Evil does not hide. It lives in the open and entices many to join forces with it.

The everything else is everywhere.

But we who seek God’s kingdom and his righteousness are counseled to walk circumspectly. We consider all factors before we take a step. We step out confidently when we know it is the Lord directing our steps.

We are to live as wise not unwise people. That’s every moment of every day. That’s a challenge but not a challenge that we who seek God will back away from.

How do we live as those who are wise? It’s a lifelong commitment, but we need to start somewhere. Get you a handful of proverbs that you will claim as your own. All of God’s wisdom is available to you, but you are wise to carry much of it with you.

Don’t wear it like a phylactery. Write it on your hearts.

Here are some suggestions. Many will already sound very familiar.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge,

but fools despise wisdom and instruction.

That’s Proverbs 1:7. I think most of you already know this one. God’s people desire knowledge, wisdom, instruction, and the Lord’s discipline. Fools do not.

You will know this next proverb as well.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart

and lean not on your own understanding;

in all your ways submit to him,

and he will make your paths straight.

I have said before that I can connect almost any message to either the Parable of the Talents, which we will read next week or to Proverbs 3:5-6. Many connect to both but you should have this proverb in your heart.

Why? Much of what you wrestle with in life involves dissonance between God’s way and your own understanding. This proverb which you should always have at the ready reminds us that God has already done all of the analysis and his way is always best. It is for our own good, and leads to blessings for us.

We don’t go much farther for the next piece of counsel that I suggest we keep on tap. It’s Proverbs 3:9-10.

Honor the Lord with your wealth,

with the firstfruits of all your crops;

then your barns will be filled to overflowing,

and your vats will brim over with new wine.

Whatever we have gained in this life comes from God. Honor him with what we have received in tithes and offerings and generosity. God will keep on blessing you. God will continue to bless you.

I’m jumping over big sections on the 3 metaphorical women—Wisdom, Folly, and the Adulterous woman and going to Proverbs 10:4.

Lazy hands make for poverty,

but diligent hands bring wealth.

We get this several different ways over the course of 31 chapters, but the quality of industry is valued. Laziness leads to destruction. Remember:

God’s Way – Everything Else

Industry – Laziness

Let’s jump to the fourth verse in the next chapter.

Wealth is worthless in the day of wrath,

but righteousness delivers from death.

We are told that hard work pays off. Sometimes we are told it brings riches, but riches are not the goal. Riches are not the objective. Riches are incidental to hard work, but we are working towards righteousness. We want to be in right standing with God.

Today, we know that only Christ can bring us to right standing with God, but we want to live in such a way that our example honors God and brings glory to his name. Our very lives are our best offering to God.

When it’s all said and done, our money won’t count for squat as far as being right with God goes. What we did with our money and riches and everything else that God gave us will say a lot about whether our response to God’s great love brought glory to his name.

Long story short—you can’t buy a stairway to heaven. Good song. Bad theology.

Let’s jump to the beginning of chapter 12.

Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge,

but whoever hates correction is stupid.

We caught on early that those who seek God and his kingdom and his righteousness love knowledge, wisdom, instruction, and discipline. Those who are not seeking God don’t want to be corrected.

Remember, fools despise wisdom and instruction or wisdom and discipline. This proverb reinforces one of the first that we learned, but notice the harshness of the language.

If you are headed to the everything else and someone who cares for you tries to help—we will call it correction—and you reject that help, you are stupid.

Now, we have told our children not to call anyone stupid. That’s good counsel, but it does not apply to wisdom. Wisdom calls it as she sees it.

Mama always said, stupid is as stupid does.

Detesting and defying good correction is just stupid. There is no figurative language. There is no sugar coating.

Rejecting people and counsel that attempt to rescue you from the everything else and bring you into God’s way is just stupid.

Let’s move on to Proverbs 13:14.

The teaching of the wise is a fountain of life,

turning a person from the snares of death.

Correction from a wise person is not for self-righteousness. It offers the hope of saving someone from the everything else. So stupid is as stupid does, but some may listen to the teachers of wisdom and decide to turn their lives around.

Let’s not forget the comparative proverbs. Here is one from chapter 15 that hits home with many.

Better a little with the fear of the Lord

than great wealth with turmoil.

Better a small serving of vegetables with love

than a fattened calf with hatred.

What’s better: God’s way and love or great wealth and feasting with hatred?

For most, this is a no-brainer. Sometimes, we need an affirmation that what we have though it may seem little is so much more valuable than what the world desires and serves up with contempt and hatred.

Here’s a corollary from the next chapter.

Better a little with righteousness

than much gain with injustice.

Think to what Jesus said in his parable of the bigger barns or the rich fool.

A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.

His counsel further instructed us to be on the lookout for all sorts of greed. In Proverbial syntax, watch out for things that lure your heart into the everything else.

Chapter 17 begins with more along these lines.

Better a dry crust with peace and quiet

than a house full of feasting, with strife.

Proverbs tells us that peace is more important than perceived prosperity. There is nothing wrong with prosperity, but when it is accompanied by strife, hatred, and contempt, it’s hardly worth it.

At this point, I’m going to tell you that the proverbs that I selected may not be the ones that you selected as your favorites. To which I say, good!

I do hope that you have half a dozen or so that you have memorized and another dozen that you keep at the ready. Proverbs must not be a book that we read and then moved on. It must be something that increased our hunger for wisdom.

I hope you are hungry for wisdom.

Here’s food for thought from Proverbs 19:19.

A hot-tempered person must pay the penalty;

rescue them, and you will have to do it again.

What do you get when you never let your child face the consequences of his or her bad decisions?

Answer is: An adult who expects to be rescued from his bad decisions.

We must learn to deal with our anger, temper, impulsiveness, poor thinking skills, and other things that lead us into the everything else. If you won’t let your kids face the consequences of their actions, they will expect rescue from them as adults.

If you rescue them as adults, you have signed up for a lifetime subscription.

Let’s jump to one that most of you know by heart. It’s Proverbs 22:6-7

Train up a child in the way he should go,

And when he is old he will not depart from it.

The rich rules over the poor,

And the borrower is servant to the lender.

I made the point when we went through this chapter that these two are linked and that link is most applicable in our time. What is missing from so much godly instruction? Our relationship with money. We must be the master.

Debt reverses that relationship.

I’m jumping a few chapters to one of my favorites, Proverbs 27:17.

As iron sharpens iron,

so one person sharpens another.

We as the body of Christ should encourage and pray for one another. We must love one another, and if we apply this proverb, we sharpen one another.

We help each other grow by challenging each other to do better. Just as you lifting budding pushes you to do one more repetition, so too do we challenge each other to grow in God’s grace.

I will wrap this up with the fifth verse from chapter 30.

Every word of God is flawless;

he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.

How can we trust in the Lord all the time? We must know that every word of God is flawless. God doesn’t write “Oops!” in the margins.

We can trust completely in him and his word and we can take refuge in him when the world is set against us.

My hope is that I touched on some of your favorites and skipped over some as well. For those who earnestly embraced the daily reading of this book of wisdom, you are blessed and you will return to them on your own. Continued study of God’s wisdom will continue to bless you.

My hope is that you won’t put Proverbs in the rear-view mirror; instead, you will continue to consult them on a regular basis. Long ago and far away, my biblical wisdom professor challenged us to make a covenant with her that we would continue to read wisdom literature for the next year.

We put our thumbprint into a piece of clay and she shellacked it and mounted it on a piece of wood so we could put it somewhere that would remind us of our commitments.

I offer you the same challenge. Commit to reading the Bible’s wisdom literature for the next year. You might find it turns into a habit.

I don’t have clay or a kiln, but I do have Facebook and will post recurring reminders to read God’s wisdom literature. Remind each other. Teach this wisdom to your children. Talk about it instead of the ball game or the weather.

Remember, as those who seek God’s kingdom and his righteousness, you are people who hunger for knowledge, wisdom, instruction, and discipline.