Parable of the Talents--Yes, Again!

 

Read Matthew 25:14-30

I have preached this parable at least twice a year to this body, and most of those twice-a-year occasions included two different messages at our services. Some years, I worked it in more.

I have preached this in other locations. It is a Go-to Parable. It is jam-packed. It is good for preaching, good for Bible study, and best when put into practice.

So, where do I go this time? I will follow my Sermon for Dummies guidelines that I keep posted by my computer.

·       Include the good news in the message.

·       Connect the good news to our current situation.

·       Repeat critical items.

I am going to focus on the third guideline: Repeat critical items. So here we go again with my acronym: TURN

T is for trusted. All of the servants were trusted with money in accordance with their ability. They had a preexisting relationship with their master before this parable began. They were trusted servants. Even the third servant was trusted with a substantial investment in his ability. We are trusted servants.

U stands for urgency. The first two servants put their talents to work at once. They were ready to be trusted more, and because of that, they could put their master’s money to work immediately. We are to act with urgency.

R is for Return on Investment (ROI). The master expected a return on the trust he placed in his servants. He didn’t have to say this. These servants knew this because of the existing relationship. We are to produce a return for our Master.

N is for No Fear. Every servant had to contend with fear, but only the third one was debilitated by fear. We all deal with fear, but we should not be afraid. Our desire to produce a return for our master should be enough to overcome whatever fear is taunting us. If you must be afraid, be afraid of not pleasing your master, but fear does not govern the trusted servants' thinking or actions. We are to live without fear interfering with our decisions.

This acronym brings us to the question of what we did with what our Master (the Lord) gave us. We must realize that we are his trusted servants, are to act with urgency, are to produce a return on our Master’s trust, and that fear does not govern our lives.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge… The key word there is beginning.

Perfect love casts out fear.

But the question remains. What did we do with what God gave us?

I have posed this as a challenge in various areas of our discipleship. Among the gifts or trusts given to us were time, talents, and treasure, the standard three.

Also, in this context of what did we do with what God gave us, we explored our salvation, wisdom, children, leadership, spiritual gifts, Sabbath rest, and even God’s generosity.

We have looked at fear and why the third servant was called wicked in addition to being easily labeled as lazy.

And we have looked at this parable in the context of fear.

So what is left?

How about victory? What did we do with the victory that God gave—I say it again, gave—us. In our belief and profession of Jesus as Lord, we receive the victory that Jesus won on the cross. We pass from death to life.

Our sin is set aside. Death has no more sting for us. Yes, we hurt when we lose a loved one. Even Jesus wept over Lazarus, knowing full well that he would see his friend momentarily. He would need a shower and some new clothes but death would not claim him for now.

Only a few, ok that few could be a few billion people, but in comparison to all who have lived since God created humans, it’s not that many, will meet Jesus the old fashioned way, through death. Most won’ get to meet him in the clouds without experiencing death.

Most of us will get to heaven the old-fashioned way. We will die in these bodies, but the death of this body is not the end for the believer.

We get that, and we discussed this when we discussed the parable and salvation, but this time, let’s look deeper into that salvation.

Let’s consider this salvation, which we know through our faith and God’s grace, in the context of victory.

Sin does not enslave us and death cannot hold us. That’s victory. No, that’s the ultimate victory.

Remember God’s answer to Paul’s prayers to remove the thorn in his side: My grace is sufficient for you.

So, what’s different from just asking what we did with our salvation?

With the words "Your grace is enough for me," we affirm that we have already won the ultimate victory. Nothing in this world can take that away from me or you.

So, should we not be the boldest people on the planet? We have already won even if we mess up everything from now until our hearts stop. We have already won.

There should be nothing that holds us back from putting our Master’s words into practice. We should be bold, we can’t lose.

Back in the mid 1990s, I went to a Chester L. Karrass negotiating seminar. It was good training, so much so that I hired the guy to train 20 of my people, who quite frankly were terrible negotiators. It was money well spent, but I’m not talking about negotiation.

The instructor began the class by asking who would bet $100 on the flip of a coin. Nobody responded.

Then he said, "What if I gave you 10 to 1 odds, and we would do this 10 times?"

I stood up right then, started pulling my wallet out of my back pocket, and said, “I’ll take that action!”

If you have a 50-50 chance of winning each time and if only won once, you would break even. Any coin flip that came up in your favor after that was gravy.

The offer was only for instructional purposes and I became good friends with the instructor, wrote a few things for him, and still consider the training he provided some of the best I have received in my life.

OBTW—for the couple of dozen negotiating strategies and tactics discuss, the instructor noted that the Karass organization only endorsed one—the Win-Win.

We have the ultimate win-win in our salvation that came by God’s mercy and grace.

We have better than 10-1 odds. We’ve already won.

That should give us peace. We should be assured of our right standing with God. We should be fully convinced in our own minds—doubt gets the boot—that we will enjoy the company of our God and Savior for eternity.

That should make us bold as disciples of Christ Jesus, bold in our witness, and send us into the world without fear of anything the world can do to us.

Yes, we will have trouble, pain, sorrow, hurt, and a bunch of stuff that if we wrote the script for our own day, would not be included. But all of that stuff is nothing compared to what is in store for us.

So we should be bold as we serve the Lord and bring glory to his name. Do not be timid. Do not hold back. We don’t do fear.

You are on a mission from God and regardless of how many times you are wounded while you go into the world with good news, you will be with God and be in right standing with him for eternity.

You win!

Now, stop holding back.

What did we do with the mercy and grace that God gave us?

I hope that we all hear, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” one day. And maybe our Master might add, “You were fearless as you brought glory to my name.”

Bruh, you were fearless!

That’s what we long to hear. We are told that if we deny Jesus before men, he will deny us before his Father. That’s “Depart from me I never knew you,” sort of stuff.

But it doesn’t apply to you. You will not deny Jesus. You know the truth. You will remain faithful to the end, but will you be bold?

Bold is not boisterous, bravado, or something in which you need a Type-A/High Dominance personality profile. There is no preferred Myers-Briggs Type Indicator required.

It’s going where God sends you and not worrying about the consequences.

You want to do your best, but you are not afraid to trip and fall and get back up as you learn new things and ways to practice your discipleship.

We are bold!

We have no excuse to be timid. To be timid is to bury our talents in the ground.

We will not accept burying our talents in the ground. That’s not us. Being bold might take—will take—practice.

And once again, I come to the sage of modern-day wisdom, Yogi Berra, for further guidance.

When you come to a fork in the road, take it.

Take what God has given you and do something with it. Just do it. Make your best decision, don’t look back, and do what you know to do to bring glory to God’s name.

When you come to a fork in the road, take it. Which way? The way that God is leading you, and do it with urgency. There is no get around to it in the discipleship business.

There are some things that we do as organizations and in those cases groups of people make decisions or you need a supervisor’s approval to act.

That’s not the case with what God has given you by grace. You are free to act without worry about losing your right standing with God as you do your best to bring glory to his name.

Should you abide by the laws and regulations in place? Of course. Understand what the law prohibits, but don’t back off beyond that. The Pharisees did that by adding to the law.

You are not supposed to work on the Sabbath, so we should prohibit even picking up a shovel in case someone forgets it is the Sabbath and starts digging a ditch.

Should we not be concerned with our personal safety? In the big picture, your destination is assured even if you die in your endeavor, but don’t do stupid stuff to hasten the process.

Should I get up in people’s faces and thump them with my Bible? If that’s your approach, make sure you take a big, heavy Bible and not some little gospel the Gideons put out. And make sure your mouthwash is Listerine strength.

Seriously, we are not making people come and be disciples; we make disciples when they respond to the good news.

We deliver the good news. The receiver decides if he or she believes. We disciple those who believe and pray for those who don’t, at least haven’t yet. That’s our hope, that they will respond to the grace offered while they can.

We will be so bold to give those who refused another round at some point. As long as it is called today, we continue to share this gospel of truth.

We try to get along with everyone as much as possible, but we will not hold back on sharing what we are commissioned to share. We don’t go into the world to offend people, but if the truth offends them, they need to hear the truth and we must be bold and share it.

So, in this ongoing saga of sermons of the Parable of the Talents, what will we do with the words from God, “My grace is enough for you?”

Among all of our other responses that bring glory to God’s name, let’s add boldness to that list.

Let’s be bold in bringing glory to God by taking his love and good news to the world!

Amen.

For more on this jam-packed parable, follow the links…

 

The Parable of the Talents

Parable of the Talents – Part I

Parable of the Talents – Part II

Parable of the Talents – Part III

Parable of the Talents: You wicked, lazy servant

The Parable of the Talents: God’s Generosity

The Parable of the Talents: Leadership Lessons

The Parable of the Talents: Points & Prayers

The Parable of the Talents and our Spiritual Gifts

The Parable of the Talents & Wisdom

The Parable of the Talents & Children

The Parable of the Talents and Sabbath Rest

Take the Talent Away from Him

God wants to give you more

After a long time…

The Baseball Glove and Salvation

Christian Stewardship - Time

Christian Stewardship – Talents

Christian Stewardship – Treasure

Looking a Blind Man in the Eye

In chapter 9 of John’s gospel, Jesus healed a man who had been blind since birth.  Jesus put mud in his eyes and told him to go wash.  There is more detail but I want to get to the part where he was healed.  He could see!

Some said that this was the man who hand been blind since birth and others said it only looked like him.  Here’s the question of the day.  How could they not know?

How could they not know?

They probably never really saw him.  They knew he was there and quickly proceeded past him surely in some discussion of world-saving importance.  They didn’t want to look his way.

They didn’t want to look a blind man in the eye for if they did, they might just be compelled to compassion and mercy.  They might have seen another person—someone made in the image of God—and they would have been compelled to mercy.

That might have cost them money or time.  It would have taken them off their path of urgent demands and out of their comfort zones.  It might have given them eyes to see and left them without excuse for not showing mercy.

How was it that the people that had walked by the blind man hundreds or thousands of times on their way back and forth on that road over the past decade couldn’t tell if it was the same man who could now see? They never really saw him.

Just as the priest and Levite walked on the other side of the road in the parable of the Good Samaritan, most of the people who had walked by this man daily wished the road was wider and that they could walk on the other side as well.

Fortunately, this doesn’t happen today.  Actually, it happens much, much more but we have become more subtle about it.  We find ways not to see the blind man on the side of the road.

Programs and movements lump people into groups and categories and divide them according to the whims of the program instead prompting the power of compassion to jump into action.  Programs have metrics.  People need relationship.  Programs let us keep our distance.  Mercy makes connections.

See a man not a movement.

Look the blind man in the eye and be led by the Spirit.

Do not surrender the Spirit that God placed inside of you to something that voids the relationships he intended for you.

Build God’s kingdom in this age one relationship at a time.  Be known by your love not your membership.

Love one another.

Meet people where they are but lead them to life for God has given life to us thorough relationship with him

The Parable of the Talents: Points & Prayers

Read Matthew 25:14-30

After a long time, the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. 

For over a decade, I have been preaching or teaching or examining this parable with you at least twice a year.  The year that we did all of the parables, I taught this 3 consecutive Sundays.  This year you can get it twice a Sunday for two Sundays in a row.  That’s 4 messages in 2 Sundays at no extra charge, but you must act now to receive this special offer.

If you know me, then you know how special this parable is to me.  It ranks right up there with lost and found in Luke 15, and has so many perspectives and dimensions. 

I always try to take a slightly different approach to the parable each time.  There is, of course, some overlap.  In the earlier service, we focused on the perspective of the master in this parable, noting his expectations and what he valued.  It was a good model for our own leadership.

Though many of the aspects of the master surely represent Jesus, we should not make the parable allegorical.   Today, I ask us to look at this unique aspect of the parable—the master was gone for a long time.

This wasn’t a typical 2-week vacation.  This wasn’t a 6-month sabbatical.  The master was gone a long time.  The servants were left to their own inclinations for a long time.

There is a short book by the title of A Message to Garcia by Elbert Hubbard.  It was published first in 1899 and is therefore in the public domain and can easily be found on the internet.  It puts us in the age of President McKinley, Teddy Roosevelt and the Rough Riders, and the Spanish American War.

In all this Cuban business there is one man stands out on the horizon of my memory like Mars at Perihelion. When war broke out between Spain and the United States, it was very necessary to communicate quickly with the leader of the insurgents. García was somewhere in the mountain vastnesses of Cuba—no one knew where. No mail nor telegraph message could reach him. The President must secure his cooperation, and quickly.

What to do!

Someone said to the President, “There’s a fellow by the name of Rowan will find García for you, if anybody can.”

Rowan was sent for and given a letter to be delivered to García. How “the fellow by the name of Rowan” took the letter, sealed it up in an oilskin pouch, strapped it over his heart, in four days landed by night off the coast of Cuba from an open boat, disappeared into the jungle, and in three weeks came out on the other side of the island, having traversed a hostile country on foot and delivered his letter to García, are things I have no special desire now to tell in detail.

The point I wish to make is this: McKinley gave Rowan a letter to be delivered to García; Rowan took the letter and did not ask, “Where is he at?” By the Eternal! there is a man whose form should be cast in deathless bronze and the statue placed in every college of the land. It is not book learning young men need, nor instruction about this and that, but a stiffening of the vertebrae which will cause them to be loyal to a trust, to act promptly, concentrate their energies; do the thing—“Carry a message to García!”

General García is dead now, but there are other Garcías.

The remainder of the essay is worth reading.  My own children have read it numerous times, surely mumbling bad things about me on some occasions and joyous when they needed a last minute book report.

It looks at how unique it is to find a person who will do his job, do it right, do it with excellence, and do it without someone having to look over his should every minute.  The first two servants in the parable were such people.

They took what had been entrusted to them, put it to work, produced an excellent return, and stood ready to settle accounts with their master upon his return.

I have previously used an acronym that I created for this parable.  It’s TURN.

T is for Trusted.  Each of these servants was trusted with money in accordance with their ability.  That means that there was a relationship of trust already in place.  The master knew what each servant could handle and extended his trust accordingly.

Such a trust sets up the scenario for success.  Failure is always a risk, but these trusted servants would find a way to succeed.  Trust continues even in the absence of the master, perhaps especially in the absence of the master.

At this time, I ask that we consider the trust that we have been given by our Master.  We are trusted with the gospel, being a light unto the world, these temples in which we live, the stewardship of this planet, and so many things that we may not think of on a daily basis.  So we pause briefly from the didactic form of this message to seek our Master in prayer.

Lord,

We seek you once again, coming this time thanking you that you trust us so much.  We thank you for your confidence in us, giving us the gifts and talents which we need to produce good fruit for you.  We petition you to open our eyes and ears and help us to see the many trusts given to us.

Our children and parents.

Our church family.

Those who are shut in or alone.

Those whom you have called the least of these.

The day itself for you have made it.

The gospel.

Our example.

Our tithe.

Investment of our time.

Our testimonies.

Lord, help us to see those things with which you have trusted us, so we may give a good account upon your return.

Amen.

U is for Urgency.  The first two servants went at once and put their talents to work.  Realize that these servants knew that they were the master of their master’s money.  They were also prepared to be trusted with more.  Part of the trust was the servant’s preparation to be trusted with more.

When the time came, they were ready.  There was no delay.  There was no when I get around to it attitude. They did not badger their master with a million and one questions before he departed.  They were ready and they put their master’s money to work at once.  They were ready.

Urgency without preparation is busyness and chaos.  They were ready and put their master’s money to work at once.

Let’s think on the things with which our Master has entrusted us.  Are we putting them to work at once?  Are we waiting to share the good news with our neighbor when the situation becomes more inviting?  Are we waiting to share our testimony for a time when we are more comfortable?

Comfort zones and obedience to our Master are often in conflict, at least until obedience becomes our comfort zone.  Let us pause once again amidst this homily and seek our Lord.

Lord,

We approach your throne of grace once again.  We come in confidence that this is exactly where you want us to be, seeking you with our entire being.  For this moment, we come in petition, asking you to grant us urgency in the right things.

Prompt us to preparation and readiness, so that when we receive a new trust from you, we are ready to put it to work.

Sustain us in those things with which you have entrusted to us for some time.  Let us begin each day with new enthusiasm as we pour ourselves into what you have given us.

Amen.

R is for Return on Investment.  We must always desire to produce fruit that benefits the body of Christ and that brings glory to God.  Obedience produces a return for our Master.  Doing things his way—putting his words into practice—produces a return for our Master.

Generosity produces a good return.  Love produces a good return.  Discipline and instruction produce good returns, that is, pruning increases the harvest. 

Study produces good returns.  Group study—those inclined towards the proverb as iron sharpens iron, so one sharpens another—produce good returns.

Ministries that connect people with the God of love and salvation and with each other produce good returns.  Let us approach our Heavenly Father once again as we seek to produce good fruit for him.

Lord,

Our hearts desire to produce a good return for you.  We long to produce fruit that benefits the body of Christ and brings glory to your name.

Help us hear your voice as we minister in this world.  Help us be fluent in your word—a workman approved—who produces good fruit for you.

Give us eyes to see those things that produce good fruit for you and those that do not.  Grant us wisdom and determination to seek only the things that bring glory to your name.

Amen.

The N in this acronym stands for No Fear.  Fear is real and is always a factor.  Having no fear is not really an option, but not letting fear govern us is within our grasp.  We do not have to give in to fear.  We are reminded that perfect love casts out fear.  It does not mean fear does not exist.  It simply kicks fear to the curb.

Without fear, we might never know courage, but rest assured that God desires us to live governed by courage and not fear.

All three servants knew fear.  Only the third servant was governed by it.  Choose courage over fear.  Remember that we are trusted servants.  God is not setting us up to fail.  He knows what we can handle and we should boldly use our gifts and talents.

Let us go to God once again in prayer.

Heavenly Father,

Help us to be bold.  Help us to fear only you and even then, to know with a blessed assurance that you have set aside our punishment, that Christ Jesus has paid the price for all of our sins.

Help us to be strong and courageous.  Help us to remember that you are with us wherever we go.

Help us to never dilute the gifts and talents that you have bestowed upon us with fear.

Help us to recognize fear for what it is, a tool of the enemy, and live as if we have no fear.

Amen.

We have taken on this parable today with a little different tact, but I hope that our points and prayers this morning have been a good investment on the year ahead. 

We are God’s trusted servants.  Let us act with urgency, desiring to produce fruit for our Lord, and kick fear to the curb every chance that we get.

Let us be people who know that they will hear, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!’

Come and share your Master’s happiness.  Let’s conclude in prayer.

Lord,

We love you.  We want our lives to please you.  We want to take what you have given us and put it to purposeful use without delay.  We want our very lives to be a living sacrifice to you, that they are a pleasant aroma to you.

We want to live unchecked by any fear generated by the enemy, this world, or our own sinful nature.

We want to bring glory to your name.

We desire to live this life as fully as we can by using all that you have given us for your glory.

Help us produce good fruit by all that we do.

In the name of Christ Jesus, we pray.

Amen.

Parable of the Talents - Part I

Read Matthew 25:14-30

If you have known me for a while, you know that the Parable of the Talents is my favorite parable.  Yes, the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son are close contenders, but I have never come across a single parable with so much packed into it. 

I won’t bury the lead.  Tom’s tweet for this parable is, “What did you do with what I gave you?”  It is the question never asked in the parable but for which every servant answered.

To bring the tweet into application mode, we ask:  “What did you do with what God gave you?”

We could put it into the corporate mode and ask:  “What did we do with what God gave us?”

I have preached and written on this parable so many times that we will surely cross some familiar territory.  I will start with my own analogy that I have used over and over again, and then get to the parable particulars.

Imagine that you gave your son a new baseball glove.  You spent some time picking it out.  You knew exactly the one that would be the very best for him.  You catch him a little off-guard when you present it to him, but you have high hopes for what he will do with that glove.

Your son takes the glove and puts it high on a shelf in his room.  It seems to be a safe place, but the glove stays there day after day.  He does not take it down to play catch or go to baseball practice or play in a game.  It is stored safely on his shelf in his room.

It might get scuffed or dirty or even wet if he took it outside.  It would become worn if he used it in practice or games.  So he leaves it preserved, if you will, sitting on the shelf.

The problem is that a baseball glove is supposed to be scuffed from digging ground balls out of the dirt.  It should have grass stains on it from bringing a little blindness to those line drives with eyes by making diving catches and sliding across the outfield.  A baseball glove is meant to be worn and to have wear and tear on it.

It is meant to be cleaned and oiled and even re-laced after time.  It is meant to be put to use.  There is nothing like the smell of a new glove, well, except, wearing off the new glove smell of the glove from putting it to use.

A baseball glove is meant to be put to use.  The son who puts the glove on the shelf for fear of getting it dirty breaks his father’s heart.  The glove is meant to be worn out.

Now to the parable. 

The parable is about the Kingdom of Heaven.  We know that because the parable begins with the word, “again.”  Some of your translations may include what is implied in that word and say, “Again, the Kingdom of Heaven is like.”  Which way is correct?

Neither.  Jesus didn’t use the word again or even refer to the Kingdom of Heaven in the original text that we find in this parable.  Such words provide smoother transitions in our reading and fit into the context of the entire chapter, but we should be careful not to presume that Jesus was just rapid-firing one parable after another.  There was probably some time to digest each teaching before he began the next.

We should also not presume that what we extract from this parable applies only to the end of the age, for this parable is very much about every day of our lives.  It is very much about what Paul would later refer to as working out our salvation.

Let’s get to the four main characters in the story.  First there is a man of some substance.  He has property and money and servants.  Three of his servants are included in this parable.

He is about to go on a journey, so he entrusts the property of his estate to these servants.  He also gives each of them money—a substantial amount of money.  In today’s terms, we are talking hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars. 

This isn’t here’s twenty bucks until I get back.  He gives them 5 talents, 2 talents, and 1 talent worth of money in accordance with their ability. 

This tells us that this man—the master of the servants—knew his servants very well.  He understood what they were capable of, probably because he had trusted them with something smaller before. 

These were men that the master deemed worthy of his trust.  His trust in this story is revealed in talents of money, some of your translations read, “bags of gold.”  Even though the third servant doesn’t fare very well in this story, the master deemed him worthy of trusting him with one bag of gold.  That’s not small potatoes.

These are trusted servants.

Let’s get to the story itself.

The first two servants act immediately.  They went at once and put their master’s money to work.  The term that I prefer here is urgency.  They were not rash or careless, but they acted with urgency. 

Notice also that these two servants didn’t go to work; they put their master’s money to work.  They already had a job—talking care of the master’s property.  Now, they had something extra.

They could have pondered what to do with the money, hoping to find a good investment; instead, they put their master’s money to work right away.  Were they careless?

No, they were prepared to be trusted with something more. 

In the course of their relationship with their master, the servants surely revealed much about themselves to the master, but they also received revelations about their master.  He was a man who expected a return on his investment. 

The third servant described the master as a hard man who expected a return even when it appeared he didn’t make an investment.  I think if the first two servants would have described their master, they would have used the term demanding.  I think the first two would have just said that he sets the bar very high and expects us to meet or exceed his standard.  That’s just who he is.

So knowing this, I expect that the first two servants had something in their hip pocket if their master were to trust them with more responsibility.  They knew their master and knew what he expected and they were ready when they received their talents.

They put them to work at once.  The acted with urgency.

Consider again, that the servants put their master’s money to work.  In the relationship with their master’s money, they became the master or manager of that money.  They put the money to work.

What happened next?  The first two produced a return on investment for their master.  We don’t know what they did, but they were surely wise about it.  The one given 5 bags of gold produced another 5 bags by the time his master returned. 

We do know that the master was gone a long time, so this was likely not an overnight windfall.  They didn’t go to the track or casino because the master would be back in a week.  They were surely wise investors and produced a return on investment for their master, something they knew that he expected.

Let’s talk a little bit about fear.  Investing has risk.  If the risk is low, the return is often low.  The higher the risk, the higher the return, usually.  Things can go wrong.  War, famine, or even the abundance of some commodity reduces the return of the investor.  Ask any wheat farm who has a bumper crop and then finds out that the whole nation is having a bumper crop and the price per bushel drops significantly because there is wheat for sale everywhere.

But, to make money, you have to spend money.  You have to invest money.  There is risk.  With risk comes fear.  Fear is real but the question is whether fear is controlling.  Does fear rule?

We understand that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.  We understand that perfect love casts out fear.  We understand that God loves us so much that we should not fear punishment from him.

But what about fear in the context of buying a $100,000 worth of calves to fatten up and sell?  The fear of Mad Cow disease might not let you write that check.

The fear of drought might cause you to put off such a bold purchase until next year or the year after that, or never at all.

Fear could immobilize people so that nobody ever invested.  But people do invest and they do make money.  Some invest a lot and make a lot.

Wisdom, not fear, must govern those who invest. 

The first two servants did not have to decide as to if they would invest their master’s money.  That was settled in their minds before the money hit their hands.  They would be wise, not fearful investors.

Fear would not adversely impact their decision-making model.  They might lose everything.  That was a real possibility.  They might take huge losses, but if fear controlled them, they would never have a chance to produce a return for their master.

Their desire to please their master was surely greater than the fear of losing all of his money.

We know how the story turned out for these two.  The one trusted with five earned five more.  The one trusted with two earned two more.  Their master was very pleased.

In fact, he said that they had done well with a few things and now he would put them in charge of many things.  Well done!

The master went beyond saying, “Well done!”  He added qualities that he considered noteworthy.  He called each of these two a good and faithful servant.  Good and faithful—who would not want to be commended by our Master with those words.

Then the master in the parable put icing on the parable cake.  “Come and share your master’s happiness.”

The master did not say, “I’m giving you a good tip” or “There will be something extra in your Christmas stocking once people start celebrating Christmas and confuse it all with stockings.”

He said come and enjoy my happiness.  Consider the words of Jesus that we find in John’s gospel.  Jesus told his disciples that he no longer called them servants.  Servants don’t know the will of their master, but you guys understand—as much as you can now—and that makes us friends.

The relationship had changed.

The master in the parable had trusted his servants and expected a return on his investment and they delivered.  In a master-servant relationship, promotions would have been sufficient.  You were in charge of a few things, now you will be in charge of many things.  You get a raise and a corner office and first pick on the doughnuts on Fridays.

But the master added, “Come and share my happiness.”  There was more than a promotion.  There was a significant change in the relationship.  Share my happiness! 

What servant is invited to share his master’s happiness?

We will continue this parable in two more segments, but for now let’s consider what we have gleaned from these first two servants.  I will use the acronym that I constructed almost 10 years ago.  The acronym is TURN.

T is for trusted.  These were trusted servants.  There was a relationship already in place.  The master knew what they were capable of and entrusted them with his property and money accordingly.  The master didn’t just give out his money to anyone and everyone.  He had a trusted relationship with these servants.

U is for urgency.  The first two servants put their master’s money to work at once.  They were the manager in this equation.  The money worked for them and they put it to work right away.  Their own master was demanding of them and they too were demanding of what their master had given them.  They did not give their master’s money any time off.

R is for Return on Investment.  Their master expected and the two servants produced a return on their investment.  ROI is the modern day term—return on investment.

N is for No Fear.  The servants acted as if they had no fear.  Fear was surely a factor.  Risk is involved in most investments, but fear would not be the governing factor.  Fear would not debilitate.  Fear would be recognized for what it was and wisdom would be the prevailing principle. 

This short acronym is not just for the end of the age.  This is good daily counsel for godly people—for the wise. 

We have a relationship with our Master and he has trusted us with gifts and talents and a commission.  We will discuss time, talents, treasure, and the gospel later, but for now know that he gives to us in accordance with who we are.  Every good gift is from above, and in the context of this parable, it is also a trust.  What God gives us is a trust, not a whimsical provision. 

We should also understand that in this trust we find our purpose.  We will never have to live a single day without purpose—a God-given purpose.  I have written and remarked many times that there is no Sabbath to take in a life without purpose.  We will never live in that pitiful state because of the trusted relationship that we have with our Master.

We should live as if tomorrow is not promised to us, even though eternity is.  We must value the hours and days of our lives.  For the things the Lord has given us to do, we do them at once.  My term for this is urgency.  This does not mean that we don’t take time to rest.  It means that what we have been given to do gets done and we can take a Sabbath and rest.  We take care of our master’s business at once.

And we should produce a return. We might call it fruit.  We produce.  It’s not all about a monetary return.  Sometimes, it is about money.  Most of the time it is other things.

And we live this life in freedom not fear.  Fear is a real thing that thrives in this world from generation to generation, but it does not control us or govern us or get invited into our decision-making process.  We assess risk, but we don’t do fear.  The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and discipline but our decisions are not governed by fear.

We will talk more about fear next time.  We will get to the third servant next time.  For now, let’s consider the lessons we can learn from these first two servants.  How did they answer the question that was never asked?

What did you do with what I gave you?  Rephrased for us:  What did we do with what God gave us?  I will be challenging you to ask yourselves this question for the rest of the month.

My hope is that our answers are those that will produce this reply:  Well done good and faithful servant.

Amen.

Read in other translations…