Faithful Servants, Worthless Servants

Gracious heavenly Father, we cling to your promise that your Word never returns empty, always accomplishes its purposes and so we pray that we might have good hearts to be good soil. We might not be hardened; we might be made soft and pliable. You might till the soil of our hearts to receive your Word, and I pray that you would give me a gracious humble heart, that I might decrease and Christ would increase. I would speak with a lowliness of spirit and yet with a boldness declaring your Word and oh Lord give us yours to hear, we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Please turn in your Bibles to Matthew chapter 25. First book of the New Testament, the first Gospel, Matthew, you’re reading verses 14 through 30. We’ve been looking at a series of parables that Jesus tells in and around the temple during Holy Week. We read in chapter 26:1 when Jesus had finished all these sayings he said to his disciples, “You know that after two days the Passover is coming.” So, it seems that all these parables he told on Tuesday, we can calI it Teaching Tuesday, these five parables of the two sons, the tenants, the wedding feast, the 10 virgins, and now the Parable of the Talents. Follow along as I read beginning at verse 14.

“For it will be like a man going on a journey who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them and he made five talents more, so also, he who had the two talents made two talents more, but he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s money. Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with him and he who had received the five talents came forward brining five talents more, saying master you delivered to me five talents, here I have made five talents more.” “His master said to him, well done good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little, I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.” And he also, who had the two talents came forward saying, “Master, you delivered to me two talents, here I’ve made two talents more.” His master said to him, “Well done, good and faithful servant, you have been faithful over a little, I will set you over much, enter into the joy of your master.” He also who had received the one talent came forward saying, “Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sew and gathering where you scattered no seeds, so I was afraid and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.” But his master answered him, “You wicked and slothful servant, you knew that I’d reap where I have now sown and gather where I scattered no seed, then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest so take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents for to everyone who has will more be given and he will have an abundance, but from the one who has not even what he has will be taken away and cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

The beginning of chapter 24. You see there, Jesus leaves the temple, verses 1 and 2, and he walks away, and Jesus predicts in 24:2, “You see all these, they will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.” He’s predicting the coming judgement of the Lord and as prophecies work in the Old Testament and the New Testament, there’s usually a near fulfillment and a far fulfillment, so He is most immediately here in this so-called Olivette Discourse, in Matthew 24, he is talking about the coming judgment upon Jerusalem and the temple that will come in 70 A.D., but also there are elements of this prophecy that are looking forward to the end of the age and that’s why his disciples ask him when will these things happen, what will be the sign of your coming and the end of the age? The simple answer to the disciples question is given in chapter 24:36, look there, Jesus says “Concerning that day and hour, no one knows, not even the angels of heaven nor the son, but the Father only.” The divine Son of God possess all of the attributes of deity and so He possess the attribute of omniscience, but here according to His human nature He can truly say that according to His human nature He does not know the day or the hour. Jesus will talk of signs and pointers, but he does not know the precise time, only the Father knows. So, you can be sure when anyone comes along and says, “Here are the 88 reasons Jesus is coming back in 1988.” That was an actual book, it sold well in 1988. Then as often happens and someone recalibrates and says, “Well actually I miss calculated one thing” and so they try to reissue it for coming years. As soon as someone comes along and says, “We know when the end will be” you can be quite certain that that’s not when the end will be. Only the Father knows and so look at 24:42, therefore here is the conclusion of the matter, here’s the application of that reality, stay awake. You do not know on what day your Lord is coming. Now when that particular illustration, stay awake, other ways of putting the same message, be prepared, get ready, stay alert which of course is what last week’s parable, Parable of the Ten Virgins was all about. Five wise virgins, think something like bridesmaids to attend the bridal party and there were five foolish and their job in the evening was to come out with their lanterns lit, probably like torches wrapped in rags, dipped in olive oil, and to escort the groom to the wedding feast that would have been at his parent’s house and five were wise because they brought extra oil for their lamps, for their torches, and five were foolish because they did not think that there might be a delay, they presumed that if they got into a pinch they could simply borrow from the five who are wise, but of course you cannot borrow someone else’s faith, you cannot borrow your way into the kingdom of heaven. They were foolish, they were not prepared.

Look at 25:13. The conclusion to that story, “Watch therefore for you know neither the day nor the hour.” So that’s what Jesus has been talking about, stay awake, stay alert, be prepared. Jesus then tells this parable, the Parable of the Talents, that he might explain and give application following on the heels of the Parable of the Ten Virgins. I love this story, the Parable of the Talents. Many of you have probably heard it before, it has very familiar imagery, it has things that even have come down into our common discourse to bury your talent to the ground, to each according to his ability. In fact, as we’ll see the word talent here is a unit of money, it doesn’t mean talent, but because it’s so related to that idea of opportunity we have our English word, talent, which we use to mean skill or ability. This is a very familiar story. One of the reasons that I love it is because it answers that question that you might have in your mind after the Parable of the Ten Virgins, which is to watch. Okay, so what does it mean? Be ready, Jesus is coming. A thief in the night, we don’t know when he will come, he may be delayed, but he will come. What does it mean to be ready? Well, this Parable of the Talents tells us what it means to watch, to be watchful, to be waiting does not mean that you are to embrace a life of passivity, but rather we see here great activity. Think about the illustration I gave at the end of the sermon last week. This very diligent babysitter. So, the babysitter is there, the parents have gone away. What does it look like if the parents way, “We are going to come back maybe around 10 o’clock and I want you to have everything ready for us when we return. I want you to watch, stay awake, stay alert.” Now does that mean that the babysitter is from 7 o’clock onwards sort of creepily just opening the blinds, staring out the window, when are they coming, when are they here, and then the lights will come and they will enter and they will find the place a complete wreck and the children have not been fed and everything is a mess and the babysitter says, “Well I was watching.” That’s now what watching and waiting and staying alert, what would a faithful babysitter do? This is just sort of just casting our pearls, any of you want to babysit the young children. There may be a delay, hours, thousands of years perhaps. Waiting and watching in that context means the children have been fed, they have been cleaned up, they got their pajama on, they’re nestled in bed, you’ve done the dishes, you’ve got things cleaned up, and you say, “We were ready.” That’s what it means to be ready and in a similar way this story about the talents tells to us, okay here’s what Jesus means. He doesn’t mean that you passively just sit there and do nothing.

I remember when I was in college and growing a lot in my faith and then some of us have that experience and it was a great time and as college students are sometimes apt to do, start to think in sort of extremes and I remember talking to a friend of mine who was also growing a lot while we were at college and he had this idea, sort of half serious and I listened to him maybe sort of an eighth serious, but we were talking, ya know, we’re so ready to serve the Lord, maybe we should just drop out of school, maybe we should just read our Bibles full time, just pray, just read our Bibles, just share our faith and there are worse impulses for someone in college to have and to do, and as I said my friend was maybe half serious and I listened to him and was in eighth serious and we eventually came around and said, “Well I think that maybe we can finish school and maybe there’s a whole lifetime of ways that we can serve.” That when you’re excited about Jesus, it doesn’t usually mean that you just quit everything you’re doing, drop everything you’re doing and just read your bible and pray and peer through the blinds until He comes again. We see here in this story of the talents what does it mean to be prepared, to watch, to live a life of preparation and anticipation. For either the Lord to return, to pray that it would come soon, or you know not the day or the hour when you will be called to stand before God and to give an account for your life. Like most parables at a basic level this parable is very easy to understand. Even if you had never read the Bible before you could guess the meaning of the parable is something like, do something with what you’ve been given. We see that in many of these parables. The two sons, commitment without followthrough counts for nothing. The Parable of the Tenants, the stone that builders rejected has become the cornerstone or the wedding feast. Many are called but few are chosen or the ten virgins, the lesson is be prepared. Well, here you have the lesson, do something with what you’ve been given.

Like most of Jesus’ parables, this one employs certain stock metaphors. This is how you can understand these stories. When Jesus tells a parable, fathers, masters, kings, rulers, usually refer to God, sons, servants, slaves usually refer to God’s people or at least those who thought they were God’s people, and then banquets, harvests, financial reckonings, those all refer to divine judgement. And we see all of those basic elements in this story. The master is God, the servants are his people, and the settling of accounts is the day of divine judgement, and the point then is rather obvious, God wants us to be faithful with what he has entrusted to us. If we are faithful and we do well, joy. If we do poorly, misery. Not let me hasten to add (we do not take Jesus’ parables that each one he is now meaning to give us a very precise definition of justification by faith alone.) So Jesus is not suggesting that you need to show that you’ve done enough good things, then you go do heaven, and if you don’t to enough good things, you go to hell, but rather he is saying what sort of evidence would there be in someone’s life that you truly love and believe and serve the master.

Parable of Talents 101, be faithful with what you have been given. But we can go a little deeper because is often the case, in a parables there’s one big idea on the surface, and then often there are sub lessons with each of the characters in the story, and often there are three lessons corresponding with three characters or three groups. Think of how many of Jesus’ parables have threes. There’s a father, there’s an older brother, there’s a younger brother. Workers in the vineyard, there’s an employer, there’s the early workers, there’s the late workers. The parable of the unmerciful servant, there’s the king, there’s the first servant, there’s his fellow servant. The tenants, there’s a landowner, the first tenants, the second tenants. It’s not an exact rule, but there are often threes and often there is a lesson that comes with each of the three characters and that’s what we find here.

First lesson then. Life the master, so we’re gonna look at the master, the faithful servants, the wicked servant. Like the master God entrusts to us a portion of his resources and expects a return on his investment. He entrusts to us a portion of what all belongs to him, and he expects a return on his investment. Now here’s where we have to come back to this word, talent, you see in verse 15. To one he gave five talents. The Greek word is talanton, so you can understand why it’s translated as talent, but this does not mean ability, as we use the word talent. This is not Judea’s got talent; that’s not how the word is used. Talent is a monetary unit; it was a great sum of money. You can see a footnote in the ESV, a monetary unit worth about 20 years wages for a laborer and that seems to be on the evidence that the best guess of the amount. Think about what a working man might make in half of his career. I don’t know if you wanna say that’s 50,000 dollars or you’ve got a really nice job and that’s 100,000 dollars, but a talent then is maybe a million dollars, maybe two million dollars. This is a large sum of money that he is entrusting to these servants. We know that talent does not mean ability because, look at verse 15, to one he gave five, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. So, talent cannot mean ability because the talents are given here according to each man’s ability. So, think then what does talent represent? This sum of money given to each servant is representative not of ability, but of opportunity. I think that’s the simplest way when you read the story, what should you have in your mind, the talent represents an opportunity to serve the master. According to their abilities he gives to them this sum of money which is representative of opportunities they have to serve the master. So, here’s the reality we have to just be honest about from this parable. “We are not all given the same opportunities.” It’s a fact. We don’t all have the same abilities. If a talent is an opportunity, Jesus says “I’m giving to some more opportunities according to their abilities.”

Now listen very carefully. People deserve to be treated with equal dignity as made in God’s image. We all have a right to be treated equally under the law, and we can say even more than that it’s good to have a political and economic system that gives people the freedom to dream and work hard and get ahead and that’s always been the so-called American dream that whoever you are, you can work hard and make something for yourself, and we hope that that would be the case, but we do not all have the same abilities or the same opportunities. That’s a fact. And Jesus acknowledges that fact. It’s true in everyday life and it’s true in our spiritual lives and according to this story that’s simply the master’s sovereign way of doing things. You just look around and you recognize that some people it’s like Joseph in the Old Testament. You read through the Joseph story and over and over again it says, “And the Lord was with him and the Lord was with him, the Lord was with him. “If you know that famous quip when Billy Graham was getting his start and the newspaper magnet said to the reporters who were covering Graham at his crusade gave two words, “Puff Graham.” In other words, I want you to make a big deal of this Billy Graham as he was getting started out and the Lord and his sovereignty used that to give him a voice and a platform. God gives to each of us different abilities, different opportunities. But he gives to each one of us meaningful and important kingdom work to accomplish. And so, here’s one of the applications, if you think of your life as someone who has been given all sorts of opportunities and you think, boy where I am now I never thought I’d be able to do the things that I do or go to the places that I go or talk to the people or do the things, I never thought this was possible. Don’t be haughty, thank God for the five talents that he’s given you and invest them wisely. There’s no reason that this first man should say, “Hey, hey I’ve got five, you’ve got two, you’ve got one. You add them together you’re only barely half of what I have.” It was the master’s decision to give so we ought not to be haughty, and if the Lord seems to have given you, perhaps at this stage of life, it’s not static throughout life, fewer opportunities, perhaps smaller resources, do not be envious, do not be discouraged, but thank God for the two talents and invest them wisely.

I’ve said this before, it bears repeating again. One of the marks of Christian maturity is that we learn to root for each other, we learn to root for each other, we root for other good Gospel preaching churches, Bible believing churches in town, and by God’s grace there are many of them in Charlotte. I remember early in ministry as I was praying earnestly all the time for the Lord to bring revival, ya know, zip the Lord convicted me and brought to my mind, well what if I answer that prayer, but I start at the Baptist church, not your church, probably would start at the Baptist church. Then do you want revival? What if I give the blessing that you’re praying for to someone else. Do you have the ability to look around and when you see other people blessed you say, “Ah, thank you God.” Some of us are the blessing police, we’re always looking around, “No, you don’t deserve that, you don’t deserve that.” Now that’s Matthew 20, that’s the parable of the laborers in the vineyard and the people that showed up and worked through the heat of the day and they got exactly what God promised to them, they got one denarius and then those who came at the 11th hour, they also got one denarius and those who had been there earlier said, “God you’re not fair”, because they thought that God was too gracious with other people. Do you ever think of that? I like God being gracious, but come on, within reason, gracious to me, not so gracious to other, or forgive them, fine, I don’t want people to go to hell, go to heaven. But you see the blessing that they’re giving, you see the opportunities, you’ve seen the abilities to live that life of comparison is no way to live and you know this as a fact. There will always be people who have more and always have less, always be people, if you make your thing how you look, somebody’s more beautiful, somebody’ less. You’re making money, somebody’s got more, a bigger house, somebody has less. There will always be people with fewer opportunities and ability, and there will always be people with more opportunities and ability. If you look at someone in your life, whatever field you’re in, or if you’re very spiritual and you have just spiritual ambition and you look at somebody who seems to have all these spiritual opportunities and you think, well I bet they never struggle with any kind of pride or comparison. Well then you don’t know the human heart.

I remember years ago at my last church and one time Alistair Begg came and did a little conference for us, and he preached there at University Reformed Church, and I had somebody come up to me afterward and with complete seriousness, so excited, heard Alistair Begg preach, and they said, “Pastor, how does it feel to be the second best preacher to ever preach from this pulpit?” I said, “Well it didn’t feel so bad until right now.” Yeah, okay, I was really glad he had been there, and I had to deal with that. I remember speaking at a conference one time, David Platt was the speaker. I remember seeing on someone’s Facebook page from my church, “I would speak at the same conference, I preached also”, and then he preached, and somebody wrote there as if I cannot spy on their Facebook page, “David Platt just gave the greatest sermon I’ve ever heard.” You couldn’t even put in parentheses, “Outside of my local church”, or something to just in case, in case. Doesn’t matter what the Lord has given you, if you live the life of comparison it will be a miserable life. The lesson here from the master is that God gives to us according to his sovereign mercy these opportunities, and you could look at that discouragingly and say, “Well I bet I’m the one and not the two or the five”, or you could look at it and be vein and arrogant and say, “Well I bet I’m the five and not the two, not the one.

You ever see those studies and they ask people to rate themselves on intellect or beauty on a scale of 1 to 10. You know what everybody, almost always, I just saw one of these, they were rating how good looking you think you are, everyone said, “Ah about a, probably 7-1/2 or 8”, because you don’t wanna say 10, that sounds like you’re vein, but you think probably. We all would like to think that we’re the five talent or maybe you’re really hard on yourself and you feel bad because you’re sure you’re the one talent. Jesus says, “I don’t want you to think that way. What I want you to think is I’ve given to all of you some opportunity. You have private ministry; you have public ministry. Every Christian in this room, there are people in your life that need encouragement, counsel, prayer. There are people we all know who do not know Jesus, you can share the Gospel with them. There are ministries you can support out of your wealth and resources. There are people perhaps you can employ and maybe someone you can give a second chance in the workforce, maybe you can write letters or maybe at this season in your life the main ministry responsibility and opportunity you have are your children. Maybe it’s a friend who needs a friend or someone who doesn’t have a friend and needs you to be a friend. Maybe our grandchildren are the opportunity for Gospel influence. God does not expect you to do more than He has given to you, that’s the good news. He does not expect you to do more than He has given to you. I know why at Christian schools we talk about changing the world and there’s a good way to think about that and dream big and have ambition, yet it’s pretty hard to know what you’d do tomorrow morning to change the world, but you can be faithful with whatever job He’s given you, whatever influence He’s given you, whatever people in your life who need you to be a mature faithful Christian and witness. Like the master God entrusts to us a portion of his resources. He gives to every Christian in this room, you have opportunities.

Second lesson. Life the good servants, if we are faithful with what he has been given to us, we will be rewarded with great responsibility and with great joy. If we are faithful, we will be rewarded with great responsibility and with great joy. Don’t you love that word, well done good and faithful servant. God is not concerned with how much; he is concerned with how faithful. Exact same commendation. One servant comes back, alright what do you have to show for yourself? “I have”, let’s say a talent is two million dollars,” I have 10 million dollars.” Next servant comes, “I have four million dollars.” The master says to each one of them the exact same words of encouragement. Why? Because they were faithful with what they had been given. Did not expect the one who had two talents to come back with five, but he came back with two. And you need to realize if with your station in life, you’re a stay-at-home mom, do not judge your kingdom influence by dollars, notoriety, you’ll be discouraged, you’ll be discontent, you’ll envy the life of some influencer out there. Rather look at the opportunities you have with your neighbors, with the circle of influence, with people in your church and you neighborhood, with your kids, and make your focus ministry, not simply moms and dads, that we want these children on loan to us from God, that we want these children to be brilliant, goodlooking, piano playing, athletic, wonderful children. Wouldn’t it be great if they checked all those boxes? But what sort of kingdom investment are you making with your children. Don’t just raise children who have what it takes to be successful, raise children who delight in Jesus more than in success and if you’re retired, yes you can retire from a vocation, we never retire from serving the Lord. If you’re retired, maybe you’re even in declining health, you still have some of the master’s talents. You’ve put in your years with Bank of America, your heavenly Father still wants your service. You have time to write or to pray or to encourage, or maybe to teach or to give, and young people don’t think that this is just a lesson for people when they become adults, whatever that equals someday. Young people you don’t know when Jesus is coming back, you don’t know when you will have to give an account before Jesus, so whatever age you are, you too need to be ready. Don’t think this is, I wait til I’m older and then I start living for Jesus, that’s great, I do what I want now, maybe when I’m 25 I live for Jesus. That may be too late, and besides you have opportunities right now, you have people in your life who need the truth of God’s Word, you have people in your life who need a friend, a witness, that need Jesus, and what’s true spiritually, young people, is usually true in all of life. That is, the surest way to be put in charge of great things someday is to be faithful with small things today. Now I know that’s not the main point of the passage because this is a divine reckoning and some way Jesus may even be saying that you are given great authority in the kingdom to come and heaven seems to be a place where there’s still ambition and work and dreams and opportunity to exercise, gifts, and authority, but there is a lesson here that when you are given a little, that’s usually where you start out in life, in fact the people who take a shortcut and before they’re ready are given the opportunity to have great things, rarely do they do well with that. Maybe it’s because of their daddy or because they had some money and they sort of made a shortcut, doesn’t usually turn out well. The only way, usually, to be entrusted with great things in life, you’ve got that ambition, you wanna make a difference, you wanna change the world, you wanna be entrusted with some great thing, you start by being faithful with small things. And just like this master who says, “Look you did a great job, I gave you five, I gave you two, and you were faithful with what I gave you and now I will entrust to you something even more. Every one of us have been given these opportunities according to our abilities. Think about your life. Do you have money, do you have a platform, you have relationships, are you good with people, do you have neighbors, are you part of an institution, a school, a board, an organization? Do you have influence with people “below you” who work for you? Do you have influence with “people above you?” Have you been given a world class education? Maybe you have time, maybe you have skills to serve others, to fix things, to build things. Maybe you’re good at talking to strangers. Think if you were just to look around this room at Christ Covenant Church, with all humility, I think we could say there are a lot of five talent folks. Now again, talent meaning opportunity, opportunities. To whom much is given, much is required.

If you didn’t grow up at the church, in any church, and you just came to Jesus, wonderful. Maybe you grew up in a terrible home, abusive, dysfunctional. Maybe you had to feed yourself just to scrape by. God is still going to give you opportunities to serve Him. You are not a second class Christian because you’re a first generation Christian. These parables blow up that kind of presumption. At the same time, listen, if you have been in a good church from the day you were born, and have two loving parents and have never known real hunger, and you had all the best opportunities of education, you’ve already seen multiple continents and travel, do not turn your back on the millions of dollars of opportunity that God has entrusted to you. You have not been given all of that privilege so you and I an simply maximize our won comfort. Notice, I love what it says here in verse 16, “He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them.” He’s eager, he’s entrepreneurial. The good servants are eager to use what the master gave them, eager to serve, eager to make a difference rather than stretching back and saying wow, wow, 10 million dollars. I’m gonna get some fun things in first. This servant says, at once what an opportunity I have, I’m gonna try to turn a prophet and make something out of these five talents and what a commendation the master gives to both of the faithful servants. We’ve heard it many times before, it often shows up at funerals, well done good and faithful servants. Intern to the joy of your master. One servant made five talents, the other servant made two talents, and they both received the exact same reward which was to hear from the master, well done, come on in, I will set you over much, whether that’s about much in this life or the next life, or simply a general statement of commendation, I’ll set you over much and notice this is not just a word that God gives to pastors and missionaries. Okay, God’s got a special blessing for pastors and missionaries, no this is true for every true Christian because every true Christian takes seriously that he or she has been given abilities and opportunities by God to be used for God’s glory.

I’m sure you’ve all had someone in your life that you really, really looked up to, a parent, a grandparent, a coach, a teacher, and to have especially when they are very demanding and you have the upmost respect for them, and you know them not to be a flatterer, they’re not just mindlessly buttering you up. To hear from that hard but fair admirable man or woman even a simple word, well done. You keep going, and keep going, it means the world and to think that God himself will say this to everyone of his faithful servants, “You did it, I’m proud of you.” I hope you have parents who say that. Parents, I hope you say that. You know this almost sounds unspiritual, but that’s a measure of how we get this whole thing twisted up. Do you know that God can be proud of you? Not just, well, you’re really disgusting to him, but he looks at Jesus and therefore, eeehh, I’ll let you into heaven and sneak by. I know you got justified, but do you know even though all of our works are yet imperfect, that for the sake of Christ he can and is pleased with his faithful children. Do you even think of God boasting about you to the angels, look at what she did, I know, she didn’t have much, but look what she did with everything that she had, I’m so proud of her. Because if you don’t know that God can feel that way towards to you and sing over you with those kind of praises then you’re going to end up like this third servant.

Here’s the third lesson. Like the wicked servant, if we are lazy stewards we will be spiritually useless and severely punished. One of the things that Jesus does, He’s a master teacher, is in his parables in particular, He gets us to sympathize with the wrong people. Do you ever find this? I do, even though I’ve read these thousands of times, I still, I read the parable of the prodigal son, and I know about it, and I’ve read Keller’s book and all of that, and yet I read it and every time I read it I sort of like, well that older brother sort of has a point, doesn’t he? He was there and you just threw a big party. You ever feel that? Or the parables of the workers in the vineyard. I resonate with the people who’ve been working 12 hours in the hot sun all day and these Johnny come latelys march in there and work for one hour and they get the same thing. When I was growing up there was a park nearby and they were doing a community building day to build this big play structure and my friend and I saw that at the end of the workday that they were going to serve, this was about the best food I could imagine. They were gonna serve Little Ceasars pizza and I think it was $5.00 then and just will be, no probably inflations his that too, but $5.00 and we looked live slightly unspiritual, but shrewd workers, and we showed up at about 4:15 and we put in 45 hours of raking around looking for something and we were there and we got all the Little Ceasars we could eat. Even though some people had been there a long time, and if I had been there a long time I would have looked at us yahoos and said, “Well that’s not fair”, just like I look at those in the parable of the workers in the vineyard and so here a part of me really feels sorry for this last worker. Do you find your heart kinda going out to him saying, well but master he didn’t lose it, he didn’t squander it on prostitutes, he just didn’t want to disappoint you. He knew that you’re a hard man and he didn’t want to mess up his life, and he didn’t want you to be disappointed in him, and he was a little bit afraid and he was timid and he was passive so he buried it, but when you came he said, master I didn’t lose it, here it is, your talent, I buried it in the ground. Don’t you find part of you saying, well yeah, he didn’t get another 10 or four million dollars, but he didn’t lose it, he didn’t bet it on horses and have to say sorry it’s all gone. I find my heart resonating with the wrong person in the story. Jesus, through the master, rebukes him, why, now here’s where this is going to hit many of us. Because this last servant, his main goal was to cover his back. He had a “spirituality” that was about security more than service. He was too scared, too slothful to take a risk for the cause of the master. He was so afraid of doing something wrong that he didn’t do anything at all. He didn’t want to commit. Remember Jesus is telling these parables mainly to the religious leaders, to the scribes, to the pharisees, the chief priests. In some of those other stories it’s easier to see how Jesus is really hitting them between the eyes, but do you see what Jesus is saying to them here, because remember what set off all of these conversations back in Matthew chapter 21, is they don’t like Jesus’ authority and they wanna ask by what authority He does these things and Jesus says, well by what authority, what do you think about John, and they, well they don’t really like John, but the people like John so they say we don’t know and Jesus says, well I can’t tell you either. These people, they don’t like Jesus, but they see that he’s popular and so they’re too afraid to really come down and make a decision. Jesus is saying, do you see you’re like this, lazy third servant who’s looking at Jesus and they’re saying, well hmm, I don’t know if I really like him, but a lot of people do like him and so I guess I’m just not gonna come down one way or another, at least not publically, not yet, I’m gonna hide this in the ground and say, see I didn’t make a mess of it. They figure the safest course with Jesus is to do nothing at all. That is not safe. Again, the issue as it has been in all five parables is presumption. They think we’re good to go so just lay low, just don’t do anything. We need more risk-taking Christians.

There is a great, almost overwhelming danger for people like me and like many of you. Homeowning, probably debt paying, children raising Christians to bury our opportunities because we are averse to taking risks. Now we have all the proverbs coming in about being wise and not being reckless of course. With the wicked lazy servant to warn us, however, we must ask ourselves this uncomfortable question, do we have a religion which consists most fundamentally and trying very hard not to mess things up, that’s not a way to live, that’s not how Jesus wants us to life, a play it safe kind of faith. Does our Christianity boil down to this, I don’t do anything really bad and then I enjoy a nice life. That’s probably a lot of church going people in Charlotte. I don’t do anything really, really bad and I like Jesus, and I live a good life. But there’s no effort to steward all that God has given you and if there is no effort to steward that and make a return on the investment that God has made in your life and you’re burying that talent in the ground, it says something about how little you love and trust this God. See at the heart of it, this wicked servant, why is he so wicked, why does he get cast into outer darkness, because he did not know what God is really like. He said, I know you’re a hard man, that is you’re implacable, you’re strict, you’re harsh, you’re merciless. Now notice when Jesus repeats what the man says he doesn’t own that description of the master, now even though he says he reaps where he does not sew, he may not be affirming that, but he’s just repeating his statement, but he very deliberately does not own this description of the master of himself as implacable, strict, harsh, merciless. Do you think that God is impossible to please? The third servant went wrong from the very beginning. He had a wrong view of what God was like and this seeps in, not in our formal theology, but in our informal heart theology. Some of you have these two planks, wrong ideas in your head. Number one, God cannot be pleased and number two, therefore I cannot do anything for God. I can be justified, I can go to heaven yes, forgiveness yes, but I cannot do anything to please God. Think about the contrast with this parable and the previous one.

The foolish virgins failed because they thought their responsibility was easy. The wicked servant here fails because he thinks his responsibility is too hard. Too easy, I don’t have to be prepared, eh, I can borrow oil from somebody else, so they’re not ready. This servant, it’s too hard. It is those who do not try who are condemned. If following Jesus means for you nothing more than go to church when convenient, try not to have an affair, try not to say any bad words, not to be a bad person, then you have not grasped all that Jesus is talking about this kingdom life, to actively follow and think of ministry above comfort and security. Some of you have tremendous entrepreneurial gifts when it comes to business, or you are not afraid of putting in the absolute hardest most disciplined effort for your instrument or your artistry or your athletic ability. Some of you dabble in a dozen different ventures and you seem to be good at all of it and you know how to invest your money in high-yield investments. Don’t look at those investments right now. And you are risk takers, we need risk takers for God, we need kingdom entrepreneurs, those you aren’t afraid to dream, to strike out at a great vision, to risk your life for cross cultural mission or risk comfort for the sake of justice and righteousness or here’s a really hard one, risk relational ease and comfort to confront sin or even harder to repent of your sin, to die to ourselves, become radical cross-carrying, burden-burying, self-denying followers of Jesus. It takes courage, guts, holy entrepreneurial spirit that we might be maximally useful to the master. For those outside the fold the warning is this, what have you done with your opportunity to make much of Jesus? You were created for worship, have you missed the reason for your existence in staying away from Christ and for those of us who are insiders, if you have a religion that is only keep your nose out of trouble and don’t rock the boat and play it safe and bury your talent in the ground, then you do not have the sort of attitude that Jesus wants. This parable is a warning, it’s a warning to the lazy, to the wicked, but I want you to note on this Palm Sunday that this parable is also an invitation. As Jesus stood outside Jerusalem and he wept because He said if only you had known the things that would make for peace, Jesus knew that when He entered that city, they would crucify Him and thought they had every opportunity to worship Him, they would not do it. This parable is a warning, but it is also an invitation for every Christian in this room to think and to realize that God, your master, your heavenly Father is not impossible to please. Good news, He’s given you abilities. Good news, He’s given to each of you opportunities, one talent, two talents, five talents, good news, and He will give to each one of His faithful servants that great commendation, well done. Enter into the joy of your master. Let’s pray.

Father in heaven, we give thanks for your Holy Word would you stir it up, stir in us a holy faith, a holy boldness and whatever small, medium, large opportunities you have for us, the risks are often not of the noticeable world shaking kind, but they are quite often of the very personal relational kind. So, help us Lord to make the most of all that you have given to us, surely the lines have fallen for us in pleasant places and we are richly blessed. So, as we praise you, and you send us out, help us to be faithful in Jesus’ name. Amen.