Parable of the Talents

Today concluded our Church's series on Time.  At the start of each year, the church does a series on the 5 rocks of the church: Trinity-centred, Bible Based, Gospel Absorbed, Growth Focused, and Mission Minded; as I said, the overarching topic this year was about Time.  Every week, there has been this quote from Matt Fuller's Book Time for Everything: "You don't have time to do everything you want to do, but you do have time to do everything God wants you to do".

Admittedly, I haven't read the book myself (it is on my WishList!), so this is not a review of the book, and I may have even mis-remembered the exact wording of the quote, however, there is a great truth there - I don't have time to do everything I want to do.  Every minute of the day, I confront that truth.  It is amazing and refreshing to see that there is time to do everything God wants me to do.

The sermon today was on The Parable of the Talents from Matthew 25.  I have linked to the full quote, but the story is a familiar one: a Master gives his Servants talents to look after in his absence.

When he returns, the servants who have doubled their money are praised, and the servant who returns the initial money is chastised.

I have always found this difficult to comprehend - why is the servant who returns the money chastised?  He hadn't lost it, he kept it safe, what is wrong with that?  Sermons in the past have likened the money in the parable, to spiritual gifts or talents, that we should use for God.  You may remember my previous blog post about Spiritual Gifts, and I have been helping more within the church.  However, it has always seemed harsh to me, that if you don't have many gifts, then the little you do have will be taken away.

Well, Sunday's sermon separated the use of the word 'talent' (which incidentally is a measure of weight, approximately 35kg - in which case I am over 2 talents, lol) from our modern understand of talents, being skills or achievements.  It talked about how everything we have is from God, and we should use it all wisely for His glory.

When listening to the sermon it occurred to me, that my trouble with this was the use of the words Master and Servants.  A more relevant analogy (to me, anyway) is that of a business man and his employees:

A business man was very generous, giving his employees a good salary and bonus. He delegates managing his finances to his employees before he departs for a while according to their ability.  One has £5M, one has £2M and one has £1M.   When he returns, he asks his employees to come to account.  The one who was trusted with £5M, worked hard and was able to return it with interest.  Similarly the one who was trusted with £2M worked hard and was able to return it with interest.  The one who only had £1M, didn't work hard at all.  He used his time for himself, and though he was able to return the initial £1M, the business man chastised him for being lazy and wicked.

The sermon from Sunday didn't use the business man analogy, but did explain why the Master was angry with the third servant.  God gives each of us His Blessings and time within which to do good for His Kingdom.  Sometimes this may require us to take a risk, and sometimes that risk may not appear to pay off.  It is up to us, however, to work hard and use our time wisely and faithfully, rather than spending time on selfish pursuits.