Talents
It's tax time, that glorious moment when we list our income, assets, and profits for the government to claim a portion.
Every year I worry that I missed something, left off a zero (LoL), or put a comma in the wrong place. It's a moment of great anxiety, but it's also a moment of great clarity for me. I look at what we have, and it becomes clear that we have more than we need, and that God has been taking care of us all along, regardless of how we feel about things from moment to moment.
It's easy for us to forget when the bills come due that the poorest among us are really quite wealthy compared to 90% of the world's population. It's also easy for us to forget that the question we should ask ourselves as the bills come due, or when we are doing our annual review of our finances for taxes, is, "Am I being faithful with the resources I've been given?"
In today's story from Matthew Jesus tells a story about money that's not really just about money. It's the parable of the Talents. A talent in Ancient Israel was a weight measurement of money that was about 75 pounds of money. Imagine measuring your money in pounds! One talent was about 20 years' salary for an average day laborer. That's a lot.
In Jesus' story, an obviously rich man goes on a trip and leaves his money with his servants. To one he have 5 talents (!), to another 2, and to another 1. Altogether we're looking at 160 years worth of salary! This is a HUGE amount of money!
2 of the servants invested the money and doubled it. The 3rd, the servant who was given 1 talent, was afraid to lose the money, so he buried it to keep it safe. I get it. This is a large amount of money, and what if he lost it? But the man was angry at the 3rd servant, and called him a wicked slave. He took that talent and gave it to the one who started with 5.
Jesus has shifted from calling out the religious establishment for missing the point of the Old Testament Messianic prophecies to pointing to the future in chapters 24-25. He predicted the destruction of Jerusalem and spoke of His return in judgment and to restore all things.
The parable of the Talents speaks of future believers (us), entrusted with the care of and growth of the Kingdom, and how they steward the material and non-material resources they have been given. The New Testament is clear that everything we have is given to us by the Father, and ultimately belongs to Him. Our responsibility is to be faithful with the finances, resources, gifts, and abilities we have been given.
It would be a great tragedy for a person who has been entrusted with incredible resources to bury them, or to waste them on temporary or selfish things. We are called as stewards of the great wealth of gifts, and we are called to invest them in eternal things and in building the Kingdom of God.
So imagine if tomorrow were the end of days, and Christ returns to fully establish His Kingdom on earth. Would He find you to be faithful with the resources with which you've been entrusted?
Every year I worry that I missed something, left off a zero (LoL), or put a comma in the wrong place. It's a moment of great anxiety, but it's also a moment of great clarity for me. I look at what we have, and it becomes clear that we have more than we need, and that God has been taking care of us all along, regardless of how we feel about things from moment to moment.
It's easy for us to forget when the bills come due that the poorest among us are really quite wealthy compared to 90% of the world's population. It's also easy for us to forget that the question we should ask ourselves as the bills come due, or when we are doing our annual review of our finances for taxes, is, "Am I being faithful with the resources I've been given?"
In today's story from Matthew Jesus tells a story about money that's not really just about money. It's the parable of the Talents. A talent in Ancient Israel was a weight measurement of money that was about 75 pounds of money. Imagine measuring your money in pounds! One talent was about 20 years' salary for an average day laborer. That's a lot.
In Jesus' story, an obviously rich man goes on a trip and leaves his money with his servants. To one he have 5 talents (!), to another 2, and to another 1. Altogether we're looking at 160 years worth of salary! This is a HUGE amount of money!
2 of the servants invested the money and doubled it. The 3rd, the servant who was given 1 talent, was afraid to lose the money, so he buried it to keep it safe. I get it. This is a large amount of money, and what if he lost it? But the man was angry at the 3rd servant, and called him a wicked slave. He took that talent and gave it to the one who started with 5.
Jesus has shifted from calling out the religious establishment for missing the point of the Old Testament Messianic prophecies to pointing to the future in chapters 24-25. He predicted the destruction of Jerusalem and spoke of His return in judgment and to restore all things.
The parable of the Talents speaks of future believers (us), entrusted with the care of and growth of the Kingdom, and how they steward the material and non-material resources they have been given. The New Testament is clear that everything we have is given to us by the Father, and ultimately belongs to Him. Our responsibility is to be faithful with the finances, resources, gifts, and abilities we have been given.
It would be a great tragedy for a person who has been entrusted with incredible resources to bury them, or to waste them on temporary or selfish things. We are called as stewards of the great wealth of gifts, and we are called to invest them in eternal things and in building the Kingdom of God.
So imagine if tomorrow were the end of days, and Christ returns to fully establish His Kingdom on earth. Would He find you to be faithful with the resources with which you've been entrusted?
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