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Matthew 25: 1–30
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May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be
acceptable in thy sight, O Lord our strength and our redeemer.
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Though it’s hard to tell from the words I just read, the Gospel
passage we just heard comes in the final, dark week of Jesus’
life – a week when he is faced with increasingly hostile crowds.
As he hints to his disciples what must soon happen to him, no one knows
exactly what he himself understood. But clearly he knew more than they
did – and he’s trying to warn them of what is to
come – not just for him, but for them as well. So he tells them a
story about a man who is planning to go away on a long journey, who
entrusts his servants with some valuable gifts and some major
responsibility.
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To one trusted servant he gave five talents of silver. To a second two
talents. And a third received a single talent. Now a single biblical
talent represented a large amount of silver – 34 kilograms, to be
exact. And in those days that much silver was worth a huge amount of
money – close to half a million dollars in our currency or 20
years wages in theirs. So each talent the man bestowed on these
servants indicated the high level of trust he had for each one of them.
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And it wasn’t unusual in that first century world for an absentee
patriarch to entrust his business affairs to certain trusted slaves.
Great households were the closest thing they had to the modern
corporation – and the slaves who worked their way up in their
master’s esteem were called stewards. So this man was not simply
expecting ordinary household servants to keep his money safe. He was
entrusting something of great value to men whose financial gifts and
abilities he had come to trust. Now he expected them to invest that
money wisely and make it grow by the time he returned – so it could
benefit the entire household.
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Now, often enough, this parable comes at a point in our year of
lectionary readings that coincides with the church’s Annual
Stewardship Drive. And that might be how you have heard this parable
interpreted in years past – as an appeal to share financially with
the church as liberally as God has blessed you. God gave to you,
initially – intellectual gifts, a financially rewarding job, an
education, perhaps, and certainly the gift of life itself. So when he
comes back at the end of time he will certainly ask you to show him what
you have made of these gifts, how you have used them to bless his Body
the Church. And I wouldn’t say that that financial interpretation
of the parable is wrong. It just falls short of all that this parable
suggests.
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For Jesus is telling his disciples this parable just a few days before he
himself will be going away – back to his Father in heaven, after
the Roman and Jewish authorities have put him to death. He has entrusted
them with the knowledge of the Kingdom of God, and just like the gift of
the silver talents, this is a gift of immense value. Now it will be
their turn to prove that the trust he has placed in them was not
misplaced. Now it will be their turn to tell others the Good News of the
Kingdom – to explain it, to demonstrate how it works, to invite
others into it and help it to grow. It’s this knowledge, this
experience of the Kingdom of God that Jesus has entrusted to his
disciples. Now he wants them to spread that Good News, to make it grow.
This historical interpretation of the parable is a valid one too. But
even this is not the only possible interpretation.
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For this year of 2020 has been an extraordinarily difficult one all over
the world. Everyone has suffered in this Corona Virus pandemic, and many
millions of people have died. Every nation’s economy has suffered
and millions of people all over the world have lost their homes, their
jobs and their ability to feed their families. On top of all that, in
this country our racial divisions have come to a head, and millions of
people have taken to the streets to protest unjust, unequal treatment of
Black and Brown people. And last but not least, we have just gone
through a chaotic election, one that has left our people anxious and
stressed, not to mention deeply divided. So where is the balm in Gilead
we’re all crying out for? Where is the peace of God that
passes all understanding?
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The Good News this morning is that this is not a world without God. Yes,
Jesus has returned to his Father in heaven. But he has not left us
without resources to handle the inner challenges of anxiety and fear.
He has not left us without resources to handle the outer challenges of
selfishness and greed, chaos, indifference and a thousand forms of
violence and brutality.
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Instead, he has entrusted our little community with enough faith to
remember God’s goodness, God’s mercy, God’s love and
power. And that is a huge gift. In fact, it is enough to make the
difference we are all looking for in our world. For as we invest that
faith in our world we will be joining with God to create blessing, to
participate in his healing of the world. Walter Brueggemann reminds us
that that job is done
“ . . . in many ways and by many
means. Conservatives want to bless the neighbor through the private
sector. Liberals want to bless the neighbor by government policy.
Generous people want to bless by concrete neighborly acts. The vision
is of all kinds of people in all kinds of ways, many strategies, many
daring acts of imagination, many gestures of kindness and generosity,
many commitments to justice and peace in the world, all making a
difference in the world.”¹
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For we are to be channels of God’s grace in this world – not
reservoirs. Just as the first two servants in Jesus’ parable did,
we’re to risk what we’ve been given – so we can develop
and enlarge those gifts. And finally, just as Jesus did with his whole
life, by word and example, we are to give it all away, blessing others
with all we–ve been entrusted with.
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Beloved, in these days and in this world that is a very great gift.
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Amen
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¹Walter Brueggemann A Gospel of Hope
(Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville; 2018)
pp. 122–123.
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