Lectionary readings
Gracious and loving God, as we await the day
of your coming, grant us, even now, to enter into your joy ☩ in the name of the Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
We continue the steady march towards Advent, and as we do, our Gospel texts from Matthew 25 bring into focus the coming again of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Last week, we heard the Parable of the Ten Bridesmaids and today we hear what is often called the Parable of the Talents, in which Jesus takes us deeper into the truth that to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be expected.
Before
getting too far into this text though, we have to remember where and when we
are. It’s been said that a text without a context is a pretext for a proof-text.
In other words, context matters. In Matthew’s narrative structuring of the
Gospel story, this chapter comes at a pivotal point. In chapter 24, Jesus
speaks about the destruction of the Temple and the coming of the Son of Man.
Then in this chapter, the 25th, Jesus offers parables that show us
what it means to live in this age of waiting. And immediately after these
parables are told, Matthew 26 opens with the plot to kill Jesus. This chronology
is no accident. It is these parables that are the last straw for those who
oppose the Kingdom that Jesus is inaugurating.
So
we must hold these two times in our heads as we read this chapter – both Holy
Week and the final week. The Holy Week context reminds us that this parable is
radical and contentious – so any conclusions that leave us comfortable and complacent
are incomplete. And the eschatological dimension, that is, the way this parable
speaks to the finality of all things, keeps our focus on the fact that this is
a parable about what ultimately matters.
These
contexts are important because, without that context, we might think this is a
story that endorses venture capitalism. Both Exodus and Leviticus command the
faithful – “If you lend money to my people, to the poor among you, you shall
not deal with them as a creditor; you shall not exact interest from them.” If
Jesus had intended to usher in a new economic system, it would have been
obvious. This is the same Jesus who told us that “You cannot serve God and wealth.”
It’s not as if Jesus is having a change of mind here at the end of his ministry
about money. So it’s worth repeating, the question we ask a parable is not “what
does this mean,” but rather “what is this parable doing.” And to think about
what this parable is doing, we have to situate it in its proper apocalyptic context.
I’m
going to go ahead and give you the conclusion of this sermon now so that we can
see how it is at work throughout this parable. What I see as the keystone of
this parable is the phrase “Enter into the joy of your master.” This parable
helps us to see how we do that. And the word “joy” is in the same linguistic
family as grace, so bear that in mind.
Because
we have the context of this parable in mind, we know that Jesus is telling this
parable within earshot of his followers, whom he knows he will be leaving soon.
They haven’t quite allowed it to sink in that Jesus is going to be crucified,
but Jesus knows that is how this week will end. And so these parables in Matthew
25 help us to navigate the in-between time. We know a lot about in-between
time, don’t we? The time between we first heard the word “Coronavirus” and the
day when the vaccine will be widely available. The time between the doctor saying,
“I’d like to run some more tests” and getting those results back. The time
between sending in a college application and getting a letter back in the mail.
The time between casting a ballot and having a certified result. The time
between a hug and kiss goodbye and seeing our loved one again, whether that be
a few hours later or in Resurrection life.
Jesus
knows that his disciples will soon be in such an in-between time. The time
between his arrest and Crucifixion, between his death and Easter morning,
between his Ascension and the gifting of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, between
now and that day on which all shall be made well in the perfect love of God.
And the in-between time is hard. There is uncertainty, there is anxiety, and there
are disagreements about how to wait. So we have these parables to show us what
holy waiting looks like.
It’s
as if a man leaves on a journey and gives five talents, two talents, and one
talent to three of his servants. Now, a talent, though we use that word to mean
a skill or ability, was a unit of weight for precious metals. One talent was a
huge sum of money – it was the average salary for about 15 years of work. So
five talents are enough to instantly retire – you’d be set for life with that
amount of money, no investing required. Two talents would be about 30 years of wages,
so a nice sum of money. The single talent is still a lot – more than even the
very wealthy in that society would give to a child for an inheritance. This is
one of the early points of this parable – this landowner is giving lavishly and
abundantly.
The
parable tells us that the first two used those talents to make more. The
translation we read says that they “traded” with them, but there was nothing
like a stock-market back then, so it’s not that sort of trading. The word in
Greek is simply that they “worked” with that money. How they doubled their
money isn’t the point though, what matters is that they did something with what
they were given. And for that action, they are rewarded by being told to “enter
into the joy of your master.”
But
these first two characters are there to provide a contrast with the third. He
has a different perspective – one of fear, mistrust, and scarcity. So he digs a
hole in the ground and hid the money there so that it would be right where he left
it if anyone asked him to return it. When the master shows up and asks how
things went, this third servant hands back to the master the one talent he
started with, which was now covered with dirt. “Here, have what is yours.” In
effect, he has rejected the gift.
We
might sympathize with this servant – some might say that his was the smart
move. But any rationale that he had for hiding the talent was based on a false
understanding of the master. Nowhere in the parable does it suggest that this
master is harsh or unscrupulous. The master begins by lavishly giving his
servants plenty of capital to succeed with during his absence and he warmly
greets those who responded in faith to what had been given them. This third
slave though is living by a different narrative.
He
sees the master as harsh, demanding, and arbitrary, and so he does nothing with
the talent. Actually, as the master sees it, this servant did less than nothing.
He could have at least invested the talent with the bankers and received a bit
of interest back. Again, as I’ve said, this isn’t a parable about economics, it’s
a parable about what we do in the in-between time. And here we see just how damaging
a flawed view of God can be. This servant’s mistake began with his
misunderstanding about the nature of the master and his misreading of the
master’s intentions.
This
is why it is absolutely so central to know that God is love and that this love
was incarnate in the life, death, Resurrection, and Ascension of Jesus Christ.
God is not standing over us as a taskmaster. God is not waiting to see whether
or not we are worthy of grace. God is not angry or disappointed in us. And this
is not my opinion – we know this to be true because of Jesus who reconciles us
to the Father and gifts us the Holy Spirit of God that we might partake of his abundant
life here and now. This is what the third servant missed – he had the wrong
image of the master in his head, and so he missed the opportunity to enter more
fully into the joy of the master.
The
way the parable unfolds, we see that faith in Jesus involves action and it
involves risk. This should be clear by his Cross, of which Jesus tells his
followers to take up their crosses and follow him. Just as God is incarnate in
Jesus, our faith in Jesus is to be manifest in our lives. The third servant
didn’t get it – he turned faith into a possession, something that you either
have or don’t. He made it a zero-sum game. But this is not what faith is about.
Faith is not a possession. Faith is not a status. Rather, faith is a catalyst. Jesus
famously says that he is “the way,” not “the idea” or “the thought” or “the
statement of belief.” He is the way, truth, and life. And this third servant
wasn’t going to get anywhere on the way by burying the talent. Just as the fig
tree that does not produce fruit in another one of Jesus’ parables is rejected,
so is this unfruitful servant.
And
I know this seems harsh. I mentioned last Sunday, Matthew 25 falls under the
heading of “parables of judgment.” There’d be no point to judgment if everything
got a pass. Now, to be clear, this doesn’t mean there is no longer room for
mercy. But judgment is actually quite good news – if God is not going to judge
abuse, and stealing, and genocide, and greed to be wrong, then I’m not sure we
can claim that God is good. The 20th-century martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer
wrote that “the sin of the respectable is running from responsibility.” Well,
in burying the talent, this servant did just that and is judged accordingly. Judgment
is not a bad thing, even if it strikes our modern sensibilities the wrong way.
A
few years ago there was a watershed book published in New Testament studies
called Paul and the Gift. At 670 pages, it’s an extremely thorough exploration
of what we mean when we say the word “grace.” I’m not going to try to summarize
the entirety of the book, but the point is that a gift can be perfected in
different ways. In other words, what makes a gift a gift depends on what you
expect a gift to be. Often in the church, we do a pretty good job of covering
the idea that grace is freely given. But there are other perfections of a gift –
and one of those covered in this book is the efficacy of grace. Because God’s
grace is so amazing, it is also effective – grace is intended to evoke a
response from and in us.
And
this response is entering into the joy of our Lord, not only after death but
here and now. What does it look like to enter the joy of God? Well, it looks
different from how the world operates. Joy is about being free to be the people
God created us to be. People who tell the truth. People who forgive those who
wrong us. People who are generous with what God has given to us. People who
love our neighbors and our enemies. People who give their allegiance to God. People
who know that they are loved.
And none of these
things are headline grabbers – Jesus does not ask us to change the world or do
grand things, but rather to follow his way. And we do these things not in order
to earn our worth, the talent has already been given. Instead, with this gift, we
are able to enter into the joy of our Lord. The great value of the talent means
that we are liberated from trying to make our own worth in life and can instead
focus on doing the work God has given us to do. There is no greater joy than
following the way of Jesus because it goes with the grain of the love that made
us, the love that sustains us, and the love that will be our end. And in the
midst of all the uncertain and unsettling things happening in the world around
us, this parable shows us that, in meantime, our work is to enter into the joy
of our Lord.
