Matthew 25:14-30
November 19, 2017
I.
After the parable about the wise and foolish bridesmaids, and just before his final parable about the Last Judgment, Jesus delivers what would become his most wildly misunderstood parable, that of the Talents. It is misunderstood because people choose — against everything else Jesus has been teaching and saying and doing for his entire ministry — to read it in a self-serving and literal way, imagining that it is about economics. Jesus, they insist, is here blessing our efforts to make money. They even think his last words here, about those having more getting more and those have less losing, are about money.
The Lord was probably hoping that by the time we got to chapter 25 we would have some rudimentary understanding of him and his ministry, so we would not be inclined to interpret him that way. Jesus has already repeatedly and categorically rejected wealth as something to strive for, culminating with his dismissal of a Roman coin as something Caesar has stolen from God.
In truth, this parable is no more about economics than the Parable of the Sower is about agriculture or the Parable of the Leaven is about pastry. In this parable he is simply drawing an analogy from the economic system of the time and using it to talk about the spiritual life in a way people might understand. Indeed, because of what we know Jesus is about, his use of economic imagery actually undercuts and neutralizes precisely the kind of bullying, acquisitive, extractive behavior he talks about in the parable.
In the parable, he presents the three slaves of a departing Master. The slaves are left with talents to manage according to their abilities. A “talent” is a very large sum of money, like perhaps a quarter of a million dollars. One gets 5 talents to manage, one gets 2, and one gets 1. He does not tell them what to do with this money. He simply entrusts his wealth to them to manage while he is away. Presumably they are to manage it according to the values and example of the Master. They are to do what he would do.
Jesus is preparing his followers for life after his death and resurrection when they will not have his physical, mortal, temporal presence as a separate individual to listen to. But, like the Master in the parable, he is leaving with them his “wealth.”
Jesus, of course, has virtually nothing that we would consider material wealth. He has no money that we know of. He does not own any property. Neither does he even have much in the way of possessions. So what is this “wealth,” what are the “talents,” that he leaves in the charge of his disciples? What are the assets or properties of Jesus? What does he give us “to trade with” while he is gone?
Based on Jesus’ last words before his ascension, “And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age,” I suggest that Jesus leaves us himself in a different form. Of course, we have memories of him and of his example of how to live. What we also now have is the message of good news for the world about God’s love which he embodies. And this is not just words, but a way of life. So that the “wealth” he leaves us with is the ability to live as he lived. The “talents,” in other words, are the specific things that Jesus does in his life and ministry that he gives to his disciples to embody as well.
II.
We see one listing of these qualities in the Beatitudes back in chapter 5. They include spiritual poverty, grieving, hungering for righteousness, a gentleness, peacemaking, mercy, purity of heart, and the endurance of persecution. We might also add the things in chapter 11 that Jesus himself does that he says verify his identity: “the lame walk, the blind receive their sight, lepers and cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news preached to them.” These are the among “talents” that Jesus bestows upon the church at his resurrection. We are given these kinds of things to do in his name.
Some disciples, perhaps farther along in their spiritual journey, receive a 5-fold package of these blessings. Some only get a double share. And some receive them but in a small degree. What they get is based on their ability, or power. They receive what they are able to handle. They receive what they are able to process and transmit according to their repentance and their faith.
First, I need to say a word about the fact that these were the Master’s slaves. Jesus is not condoning slavery as an economic and social practice. No one steeped in the Hebrew Scriptures, which are the record of a band of liberated slaves and their descendants, could ever give any kind of approval to slavery. But he is saying that while perfect obedience to an earthly master is a deep, corrupt, lethal, and perverse evil, perfect obedience to God is the highest good. To be God’s slave is to be the slave of no one; it is to find absolute freedom to be your true self in God.
The first slave “went off at once and traded with” what he receives. That means, he reflects and expresses in his life and relationships these qualities of love and goodness we see in Jesus. He spreads the good news. He is an agent of healing and reconciliation, compassion and justice, peace and blessing in the world. He functions like salt and light in bringing balance and truth into people’s lives. To trade with something is to give it away, to exchange it, to plant it in the soil so that it grows, to invest it, to let it shine so that people will desire it and give of themselves in order to receive it.
Again, in his final words, Jesus tells us what this looks like. “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you.” We make disciples by sharing these gifts, these talents, and letting them shine.
We make disciples by being disciples. Indeed, we make disciples of Jesus by being Jesus. That is, we allow his light to shine in our lives by doing the kinds of things he does. We exhibit humility, simplicity, generosity, and forgiveness. We welcome the outcast and unpopular. We give to those in need. We call out hypocrisy. We live in prayer and joy and equality with all.
III.
The slave who gets the 5 talents generates 5 more, which is to say that these qualities of Jesus are infectious. Like the seeds in the parable of the sower, they grow and bear fruit. In this case, the investment of goodness and blessing doubles. The slave who gets the 2 talents has the same result, a rate of return of 100%. There is no economy of scale here, in which the greater investment gets a higher rate. But forgiveness inspires more forgiveness, simplicity more simplicity, justice and compassion and non-violence return more justice, compassion, and nonviolence.
Because of the way Christians live, there is less hatred in the world. Because of the way Christians live, there is less fear and anger stifling people’s lives. Because of the way Christians live, people are less prone to act out of greed, gluttony, lust, envy, or the other sins. Individuals, families, and communities are healthier. The earth is less abused and exploited. Slavery is rarer, as are war, torture, imprisonment, and bigotry. Walls come down.
That’s how it’s supposed to work when the followers of Jesus function like leaven or salt or light, and start influencing the whole society with Jesus’ way of life.
When Jesus returns, what the disciples have to show for their application of what he places in their care is a better world. More people follow Jesus, which means that the example of the disciples moves others to live in the same way. Because of their work with what they have been given the world looks just a little more like Jesus.
The third slave, however, does not take the blessings of repentance and discipleship into the world. He does not apply Jesus’ teachings in his relationships. He does not advocate for Jesus’ principles in his life. He keeps it a secret. He “dug a hole in the ground and hid his master’s money.” He hides the light God gives to him under a basket. He continues in the world according to the world’s standards, and only holds Jesus’ Way in his mind as an idea. It does not get put into practice.
Worse, he might call himself a “Christian,” while in his actions he upholds hatred, inequality, division, and exclusion. He has stuffed God’s gift of love where it can do no good, and returns it only to God perhaps in the form of worship. But worship without discipleship is empty. Several of the prophets rail unambiguously against piety that does not bear fruit in justice. That’s what this guy does.
He does what he does out of fear. He says he is afraid of the Master, that is, God, but in reality he is probably afraid of what others will think of him. Perhaps he is afraid of failure… but he seems to indicate that he is also even more afraid of success and what that will require of him.
If we who claim to follow Jesus are indistinguishable from everyone else in the rat race, we are not effective. We have buried our gift. We have let the world stay as broken, hurt, violent, lost, and enslaved as ever. We have succumbed to fear and not trusted the perfect love that it casts out all fear.
IV.
In order for us to understand Jesus we have to realize the importance of flow. The spiritual talents are not static, solid, material things; they are the only experienced as the flow of God’s love into the world. It is dynamic and always moving. If you try to hold onto it, you lose it; but if you let it go you receive even more.
When Jesus says: “to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away,” he means those through whom more of God’s love flows, will receive more. God’s love will pour through them like a firehose! But those who have blocked their own receptivity out of fear receive nothing because they have no flow. Even what little they have will just evaporate.
What God gives to us — love, compassion, mercy, healing, acceptance, justice, and joy — is intended to be given away, and if it is given away it increases. We need to become clear channels for God’s goodness and truth to flow. These talents are more like nozzles, openings, conduits, spigots. The more open we are, the more we experience the joy of the Master, the Lord Jesus, our God.
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