Be
Faithful Stewards
Today we’re going to talk about
stewardship. I suspect that the main reason we’re nervous about this word is that
we’ve heard it used so often in the context of fund-raising and we think it’s
just a nice theological cover for a pitch for more money. It’s true that
stewardship does include money but it includes much more than money, and our
gospel reading for today spells it out in some detail.
As we move toward the Advent season we
find that our readings in the lectionary are looking forward more and more
toward God’s future kingdom and the return of Christ in glory. The issue that
comes up over and over again is ‘How do we get ready for Christ’s return?’ This
is the subject of the three parables in Matthew chapter 25. The first story
tells us how important it is to be ready at a moment’s notice so that we don’t
miss the enormous party God is getting ready to throw. This week’s gospel goes
on to address the issue of what we should be doing while we’re waiting.
The story is a very simple one. A man,
presumably a rich landowner, is going away on a journey, so he calls together
his trusted slaves and commits his property into their care. The word ‘talent’,
which is used in our translation, does not mean ‘natural abilities’ as it does
to us today; rather, in those days a ‘talent’ was a sum of money, a very large
sum in fact: it was approximately what a labourer might hope to earn in half a
lifetime! The ‘talents’ are not distributed equally; one slave receives five,
another two, and a third one, ‘each according to his ability’ (v.15). The
obvious intention is that the slaves put the money to work so that when their
master returns he will receive a profit.
And this is in fact what happens with the
first two slaves; they each put the money to work, and by the time the master
returns they have doubled it. But the third slave is a little more timid,
perhaps overawed by the huge amount of money entrusted to him and terrified
that he might lose it, so he buries it in a hole in the ground and then gives
it back to the master when he returns. The master is pleased with the first two
slaves because they’ve done well with what was entrusted to them, but he’s not
pleased at all with the third slave.
There are three things I want to point
out to you about what this parable teaches us.
Firstly,
everything in life is entrusted to us by God. In medieval times the steward of a castle
and of an estate was a very important official. It was his job to run the
estate on behalf of the lord of the manor, and he was responsible to the lord
for seeing that everything was in good order and turning a profit. If the lord
of the manor went away - for instance, to take part in the king’s wars - the
steward would be left in total charge of the estate and to all intents and
purposes he was the lord of the manor
to the tenants and employees. But of course there was one important
distinction. None of it actually belonged to the steward. It had been entrusted
to him by the lord of the manor, and it was the lord’s plans, not the
steward’s, that were the deciding factor in how the estate was actually run.
The Bible teaches that human beings are
God’s stewards here on earth. At the very beginning of the Biblical story, God
put people on the earth to take care of it, protect it and use it according to
God’s purposes. We were given permission to eat from any tree in the garden -
in other words, we could use the good things of the earth with a clear
conscience because God put them here for us to enjoy. But this was not blanket
permission; the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was forbidden to us.
Whatever else that may mean, it certainly means that our freedom to do what we
like was limited by God’s will and God’s plan. We are his stewards, and as his
stewards we have the right to enjoy the good things of his creation, but we do
not have the right to plunder and destroy it and we do not have the right to use
God’s gifts in a way that God would not want. We do not own anything. It all
belongs to God, and he has lent it to us - just like the master in the story
lent the money to his servants. He has lent it to us to use according to his
will, not ours.
The human tragedy, of course, is that we
see ourselves as the owners, not the stewards. So often I act as if my life
belongs to me, and it is for me to use it as I see fit, for my own happiness. I
act as if my money and possessions are my own, to use as I like, without any
reference to God’s preferences.
But the truth is that we are the stewards of God’s good gifts, not the
owners. Everything in life belongs to God and is entrusted to us for doing
God’s will in the world. What are some of the things he has entrusted to us -
the things that correspond to the ‘talents’ in the parable? They would include
our life, health and strength, our talents, abilities and interests, our time,
our job and our leisure. Our children are entrusted to us by God. Our knowledge
and influence are gifts we can use for him. Our money and possessions are a
trust from him. Even the gospel message itself has been entrusted to us, not to
hoard, but to pass on to others.
We aren’t to think that God only wants us
to use these gifts for ‘churchy’ things. God is actually far less interested in
church than we are! But God wants the poor to be fed, the weak protected, the
suffering helped. God wants our families to be strong and our children to grow
up knowing and loving him. God wants communities to be strong and full of
individuals who care not just for themselves but for the good of everyone. God
wants churches to be healthy so that they can be models of his kingdom and
centres for mission. God wants the message of Jesus to spread to the ends of
the earth and the ends of our communities as well. These are some of God’s
purposes for the world. And we are to use the gifts he has entrusted to us to
help those purposes come about.
It is God’s desire and joy to see us
using all of the gifts he has entrusted to us to the full, for his glory and
for the well being of others. In the 1980’s movie ‘Chariots of Fire’, the
sprinter Eric Liddell is explaining to his sister how he balances his love for
competitive running with his sense of call to be a missionary to China. He
says, “I believe God made me for a purpose, for China. But he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel his
pleasure”. Liddell understood that his athletic ability had been given to him
by God, and that in using his gifts to the full, and not denying them, he was
bringing joy to the God who created him.
So the first thing is that everything in
life is entrusted to us by God. The second thing we learn from this parable can
be summed up in some words of St. Paul: ‘It
is required of stewards that they be found faithful’. And faithfulness for
these three servants didn’t mean taking no risks and hiding the money in a hole
in the ground. It meant using the money according to the purposes the master
had in mind when he entrusted it to them.
In verse 29 Jesus says something that
sounds very harsh. He says ‘For 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’. This sounds like a harsh saying but it is in fact a
universal law that we can see demonstrated around us all the time. If I take
the little muscles God has given me and use them faithfully, eventually I will
develop bigger and stronger muscles. But if I lie around and do nothing with
them - ‘protecting them’ or ‘burying my money in the ground’, if you like -
even the little muscles I have will atrophy and their strength will be lost to
me. Likewise, if I’m trying to learn a foreign language and I take the few
words I know and use them as best I can in trying to speak with people, I will
very quickly learn more words and how to use them. But if I say “I don’t know
enough to speak yet” and so ‘hide my talent in the ground’, I will never learn
more and in fact will soon forget what little I do know.
God is not asking for star performance
from us. He is asking for faithfulness. He is not interested in me envying the
gifts he has given to others; he
wants me to use the gifts he has given to me.
He has given us the gifts and abilities we need to fulfil the mission he has
called us to, and if we use them faithfully we will find ourselves growing and
branching out into new areas and new gifts we didn’t think we had. The issue
isn’t how many gifts we have, or which ones. The issue is whether or not we are
faithful in using what God has entrusted to us for his glory.
It would be very easy, for instance, for
us to say, “Because I haven’t got a degree in theology I’m never going to open
my mouth about my Christian faith; after all, I don’t know enough to be able to
make an intelligent comment about it”. The problem is that if only people with
theological degrees are competent to comment on the Christian faith, God’s not
going to have many witnesses, is he? And the truth is that all of us have
something we can share with others about Jesus and who he is and what he is
doing in our lives. If we don’t, then preachers are doing a bad job and you
should fire us all for malpractice! But in fact none of you would be here today
if your faith didn’t add some meaning and value to your life, and with a bit of
faith and a bit of practice you can explain that to someone else. The Gospel
hasn’t been entrusted to us to be hoarded in a hole in the ground, you see;
it’s been entrusted to us to be passed on to others.
What causes us to be unfaithful in using
the gifts God has entrusted to us? Sometimes it’s simple laziness. The
master in the parable describes the third slave as ‘You wicked and lazy slave!’
(v.26). It’s far easier for me to sit at home and read a book than to actually
go out and use the gifts God has entrusted to me to help build up God’s
kingdom.
But another reason for unfaithfulness is
fear - especially fear of failure. One reason I’ve never learned to skate is that
I’m afraid of people laughing at me when I fall down over and over again. It’s
much safer to watch on the sidelines, but I suspect that in the long run I have
a lot less fun. My fear, in other words, is getting in the way of the potential
for fulness of life that God has put in me. And fear doesn’t just stop people
from skating but from doing all kinds of much more important things for the
extension of God’s kingdom. The faithful steward has learned how to deal with
that fear; he or she has learned not to let fear prevent them from trying new
things, taking risks and stepping out in faith for God. And God loves to see
that happen.
So the parable teaches us that everything
in life is entrusted to us by God, and that it is required of us as stewards
that we be found faithful in using God’s gifts. The third thing we learn from
the parable is this: that there will be
a day of accounting to God for how we have used the gifts he has entrusted
to us.
We are used to thinking of holiness in
terms of avoiding sin, and judgement has to do with the sins we haven’t been
successful in avoiding. But the picture of the judgement that this parable gives
us is very different; it has more to do with how we have used the opportunities
God has entrusted to us. God isn’t just interested in the sins we have avoided
but also in the positive good we have done. “What did you do with what I
entrusted to you?” he will ask us. “What about the time you were given - did
you use it to do good or to do nothing? To work for the kingdom or to work for
your own selfish ends? And what about the people I gave you some influence over
- your children, your friends, your fellow-workers? Did you use that influence
to help build my kingdom? How about your talents? What did you do with them to
help make the world the kind of place I want it to be? And what about your
money - there was so much good you could have done with it. Did you?”
These are the kinds of questions this
parable suggests that God will be asking us on the day of accounting. And the
rule of thumb will be “To whom much has been given, of them much will be
required”. God won’t ask you to produce things with gifts he hasn’t given you,
but he will want to know what you have done with the gifts you have been given. In other words, as we
said before, the issue is faithfulness.
We sometimes say of someone “He’s a good
man - he never does anyone any harm”. Richard Baxter, a Puritan writer, once
said “That’s praise for a rock, but
not for a man!” Bible translator
Gordon Fee adds, “A fence post can be
a good Christian on that score!” The lazy servant was punished, not because he
did wrong, but because he did nothing.
John Powell, a Catholic writer, taught me
a great prayer: “O God, don’t let me die without having really lived and really
loved”. And John Wesley used to teach the following rule to his followers: ‘Do
all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all
the places you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can’!
God longs to see you and me living as
good stewards, using our time, our talents, our money and everything else he
has entrusted to us for his purposes, so that the world becomes the kind of
place he yearns for it to be. And God rejoices to see the work we do, the love
we share, the people whose lives we touch, and the gifts and talents we use to
the full. “Enter into the joy of your Lord”, said the master to the faithful
stewards. And to God alone be the glory!
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