USING THE GIFTS GOD GAVE YOU
Matt 25: 14-30 (702) May 23, 2010
INTRODUCTION
Being a disciple of Jesus involves taking a risk…"to deny yourself and take up your cross and start following Jesus is risky business. Discipleship involves surrender… giving up my time, my talent, my treasure for the Kingdom of God.
And none of us surrender our stuff too easily. Every single one of us stands before Jesus like the rich young ruler as people who "own much"
And when we're asked to "go sell everything we have and follow him" we want to argue with Jesus… I'll give you some time Lord, I'll surrender some of my stuff, I'll use some of my talents for you but you can't expect me to sell out completely… And he says "O yes I can" "Because I surrender everything for you".
But Lord that’s not what I had in mind when I became a Christian. I thought I'd go to church regularly, be nice to people and help out every once in a while. I had that kind of discipleship in mind. Most of us are like Wilbur Rees who wrote
I would like to buy $3 worth of God, please.
Not enough to explode my soul or disturb my sleep,
but just enough to equal a cup of warm milk or a snooze in the sunshine.
I don't want enough of God to make me love a black man or pick beets
with a migrant.
I want ecstasy, not transformation.
I want warmth of the womb, not a new birth.
I want a pound of the Eternal in a paper sack.
I would like to buy $3 worth of God, please.
Three dollars worth of God doesn’t involve much risk. It lets me believe I've purchased enough of Him to keep me out of hell, but allows me to keep most of my life for my own usage.
So what do we do with these words from Jesus?
"For whoever wants to serve his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it." (Matt 16:25)
It kind of blows that 3 dollars worth of God philosophy about discipleship out of the water, doesn't it.
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I'm going to say it again… Real discipleship is risky, and the parable of the talents isn't as much about what someone does with their talents but rather what someone is willing to risk for the master's sake.
God has given every single one of us a life and the resources that make up that life… we all have the same 24 hrs per day…God has entrusted us with abilities and talents, God has given all of us a quantity of the "stuff of life".
And this parable is about our willingness to risk that stuff of life for his sake.
There are 7 words that hang as a banner over every dead church
"We Never Did it That Way Before"
If we appoint the same people, continue the usual programs, rely on the comfortable structure of the past… its safe, its known…we minimize the risk…but we also fail to grow new leaders, mentors and outreaches that grow the Kingdom and make disciples who are empowered to use their talents for the master's glory.
The Lord Jesus Christ calls us to take risks for the sake of his kingdom.
I THE RISK OF PARTICIPATING INSTEAD OF OBSERVING
Please understand you don't really join the church. You may choose a local body of believers to align yourself with, to fellowship with… but God adds you to his church when you are saved.
And God adds you to his church for growth…you are to grow spiritually through his word and the fellowship that comes of sharing life with other disciples but you are also called "To go and make disciples".
God has called you to be a participant in His Kingdom's work, God's church was never designed for observers.
Our story this morning features a Lord or Master who has gone away on a journey, but before he left he gave his servants resources to manage. One received 5 talents, one 2 talents, and another 1 talent. The Greek word "talenta" represented the largest denomination commonly minted ---it was a lot.
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And to be honest the 5 talent servant and 2 talent servant are window dressing… they set off the central character…the 1 talent servant.
Although he has less to lose than the others, he did nothing. He had 1 talent of the stuff of life and did nothing with it. He was the typical observer. He was a benchwarmer.
he would not risk…even the 3$ for God.
[ I was watching this show called American loggers the other day… and they were testing a rookie out by having him climb a tree and top it. He got about half way up and froze. He chose an option that wasn't really an option. He feared the abuse he would receive from the loggers beneath him,..and he feared the heights above him… So he froze between the options and took neither.
He is the perfect illustration of the 1 talent servant. The servant neither risked the talent or threw it away. He simply buried it and did nothing with it]
As God adds us to his church he expects us to use our lives… our influence, contacts, network, abilities, money, time and energy for his glory and the kingdoms growth. God expects us to risk that for the sale of the church and kingdom. We have the same opion as the servant: risk it or lose it.
Refusing to risk it makes us observers instead of participants. And it warps our perspective of God. When confronted by his master - the servant who would not take the risk shows how twisted his perspective had become.
"Lord I knew you to be a hard man reaping where you have not
Sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed".
What's funny… not ha ha, but ironic is this so called hard man had entrusted his servant's with "big time 1oot" He'd sown that seed in them… He scattered his talents into their care. And he joyfully rewarded servants who took risks for the sake of the kingdom.
Living a risk less life will warp our perspective of God… and people. Sitting the sidelines makes us critics of those who play of the field, and the team owner.
The question for you today is will you allow that to happen?
[Edgar Allen Poe told of a farm family for whom the big event of the year was the arrival of the mail order catalog. One year they ordered a telescope to look at the countryside around their home. But the first time they used it they discovered a hideous monster perched on a nearby building. They locked the doors, fastened the windows and
3.
hid inside the house…waiting for doomsday. Then the youngest boy in the family noted that it wasn't a hideous monster at all it was just a praying mantis on the window screen, warped all out of perspective by their point of view.]
Those who become risk taking disciples will see the world through Jesus eyes. Those who simply observe from the inside will find themselves with a warped perspective.
Surely these are the days for God's people to take the risk to become participants instead of observers. Secondly disciples understand.
II THE RISK OF ACCPETING RESPONSIBILITY INSTEAD OF PLACING BLAME.
The final scene in our parable this morning is a scene in which the risk takers are rewarded and the riskless servant is held accountable. "After a long time the Lord of those servants come and settled accounts with them" (Matt 25:19)
Listen to the 1 talent servant who would not take the risk. He blames everyone but himself "I was afraid and went and hid your talent in the ground".
His excuses "It's your fault for expecting too much, I was afraid, so here's what belongs to you.
This game goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden. Adam blamed Eve (and God) Eve blamed the snake. Maybe the snake blamed the apple -- but the problem wasn't the apple on the tree it was the pair on the ground.
Each and everyone of us will be held accountable for our choices. And if you want to please God you have to know Hebrews 11:6. "And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him."
Faith always involves taking a risk, but for those who do it makes God smile in pleasure. And he holds those who do in high regard whether we are the 2 talent servant or the 5 talent servant…. the same commendation is given to both. "Well done, good and faithful servant you have been faithful over a few things I will make you ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of your Lord."
Both had risked everything he'd entrusted to them. and you have to believe even if the 1 talent servant had risked and lost the talent, the Lord would have known what was in his heart.
4.
God does not expect us to go beyond our capacity for risk. Some of us have 5 talent capacity, some 2, some 1.
If God's given you pebbles he doesn't expect you to build a pyramid…but he does expect you to build. If God's given you cotton thread be doesn't expect you to weave a golden garment, but he does expect you to weave.
God does not expect each of his children to risk the same thing. God does not expect equal gifts, but he does expect equal sacrifice.
It’s the moral of this parable that faith grows by taking faithful risks.
"Take the 1 talent from him and give it to the servant with 10"
"For everyone who has will be given more and he will have an abundance, whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him." "and throw that worthless servant outside into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth".
Maybe today you have all kinds of excuses for not living a life of discipleship, your past, your present, your parents, your abilities… but really they're just excuses for not taking a risk of faith. Maybe your perspective of God has been warped because you've sat on the sidelines as an observer for too long.
The world Christian is used only 3 times in scripture. Saying you’re a Christian isn't too scary, because in America that can mean anyone who goes to church occassionly or believes in God.
But there's another word used 260 times throughout the pages of the N.T. It's the word disciple
As philosopher Dallas
Willard has said, "The New Testament is a book about disciples, by
disciples, and for disciples of Jesus." Derived from the Greek word mathetes, which means "learner" or pupil," a disciple is simply one
who learns from a teacher. But Jesus expanded this meaning. According to Jesus, our mission on earth is not only to create Christ followers who know
his teachings but also who obey his teachings. Jesus said, "All authority
in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go 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 I have commanded you.
And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age" (Matthew 28:18-20).
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According to Jesus our Master a disciple has one simple responsibility in life
To Learn and obey what Jesus taught.
And I promise you if you do that in this world you'll stand out like a sore thumb……
