Burying the Talents of the Great Rewarder

A number of months ago I was reading the parable of the talents to my kids at bedtime. There was nothing unusual about the night. I was leaning against the doorframe to the bedroom they all currently share, Bible open in my hands. The lamp was turned off in their room to help them settle down and I was relying on the hallway light for my reading. The plan was simple as always. Read a little bit, discuss a little bit, sing a song or two together, pray, give kisses and hugs goodnight, and finally, navigate multiple attempts to get out of bed again for various and sundry reasons. It was a typical night, not the kind of time I would have predicted for the conviction of the Spirit to fall.

We were almost finished our reading through the book of Matthew and that night had come to chapter 25, verses 14-30. The parable of the talents will be well-known to most of you, but if it’s not you can read it here and I’ll also post it below. The summary is that a master leaves on a long journey, entrusting three servants with three very large sums of money (called talents). The first one receives five talents, about 100 years’ worth of wages for a laborer. The second receives two talents, about 40 years’ worth of wages for a laborer. And the third receives one talent, roughly 20 years’ wages. The first two servants spend the following lengthy period investing their master’s money and both double the amounts they received. The third servant goes off and buries the money he received. When the master returns, he affirms the faithfulness of the first two servants and then rewards them with both increased authority and joy. But the third servant explains that he played it safe and merely stashed his master’s money away. He says he did this because he knew his master’s character to be harsh and stingy. The master, in turn, strongly rebukes him, telling him that if he knew this he still should have at least put the money in the bank, where it could have collected interest. He then commands that the one talent be given to the first servant, and that the wicked servant be cast out into the “outer darkness,” essentially into hell. The parable ends with the third servant losing even the amount that he had preserved, while the first two servants receive even more than the enormous amounts they had ended up with.

This is a parable I know well, and have read dozens and dozens of times. But for whatever reason, when I read it this time (and read it for my kids, no less, not for me), clarity and conviction fell hard. The familiarity of the passage meant that I’d never really understood the whole bit about the master’s character. But I suddenly realized that this was at the very core of the parable. The wicked servant says of the master, “I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground.” Essentially, “You are a stingy, exacting man, so I didn’t risk doing costly work that would go unrewarded. I played it safe and stashed your money away.” In Middle Eastern culture, then as well as now, stinginess is viewed as one of the very worst vices.

I was struck with a question I’d not thought of before. What was the servant doing all those years when the other servants were busy trading for the increase of their master’s wealth? Presumably, looking out for his own wealth. And why? Because he did not believe that it would be worth it to risk spending all those years and all that sweat, only to have his master come back and take it all from him. If he invested for his master, he would labor and sacrifice and risk, and for what? A stingy master? No, thanks! He would instead do the minimum, follow the letter of the law, try to serve two masters. His master had given him this money to keep safe, so he would do that – and no more.

The other two servants seem to have had a radically different view of their master’s character. We see this from their actions. They do spend a long time using what their master had entrusted to them to generate even more wealth for him. How are they able to do this? Well, the parable tells us that they are faithful. In one sense, this is enough. Faithful servants seek to obey their masters above and beyond what they are asked, as if they are working as unto God, not unto men. But it seems that the whole back-and-forth about the master’s character is giving us a clue that the other servant’s must not have believed that their master was stingy and harsh. Rather, they must have believed that in the end, their master was a rewarder. The end of the parable shows us this was indeed his true nature. But also consider how often Jesus speaks of heavenly rewards in the book of Matthew alone (5:12, 5:46, 6:1, 6:2, 6:4, 6:5, 6:6, 6:16, 6:18, 10:41, 10:42). Then, take the radical statement from Hebrews 11:6 that to please God, one must believe that he is a rewarder of those who seek him. No, this faith in the master’s character is the difference between the two servants’ faithful risk and the other’s wicked self-interest.

These truths cut to my heart because I was in a long season of doubting God’s character. After seven years of costly ministry on the field, preceded by seven years of costly ministry in the US, I felt like we were in shambles. We had worked hard for our master and even seen what he had given us multiplied many times over. A few dozen had come to faith, a church had been planted, hundreds had heard the gospel, missionary teams had been strengthened and served – tens of thousands of words had been written. But our health, our faith, our finances, our prospects? These all looked pretty bad. My heart had settled into a posture where I was counting up the cost, and feeling like God was harsh and stingy. I was no longer open to risking for God in the same way, instead feeling like I needed to take care of myself and my family’s future. Sure, I knew I would keep doing the essentials – trying to pray and read my bible, trying to write, trying to encourage others, doing bedtime devotions with the kids. I wouldn’t get rid of the talent entrusted to me – but I just might bury it.

“Is this really what I think of God’s character?” I thought to myself as read the cynical words of the third servant to my kids that night. “…a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed…”

I finished the parable and paused in my reading, quiet, sad, and somehow grateful to feel the sharpness of the Word after a long season of numbness.

“Dad?” my oldest son asked, wondering about my extended silence.

“Huh?… Oh, right. Um, what song should we sing?”

“The fruit of the Spirit’s not a coconut!” piped up our youngest. Ah, yes, a classic.

We proceeded to finish the bedtime routine, but I knew I would be chewing on Matthew 25 and this train of thought for some time to come. Deep down, I had felt that there was a part of me that still believed that God is not stingy, but instead a generous rewarder. That everything, absolutely everything, would be remembered and reflected in that eternal weight of glory being prepared for us. But this faith had been slowly buried under shovel-fulls of sorrow, self-pity, and spiritual fog.

In the following months the theme of God as a rewarder, and the resulting joy of those who out of this truth risk and suffer (and are therefore the most fully alive of any of us), jumped out at me from passage after passage. I saw it shouting at me from the Beatitudes, from Hebrews 11, from 2nd Corinthians 4, even from grumpy Naaman the Syrian risking seven dips in the muddy Jordan. I remembered how it was the truths of the coming resurrection that shook me out of seasons of spiritual depression in the past – one of the reasons I had initially chosen to highlight that theme in my blogging. Slowly, the faith to risk because of God’s character returned, until I found myself one night hearing my wife telling me she was now ready to attempt a return overseas. In fact, she was playfully kicking me while she said this, asking me what was taking me so long to join her.

There were a number of powerful truths that combined to open my heart again to risk again, whether that means ministry overseas or back again in the States someday. But the first life-giving blow came from the parable of the talents, from a seemingly-normal bedtime with my kids, and with it the resolve to no longer doubt the character of my master.

He is the great rewarder. His commendation awaits. I must not bury his talents, but invest and risk them. Risk them all.

[14] “For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. [15] To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. [16] He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. [17] So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. [18] But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s money. [19] Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them. [20] And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here, I have made five talents more.’ [21] His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ [22] And he also who had the two talents came forward, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me two talents; here, I have made two talents more.’ [23] His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ [24] He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, [25] so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’ [26] But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed? [27] Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. [28] So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents. [29] For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. [30] And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’

Matthew 25:14-30

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