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I’m reminded a lot lately of the story of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30; Luke 19:12-28). That’s not surprising given that I’ve spent most of my personal and academic study involved in the parables. However, this illustration in particular has always taken me.

Jesus, if we were to set aside all claims to deity for a moment, was at the least a master storyteller. If you were to take the time to not only read the parables, but to also study the culture and times during which they were first told, you’ll find that Jesus has a masterful way of setting up his listeners and then yanking the rug of security out from under them. He sets up his audience to put themselves in the place of the character who seems to be doing the most right, only to be told that the very same “right” character was so very wrong. It’s speculation, but I’m sure that’s one of the biggest reasons that the religious leaders (Pharisees) wanted Jesus out of the way—he threatened their very security and livelihood.

The story goes something like this, in my paraphrase—a landowner, preparing to leave for a long trip, calls three of his workers and gives them responsibility to manage his assets while he’s away. To the first worker he gives responsibility for five portions, to the second, two, and to the third, one portion. Then, he leaves. The first two workers go out and invest what they’ve been entrusted with, doubling their portions, the third worker buries what he’s been given in hopes of at least being able to return to the landowner the amount he was given. When the owner returns, the two workers who invested what they were given are praised, while the worker who doesn’t loses what he was given and is thrown out of the owner’s employ.

We’re tempted (like any beginning Bible scholar) to determine the modern day equivalent of what each worker was given—we want to know how much it was in today’s dollars that the first worker got, that the second worker got, and how much the third worker buried in his backyard. The fact is that how much a “talent” is worth in today’s dollars isn’t important for this story, so we can set aside our calculators and slide rules. It’s the actions of the workers—specifically, the third worker who buried what he was given—that is important for us.

The crowd listening to this story, most of them being Jews, would have immediately identified with the third worker as Jesus tells the story. Israel was a nation whose intent was to preserve and protect their spiritual and national heritage at any cost. It was the cause of a lot of tension between Israel and the occupying Roman government and would eventually lead to Israel’s destruction only a few decades after Jesus gives this parable. In this sense, the parable is prophetic.

In Jewish law, burying something was considered the safest way to protect it from loss. In fact, if I had been entrusted with a friend’s life savings, and I buried it in my backyard, and a thief was to come and steal it from where it was buried, I could not be held liable for the loss.

The problem with this was that God’s expectation for His people (Israel) was that they would do much more with what they were entrusted than to simply preserve and protect it. They were expected to share it. To invest it in other nations. To be a beacon for other nations, a model for other nations to look at and desire to emulate by worshipping the same God of Israel. They were to be an example. However, Israel had repeatedly failed at fulfilling this trust (although, in a prophetic future they will finally succeed at this, but not because of anything they’ve done about it; it will be entirely God’s doing). Eventually, even the one portion they had (the land) was taken from them by the Romans, who then moved other nations into the land to take their place (which, by the way, is where we get “Palestine” from—there never were a “Palestinian people”; it was an invention of the Roman Empire after they forcibly removed the Jews from their homeland in order to prevent the Jews from ever again reestablishing themselves in the same area).

What makes this the rug that Jesus pulls out from underneath his listener is that this trust was not the “five talents” or even the two. It was the single portion that the third worker was given. What makes this even more ironic is that the owner gave to each worker “according to his ability.” The owner figured that this third worker could at least handle even this small thing. For God, what Israel had been given was the simplest and most basic thing they could use, and they didn’t use it. Eventually, it was taken from them (but prophecy suggests they will receive it back at the appropriate time—and this time, they’ll have learned their lesson)

What application could this all have for you and me? I think there are a few:

• God, the “wealthy landowner,” doesn’t give us any more—or less—than He knows we have the ability to work with. The fact that Jesus mentions that each worker was given a portion “according to his ability” is important. God knows how much blessing–and how much trouble—we are each able to deal with. He will never give us more trouble than we can handle, but he also won’t give us any less or more blessing than we can use.
• The corollary to the first point is that we will not get more until we get faithful what we’ve already got. The phrase “according to his ability” is applicable here. The first two workers got five portions and two portions because they had already shown that they could handle those amounts. They had to show that they could be faithful with a single portion or with two portions before they would get the five portions. If we are not faithful in using what we have now, even if it doesn’t seem like much, how should we expect to get any more? Even in the modern workplace, I could not expect to become responsible for a large project roll-out until I could show that I could handle the smaller regulatory changes (and unfortunately, I blew it on two of the smaller projects, so I lost even those and here I am collecting unemployment).
• Which brings the second point: we are expected to use what we’ve been blessed or troubled with. Even if it is for the smallest of profits, like the worker who could have put it in the bank to simply accrue a small amount in interest, we are expected to do something, anything, with what we’ve been given. Anything but burying it away to never be used or applied to our lives and the lives of others. More importantly, we’re expected to use it right here, right now (note, the first two workers “immediately” did something with what they were given—they didn’t wait until the economy got better or they were able to relocate to a more hopeful place). This is where “Grow where you’re planted” comes in that I’ve been constantly thinking about. There are opportunities to use what I’ve been given right here, right now if I would simply get my head out of my own hind end and look around. I don’t need to wait for the economy to improve, to get a job, or wait to be able to move to California or anywhere else to do what I should be doing right now. The fact of “Grow where you’re planted” is that I could be blossoming and flourishing today if i would simply put to use what I’ve been given to work with, even if it doesn’t seem like very much right now.
• The most important point: the blessing we are given is never meant to be kept for ourselves. This goes directly against so-called “Word of Faith” or “prosperity” teaching. The reason our cup sometimes overflows isn’t for us to think about getting ourselves a bigger cup. It’s so that the overflow can go through our cup into the cups of others. One of the reasons I listen to Joel Osteen, even though he’s classified as a “prosperity teacher,” is because he’s one of the very few such teachers, if not the only one, to make the point that blessing is meant to be shared and not hoarded (unfortunately, he waited until the last chapter of “Your Best Life Now” to make that point, but the point was made). We are blessed to be a blessing. If we are going to teach prosperity, we had better remember to include the reason for prosperity, and it’s not to keep it to ourselves.