The High Risk Venture of Faith

I preached on Jesus’ parable of the “Talents” this past Sunday (Matthew 25:14-30). This is that famous story where “the Master” leaves town, but before he does, he gives over his “talents” (or large amounts of money) to three of his servants. One gets five talents, another gets two talents and the third gets one talent. After a long time, the master returns and inquiries about his talents that he entrusted to the servants. The first two have doubled their talents while the third servant had dug a hole and buried his talent to keep it safe and returned it back to the master. “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

Jesus is telling this story during his own high risk venture in the week leading up to his arrest, torture and execution. You see, he is the master of the story and is about to “leave”. He is imparting to his disciples his “talents” of a powerful and radical message of love and compassion, forgiveness and justice. The problem with the third servant’s response is that he didn’t share, invest, or take any risks with the talent he was given. Faith is a risk taking venture. He didn’t do that, he buried it similar to their burial of Jesus on that Friday.

The greatest risk, as it turns out in the parable and in the life of faith, is to not risk anything at all! What if the first two servants had lost their talents? Of course, Jesus doesn’t tell the story this way, but even if it was, I can’t imagine that the master would be angry with them – he might have even applauded their efforts. This parable is not about a prosperity gospel where God blesses people with wealth, but about what Jesus hopes and expects from his followers after he is gone from this world. He doesn’t want us to play it safe. He wants us to get out there and use the gifts we have already been given to invest in the reign of God in our world. Notice, we don’t know how the first two servants doubled their talents, but that is also instructive because there is no one way to participate in the Kingdom of God, but as many ways as there are people. We are freed to use our gifts and collaborate with the master to invest faithfully. Faith is a high risk venture, but incredibly liberating. This parable is inviting us to the high-risk adventure of being a servant of Christ. Let’s invest in God, together!

Pastor Tim