The talents
"His master replied, ‘You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so when I returned I would have received it back with interest." ‘Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has the ten talents. 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. (Matthew 25:26-30—NIV)
Now, whom are we talking about?
We are talking about the Lord's servants to whom He has given talents. We are not referring to physical Jews who do not know Jesus, or to the unsaved.
What are talents? Talents are whatever the Lord has given you: the body and blood of Jesus, the Holy Spirit, justification by faith, the gifts and ministries of the Holy Spirit, your family—all that has been added to you since you were born. All is to be used in building the Kingdom of God.
To one man the Master gave five thousand dollars, so to speak. To another man two thousand dollars. To another man one thousand dollars.
When we look around us we can see that Christians vary greatly in the amount of spiritual understanding and ability given to them. Isn't it so?
Then the Master returned.
The man who was given five thousand dollars produced ten thousand dollars. The Master congratulated him and put him in charge of many things.
The man who was given two thousand dollars produced four thousand dollars.
The Master congratulated him and put him in charge of many things.
The man who was given one thousand dollars dug a hole and hid his thousand dollars in the ground.
The Master called him wicked and lazy, took his thousand dollars and gave it to the man with ten thousand, and drove the wicked servant into the darkness.
Today's teachers say this could not apply to Christians because they are saved by grace and could never be put in the outer darkness. "Oh no, they are going to be raptured, hear nothing negative at the Judgment Seat of Christ, and then rule the nations with a rod of iron (after they sit in their mansion wearing their golden slippers and admire their back yard full of diamonds)." The doctrines taught today would be funny if they weren't so appallingly disastrous!
What we are preaching today is sheer mythology. Furthermore we are contravening the Words of Jesus Christ with our ear-tickling traditions.
The people under discussion, in the parable of the talents, belong to one of six groups.
They are unbelievers.
They are the Jews living at the time of Christ.
They are physical Jews who do not know Christ.
They are physical Jews who know Christ but Gentile Christians are not included.
They are Gentiles who know Christ but Jewish Christians are not included.
They are Christians whether Jewish or Gentile by race.
Has Jesus come to the unbelievers and warned them that if they do not use the talents they have they will be thrown into outer darkness? that if they use their talents wisely they will be entrusted with authority in His Kingdom? This is ridiculous and against everything we believe.
Has Jesus come to the Jews of His own day with this warning? This is not possible for He is speaking of His return. Will He raise them at His coming and either throw them into the darkness or entrust them with great authority?
Has Jesus come to the physical Jews who do not know Christ and warned them that if they do not use their talents they will be thrown into outer darkness? that if they use their talents wisely they will be entrusted with authority in His Kingdom? There is no basis for such an idea.
Has Jesus come to the physical Jews who know Christ and warned them that if they do not use their talents diligently they will be thrown into outer darkness? that if they use their talents diligently they will be entrusted with authority in His Kingdom? but this does not apply to Gentile Christians?
To make a division between Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians would be to do away with Paul's teaching of the one Olive Tree, the one Seed of Abraham, the one new Man.
Has Jesus come to Gentiles who know Christ but not Jews who know Christ? This is impossible for the previous reason.
The plain, simple truth that every Christian would recognize if his mind had not been poisoned with the current teaching is that Jesus Christ is warning His servants, the Christians, both Jewish and Gentile, that if they are careless and lazy with the grace He has given them, not working at it, not bearing the fruit He is looking for and reproducing that fruit in others, they will be thrown into outer darkness at the coming of the Lord.
To believe otherwise is to choose to be deluded.
The penalty for not being diligent with what God has entrusted to us is the loss of what we were given and confinement in the outer darkness. This is an exceedingly severe punishment that we would suppose would be reserved for murderers and adulterers. The fact that being careless with the things of God, as so many believers are in the United States, will bring such consequences upon us, shows us that the Gospel of the Kingdom is much stricter than is being presented.
There is too much emphasis today on God's love and mercy. The severity of God is not being stressed as a scriptural balance. The lawless grace we are preaching, the grace that does not require a new righteous creation but brings us to Heaven on the basis of a sovereign intervention of God, is pure mythology. I believe the Lord God would have the current teaching of lawless grace thrown out of the churches because it is ruining His intentions concerning man. Our current view of grace makes Jesus Christ the minister of sin! It is a horrible error!
We would have to think a long time before we could create a doctrine deadlier in effect than the current teaching of lawless grace.