"(He) Entrusted to Them His Property"

by Robert Hamerton-Kelly

Scripture: 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11; Matthew 25:14-30

"For it will be as when a man going on a journey called his servants and entrusted to them his property."

-- Matthew 25:14

Today is Stewardship Sunday and after this service the Congregation will meet to discuss and endorse the “goal budget” proposed by the Church Council on the recommendation of the Finance Board. This sermon is supposed to motivate you to support that budget with your tithes and pledges, but I would rather thank you than exhort you, because I know that you know what needs to be done and that you will simply and quietly do it. You have convinced me by your goodness over the years that God is indeed good and by your faithfulness that God is indeed faithful.  So I have no doubt at all that God will meet our needs again this year and that you will be the means by which God does so. We have not only remarkably unselfish people in our midst, but also remarkably astute, skilful and efficient people to handle our investments, finances and bookkeeping.   I believe Stewardship Sunday should be at least in part a time to celebrate God’s goodness through the talents of His people in this place. So thank you all! Feel good about all that we have achieved in the past year, and in the years before, and look forward to another year of spiritual growth and more effective service to each other, to our children and youth, and to the world.

Speaking of talents brings us to the parable for today, the parable of the talents. Talents are units of value; the note in my RSV says that a talent was worth 15 years of wages for a laborer. So it was a unit not of small value but of large. It is interesting that the best way the annotators could find to convey the value of a talent was in terms of the time of one’s life it took to earn one. This shows a very important meaning of money, as the measure of the time of one’s life and thus a powerful symbol of dedication. We however use talent nowadays to refer to an innate ability and I have not been able to find any explicit etymological link between the two meanings. I surmise that talent as ability is to be regarded as an item of value and thus attracts the talent word, which historically has always meant primarily a measure of value. In any case stewardship is about value, specifically the proper respect, care and exploitation of the value that has been entrusted to us by God along with life itself.

“Entrusted,” that is the stewardship word! We are still in our Gospel readings in the shadow of the “day of the Lord” and Jesus intends today’s parable to be another illustration of what that day will be like for us. Last week we were primarily to keep alert and pay attention because, secondarily, we shall have to give account of our lives to God. This week, primarily, we are to remember that we must give account, and specifically in this parable, of the property the master entrusted to us. What is that property? It is life itself and all the advantages and opportunities God has given us along with it. In the profoundest sense our lives are God’s property, beloved property, and he entrusts it to us, to our free will, to be used responsibly and profitably for His project in the world.

I have already said that the spirit in which I offer this sermon is one of thanks not threats, but we cannot avoid entirely the note of demand that we show how we have fulfilled the duty of trust that God gave us when He created us, and the threat that if we waste our time and talents we shall regret it before the Lord. God expects us to take the life He gives us and to develop it to the full. However, many talents He gives us we must use them strenuously and intelligently in this world.

A parable is not an allegory and so we must not think that Jesus intends this parable to advise us on investment strategy, urging an aggressive rather than a conservative approach. It is incidental that the details concern money because the overall point, which is all that counts, is spiritual, namely that one must use to the full the energy, gifts and opportunities God gives us whatever they may be. It is largely fortuitous that Jesus uses money to make the point, - although money as we have noted is a good symbol of life, - but fortunate for Stewardship Sunday. Money does represent the time and achievement of our lives and is a good symbol of our duty to dedicate our lives to God.

So, recognizing that Jesus is not giving investment advice I believe we can still use the mercantile symbols to make the spiritual point, that God has entrusted to us our lives, just like a man might entrust his property to certain employees, or we entrust our retirement savings to financial institutions. Recent betrayals by corporate executives and oversight bodies have sown mistrust in our financial world and we have had an opportunity to see how vitally important it is to the whole fabric of life that people be trustworthy and behave honorably in the matter of other people’s property entrusted to them.

So Jesus tells us that our lives are another person’s property entrusted to us, God’s property given in trust to be lived for His glory. Please don’t take it amiss that I should say we are God’s property; it is a glorious thing that God should own us, that is, claim us and not be ashamed to be our God and acknowledge that we are His people. In this usage the term “property” should be given a positive meaning. We cannot, of course, be another person’s property, since slavery has long since been illegal, but we can belong to God. The Apostle Paul always introduced himself as the slave of Christ, Christ’s property, and that was his glory.

Let us conclude with some thoughts about that word “entrust.” In the NT it is used with three meanings: 1) To give something to someone to care for, to entrust; 2) To hand somebody over as Judas handed over Jesus, to betray; 3) To hand on as parents hand on traditions to their children down the generations. By the logic of poetic association, I suggest that we accept all three meanings and keep them all in the air as a good juggler would.

Then the message would be that we shall be trustworthy with the property God entrusts to us; we shall not betray him for thirty pieces of silver or any sum of mere money, and we will pass on to our children and children’s children the truth that our lives belong to God who has given them to us, a solemn trust to be spent to the profit of all that is good, and beautiful and true, all that reflects the beauty of Jesus and the generosity of God.

When God created us He gave us in trust the whole of this wonderful world to enjoy and to care for as good stewards. He gave each of us special talents and opportunities to invest in His great project. The church is an important part of that divine project. Let us use our talents and opportunities to be good stewards of the church of Christ in this place. Give as Christ leads you, and rejoice in the palpable progress we make here from year to year. God is indeed very good, and we respond to His goodness with a goodness of our own.

Amen.