Just a short thought and a question. Are you a digger or a multiplier? The question comes from the passage of scripture listed below:
Matthew 25:14-18: “For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s money.
Let's put this in perspective before answering the question. Jesus is telling parables about the end times and what it will be like when He returns to the earth. Jesus uses many analogies but they all have the same themes, "will you be ready when the Master returns?" and "what have you been doing while the Master was away?" Pretty simple stuff but it is amazing at the way that human beings procrastinate when there is no tangible urgency to our current situations. There is the prevailing sentiment that I can get to that later or "it can wait."
So we see here in the above parable that a master had three slaves. The master was going on a long trip (can you see the symbolism of Christ being here, making disciples and then ascending back into heaven i.e. taking a long trip?) and he gave each of the slaves some "money" to invest. It is not known when the master will return but he gave them orders, according to the passage in Luke 19 that mirrors this story, to "engage in business until I return." He gave "his property" to them with the expectation that they would invest and multiply it.
Notice something else, the master knew about the character of each one of his slaves. It is recorded that each slave was given "according to his own ability." Here is where we can see the grace of God. God is not going to ask anyone to do anything that they are ill equipped to do. Yes, he will give the Holy Spirit to empower us but each of us has our own natural ability and God sometimes works within that ability to accomplish His will on the earth. Does He sometimes supersede our natural ability and use ordinary folks to do extraordinary things? Absolutely. The bible is a compilation of God doing just that for thousands of years and He still does that today. God allowed Moses to overcome his speech impediment. God allowed Gideon to overcome his insecurity. God allowed Peter to overcome his pride.
But God also works within the confines of our natural abilities and use those abilities (ones that He gave us anyway) to accomplish His will. He used Paul's intelligence, his knowledge of the Law and his skill with reasoning to make him an emissary to the Gentile (e.g. Greco-Roman) culture and knew that Paul was able to use the same logical reasoning paradigm that the scholars of the day used; except Paul used their logic against them and was a great theologian and a masterful writer who reasoned that there was nothing else except for Christ and him crucified. The disciples were fishermen and Jesus used that vocation to allow them to understand that they were to be fishers of men. What I am trying to say is this: God knows what we are capable of and He will not overburden us or overwhelm us by charging us with a task that we are incapable of handling. As the old church says it, 'God won't put more on us that we can bear'.
Now, let us consider each slave. The two slaves that received 5 and 2 talents, respectively, each set about the master's work. They had no worries about his return date and they did not take into account that they probably had time to goof off before going to work and investing the talents. The Bible says that they set to work "immediately" and because of their obedience and their ability to work, they each doubled what the master gave them. Then there was the slave that was given one talent. He did not do anything except he immediately dug a hole in the ground and hid the talent. There is a problem here. Have you ever considered how much energy is expended in digging a hole? The energy spent there could have easily been spent "trading" or investing his master's property.
Considering the nature of this parable and the message Christ was trying to convey, we have to understand that Jesus/God is the Master of the story and we are the slaves (i.e. disciples- Paul and James considered themselves bondservants of the Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 1:1, James 1:1). This doesn't contradict the scripture in John 15 where Jesus says that the disciples are no longer slaves because he was speaking in terms of their knowledge of the intimacies of the Kingdom of God. Furthermore, while he was instructing them on the cost of discipleship, he used this phrase "a servant is not greater than his master" (John 15:20). So we are friends of the Lord Jesus Christ but we are also His servants as well because He is our Lord.
With that said, it is a known fact that we are masterful diggers. When God has given us a task and has even been gracious enough to give us something that we can handle and given it according to our abilities...we find every excuse in the world not to do it! We dig holes here and dig holes there when we could transfer that energy and DO what God has asked us to do. Rather than multiplying what God gives, we do not and we spend a lot of idle time doing absolutely NOTHING. That's not the intention of God when he blesses us with "his property" i.e. a gift or talent that could be used to glorify Him in the earth.
In all honesty we are probably a mix of both. Sometimes we dig and sometimes we multiply. I have been a digger before. There are things that God has asked me to do that I still feel apprehension about. I have also been a multiplier in that there are other things that I have been tasked with that I did according to what God said. We are all going to fail and fall. That is inevitable. The question is, which task occupies the majority of our time? Do we spend too much time digging? Or are we willing to do what it takes to multiply?
This story ends with the master returning and rewarding the servants that multiplied and cursing the servant that did not. This servant did not receive a "well done" nor was he considered "good and faithful" but "wicked and lazy". Those are terrible words to hear when the master returns. Someday, the Master of the Universe, the One that holds all things together by the word of His power, Jesus Christ will also return and the bible says this in Revelation 22:12 " behold, I am coming quickly and my REWARD is with me." We will be rewarded based on the works that we do in the Kingdom of God here on earth. It is my prayer that God would strengthen me to do those things that he has given me to do. I am not perfect and I fail daily but I will continue to ask God for strength! I also pray for you as you read and as you are convicted that you would begin multiplying. I was convicted by this scripture with respect to my efforts in evangelism. I have a burning desire to evangelize everyone that I meet but I don't always do it. Sometimes I let opportunities pass and I make excuses! But I pray that God would continue to give me open doors for ministry to the many people that I come across. Please pray for me and I will do the same for you. I am certain that ALL of us want to hear those words from the Master, "Well done good and faithful servant...you have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many. Enter into your Master's joy." Grace and peace.
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