WHAT TO DO?

November 13, 2011
Pentecost 22
1st Thessalonians 5:1-6
Matthew 25:14-30

(prayer)

When I was a youth, I used to stretch my mind pondering the nature of existence. I would imagine where and how I fit into the grand scheme of the universe as I knew it: living on this earth, on the edge of the Milky Way, swirling and moving within this vast sea of billions and billions of stars and emptiness. I would feel insignificant and special at the same time.

And I would try and imagine what might still exist, if I didn’t exist. I didn’t make the explicit comparison, but I suppose it was my own way of asking “if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?” These are the kinds of thoughts that would keep me up at night.

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I think that Human beings are amazing and wonderful creatures. We are made up of the primordial elements that enliven our entire universe, a yet our particular combination is this mysterious mix of matter and mind – of flesh and spirit (to use theological language). The fact that we are more than physical beings of instinct is what really defines us. As my youthful mind stretching taught me, we are aware of our existence beyond the innate thrust to survive. We can ponder our existence. That simply act of pondering defines us in a way. In the words of the philosopher, ‘we think, therefore we are.’

What I find especially interesting is that these deep thought allow us to go beyond instinct – even against instinct, when we choose to. Sometimes, this can be seen later as wonderfully wise and at other times, going against our basic instincts leads to embarrassing regret.

All in all, this enables us to explore and grow and learn as the creatures we are.

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We are beings of complex choice.

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Today is the second of three consecutive weeks when we are invited to read part of chapter twenty-five in the gospel of Matthew. It’s a long chapter, some 46 verses long. Last week, we read verses 1-13 >> ‘The Parable of the Ten Bridesmaids’: a lesson in thinking ahead and choosing to be ready; next week, we will hear verses 31-46 >> a parable about how people are judged to have served Jesus: a lesson that will see how no one really saw the true impact of the choices they made.

Today, we heard the middle story, ‘The Parable of the Talents’.

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This parable is a favourite of Church Fundraising and Finance Committees. I have heard it reflected on several stewardship or philanthropic events I have attended that encourage us to be cheerful and faithful givers. And why not, this parable talks about multiplying financial resources. In the church, these kind of results provide opportunities for enhanced and expanded mission – to further the realm of God on earth.

The Parable: In an agricultural society, land was the source of wealth. The political leaders and aristocracy lived on the taxing of land and its produce. Other than these political expenses, landowners had great opportunities to expand and grow their wealth. Like today, in Jesus’ day, there was quite a gap between the rich and the poor. The poorer workers struggled hard to survive day-to-day and the rich worried about getting richer. One of the ways they did this was to invest the money they earned into acquiring more lands.

The example in Jesus’ parable in the middle of Matthew 25, is of a wealthy landowner who possessed several tracts of usable land in different areas. Even hands-on owners like this couldn’t manage all of their property at the same time. They had to entrust others to manage things in their absence. In the parable, the master of this property was likely off to visit other parts of his vast holdings and instructed three servants to manage some of his wealth. I just called them servants, but many translations (like the NRSV) uses ‘slaves’ – one word in greek translates to these two English words. We often think of slaves as being ‘unpaid’ forced labourers. Even if these people were paid enough to survive day to day and even if they had the theoretical choice to leave and work elsewhere, the reality is that in the first century, there was little practical difference between a servant and a slave.

All that aside, these three ‘servants/slaves’ were given a white collar kind of job – there were to be brokers/investment managers. And the amount of money they were given is astronomical – way beyond what they could ever hope to see for themselves.

A Talent was a measurement of money in the ancient world. It’s exact value varied from place to place and in different times: about 75 pounds of gold (current value $2.1M+), the wages needed to pay a crew of 200 rowers for a month; One definition of a Talent was to equate it to what a labourer would earn over the totality of their life time: about 50 years daily wages. No worker could ever accumulate this kind of money – the daily wage was just enough for the family for a day: you’d have not work for half a century while not eating to have those kind of savings.

So you can imagine how obscenely high this money would seem to the three servants in the story – and they were given eight times that much to manage (the most trustworthy and talented servant investor was given five talents, the next, 2 talents and the final servant (obviously a first timer in this role) was only given 1 talent). When the master returned, his 400 years worth of wages had grown to 750 (8 talents had become 15 – an average return on investment of 88%. Even Italian government bonds as risky as they are right now are only offering about 7%. But the average return is not what is noticed – instead the fact that servant number three simply buried the money and returned it safely, but with a 0% gain was the topic of conversation.

Since making money was the whole point – the first two servants are praised for their good stewardship. The third servant is fired - his portfolio is given over to the first servant. The reluctant investor is kicked out of his home on the master’s estate and forced to find another way to support himself: not a promising prospect (weeping and gnashing of teeth is more likely).

The moral of the story: “For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.”

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I know that we would love to think of this parable literally: how we would love to get a 100% financial return on our investments, like the first two stewards – who are both praised by the master.

But I could not be more firm in my belief that Jesus was NOT preaching about money! The money is a metaphor. If it is a literal parable, I’m not sure I can agree with the ‘master’ – expecting outrageous financial gain at the expense of slave labour. If that was the case, I’d applaud the third servant not expel him for refusing to taking part in the obscene corruption of the system that widens the gap between rich and poor. But I don’t have to go there because, I am sure that Jesus was not actually taking about the investment of money, but rather the way we invest our faith!

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Many sermons of the Parable of the Talents focus on the value of being active in our pursuit of advancing Jesus’ mission. We can be reminded that following Jesus is not always served by being overly cautious and keeping the good news to ourselves, but we are encouraged to risks to grow and learn and expand the church.

All of these are good and fine sermon topics on the ‘Parable of the Talents’. And I’ve preached versions of these in the past.

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And yet, I wondered if that was really where this text was calling me for this Sunday.

Sometimes, as I plan for the worship service in a given week, I am naturally drawn to a particular message from the readings. Sometimes, I can’t type fast enough to get the sermon out of my head. This week took more time, a greater effort of searching, and prayer and discernment.

“What to do? What to do?”

I had planned to focus my time on Thursday morning this week to figure this out. But as often happens in this ministry biz, the day I expected to have was not the day that occurred: I spent the bulk of Thursday morning consulting with a couple of clergy colleagues from other United Churches about some situations going on in some of the congregations of our Presbytery. We all seemed to have noticed a pattern in churches that are having a tough time right now. I know that the dynamics are not limited to the United Church of Canada.

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Some modern churches find themselves struggling between the pull to be in ‘maintenance mode’ and the call to be move their mission beyond where they are now. As I finally sat down on Thursday afternoon to work on this message, I was able to see that this parable could be used as a scriptural warning against stubbornly holding our ground instead of using the gifts that have been entrusted to us.

I believe that to be true at the congregational level and I am also quite sure that it applies at the individual level.

The basic question often is:

Is there something about what we have already experienced, faith wise, that really worked for us and that we do not want to loose? In other words, have we discovered what feeds our spirit, what nurtures our soul, what inspires us?

If that is the case, how does a changing world affect that? Do the way we have done church and liked church, still happen the way it once did? Or is it threatened by a changing population in the church, in an increasingly busy world?

One of the conversations I had recently, I imagined two possible statements people might make – people who feel their way of being church slipping away:

 I want this church to be here for my grandchildren.

 I want this church to be significant for my grandchildren

One of these statements of a proclamation based on maintenance; the other, a proclamation based on mission. One of them looks backwards for a model for how to be the church today, the other looks forward.

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One of my personal goals as a minister is to be involved in a church that seeks to be relevant to the world we live in. This reminds me to be mindful about the uniqueness of this time in history and to not assume that the way church has been is the way it always has to be.

As I have been reflecting personally on this parable this week, I am coming to see that relevance only tells half the story – the real goal is to “be significant” – to allow faithful endeavours to make a difference in people’s lives.

I want to invite you all to think about a couple of questions:

 So, what is it that we all need to be mindful of as we seek to be St. David’s United Church – Leduc in 2011 and beyond? What makes church significant to you at this time in your life? What is missing in our mission together that would improve your faith life in the church?

 Who we have been prior to this point is unchangeable history. But I imagine that there can be some value in knowing the path that has led us here. What must we maintain of who we’ve been so that we can move forward with some sense of purpose and continuity?

Take a few minutes to think about this. If you are willing, chat about this with some people around you.

{conversation}

I’m open to talking with people about this. I know your church Council wants to share in these conversations.

Talk to me, email me, facebook me. Your church council usually meets on 3rd Wednesday evening.

I believe that this our mission will be strengthened through engaging what it means to be a church, significant in people’s lives. And like the metaphor in the parable, I believe that these kind of vulnerable and faithful investments of thought and action will bring us more that we can possibly imagine.

Let us pray...

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#509VU “I, the Lord, of Sea and Sky”