Jack Taylor’s 138-point game and the Gospel of Matthew

Even though I’m not a big basketball fan, I’ve had a lot of fun with this story about Grinnell College’s Jack Taylor shattering the NCAA record books by scoring 138 points in a single game. The whole team beat Faith Baptist Bible 179-104. Faith Baptist Bible’s David Larson went an impressive 34 for 44 shots to score 70 points, too! Imagine scoring that many points and being a footnote to the story.

Anyway, all the outlets covered it and ESPN had this write-up, using Associated Press reporting. Let’s cut right to the religion news portion of the story that caused one reader to send it in:

Before his squad took the floor Tuesday night, Taylor met with a few teammates for a pregame devotional. It was the first time that Taylor, a sophomore at the Division III school, had ever read Bible verses with other players prior to tipoff.

They focused on Matthew 25, a chapter that features a parable about the value of talents.

“I gotta thank the man upstairs,” Taylor said. “I was able to multiply my talents tonight.”

Is the parable about “the value” of talents? The submitter thought the reporter was simply confused but it’s not necessarily in error. The parable is about what it means to be a faithful servant in God’s kingdom. It’s called the Parable of the Talents because of Jesus’ reference to talents — that is, to monetary units. It does sound like the reporter is thinking of talents as in skills.

As the submitter said:

It’s a nitpick in the grand scheme, but if I were drinking coffee this morning, I surely would have spit it!

Well, we wouldn’t want that.

But on this Thanksgiving, I wish all of our readers a blessed day, surrounded by family and friends. Thank you for all you do throughout the year to make this such a fun discussion sight.