Photo from the Israel Project
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Compare Matthew 25:14-30; Mark 13:14
This is a tough parable. But one of its applications seems absolutely clear: We’re to make use of the gifts that we’ve been given (whether financial, artistic, managerial, intellectual, musical, or whatever) to do good. We’re not supposed to simply sit on them.
We should be asking every day, “Am I doing the things that I should be doing? Are there things that I ought to be doing that I’m neglecting? What does the Lord expect of me? What is it that he wants me to do? Am I squandering my time and my gifts? Am I using them as they should be used? As he intended me to use them?”
When I was very young, I broke my arm trying a bicycle trick. When I was a teenager, I broke my arm attempting a motorcycle trick. I wasn’t really near death, but it occurred to me that I could have been — and that those on the other side might not have been particularly happy to see me. “You weren’t supposed to be here for another sixty-seven years.” “You threw your life away doing what?” “Did you really imagine, you idiot, that that’s what you were sent there to do?“) It struck me that perhaps I should try to be a bit more responsible.
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