This has been my favourite parable for many years, perhaps because it was my first ever sermon at a mid-week church meeting. I love the whole story arc of gifting and obedience. Reading a post over at The Gospel Coalition Blog a fresh view was presented that I hadn’t considered before.
Matthew, chapter 25
24“Then the man who had received one bag of gold came. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. 25 So I was afraid and went out and hid your gold in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.’
26 “His master replied, ‘You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? 27 Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest.
What struck me was that the third servant claimed to have been afraid, yet the master challenged him that he’d been lazy. I wonder if the servant just voiced the first excuse that came to mind because he wasn’t expecting the Master to return and had been caught off-guard?
This challenges me to be more honest in my motivations, particularly in relating to gifting. If I see the opportunity to use a gift and don’t, then I’m being lazy. If I’m being lazy then I’m being wicked, because I’ve prevented God’s goodness that would come from the application of the gift from being worked (at least in that specific way).