Bury Our Talents

Today’s Gospel reading is about using our talents wisely.  Almost all of us believe Jesus, through Matthew, is telling us to use our God-given talents wisely, especially to help others.  Yes, we should, but this reading clearly tells us that talents are a form of money.  In fact, a talent was worth about 20 years of wages for a laborer!  So what’s it all about – the message?

Jesus begins his parable by saying, “A man going on a journey.”  Who was that man and where was he going?  We only know from Luke’s version of this same parable. He was a man of noble birth going to a distant place to have himself appointed king of his own people.  Then he would return. 

Also from Luke, we learn his compatriots disliked him and did not want him to be king.  That’s critical information, and we don’t find it in Matthew’s version.  Although, in Matthew we discover this man was a demanding person harvesting where he did not plant and gathering where he did not scatter.  No wonder his compatriots disliked him.  No, they hated him. 

This guy was a tyrant and greedy.  He expected his servants to grow his money.  He didn’t give them anything in return.  And if they didn’t do what he told them - make his money grow – then they were useless servants to be thrown into the darkness outside where there would be wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Oddly enough the "hero" of this Gospel is the servant who buried the talent and not the ones who helped the greedy, cruel master grow his money.  He was the one who risked being thrown into the darkness.

Who is this despicable character to which Jesus refers?  He’s Herod – the powerful arrogant and hated King Herod!  Jesus cleverly condemns Herod without naming him.   Herod had gone to Rome to get himself crowned by the Roman occupying army and nation.  

The message of this Gospel surprisingly is not about using our human talents wisely.  It’s about the opposite of the kingdom of God.  That’s Jesus’ world in which he lived. 

It was a world based on power, violence, investments, interest, exploitation, dominance, occupied territories, nationalism, arrogance, terrorism, slaying enemies without justice or recourse.

It was about the rich getting richer and the poor becoming destitute and miserable by the decisions made by those in power, the last part of the Gospel reading.

This is a powerful parable with a message for us today – seek the kingdom of God – stand against injustice even if we have to carry Jesus’ cross on behalf of others.  In other words: beware the kingdom of Herod where there will be “darkness outside, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.”

Deacon David Pierce