Faithfulness

Preparing for His Appearing: Parable of the Talents

Ken

Stewardship of the goods entrusted to us by God is preparing for His appearing because it requires our trust in Him to comprehend, plan, execute, administrate, and maintain whatever undertaking God has delegated to us, until He returns. Immediately after His disclosure to His disciples about the nature of His Second Coming in the Olivet Discourse (Matthew 24), Jesus outlined thoroughly His expectations of how we are to prepare for His appearing in the Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30) through our stewardship of His goods. 

First, faithfulness to Him is the primary thing our Divine Master expects from us, unlike the world’s preconceived expectations of monetary gain. “Moreover it is required in stewards, that a man be found faithful” (1Corinthians 4:2 KJV). 

Second, He gives to each of us goods to steward “every man according to his several ability” (Matthew 25:15).

Third, He mandates our trading with His property, i.e., “he that had received the five talents went and traded with the same” (25:16) and “likewise he that had received two” (25:17). 

Fourth, He considers it a Faithful Return On Investment (FROI) to receive back a doubling of His investment, e.g., five talents “made them other five talents” (25:16) and two talents “gained other two” (25:17). 

Fifth, His commendation is the same, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord” (25:21, 23). 

Sixth, He angrily regards us, if we wickedly have a low esteem of Him, feel Him to be unjust, unworthy of our labor, undeserving of our trust, and beneath our dignity to stoop. “24 Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed: 25 And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth: lo, there thou hast that is thine. 26 Thou wicked and slothful servant” (25:24-25, 26). 

Seventh, gaining from other’s labors is appropriate (25:26); a lawful gain for the use of money or simple bank interest is not unwarranted (25:27); and, the benefitting of the most resourceful from the loss of the least resourceful is also warranted (25:28). “For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath” (25:29).

Father, may Your kingdom come and will be done on earth, as it is in Heaven. Grant Your servants understanding to transact Your business here below, until You take us Home to Heaven. In Jesus’ name, return quickly. Amen.

Judy the Lifesaving Dog

Ken

“A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast” (Proverbs 12:10 KJV). And, why wouldn’t we care for someone who is so faithful to us? Judy (1936-1950) was a pure-bred liver and white Pointer, born in Shanghai, China and adopted by the British Royal Navy as a ship’s mascot for the HMS Gnat, and later with the HMS Grasshopper. During WW2, many times she provided early warning to the ship’s crew of approaching enemy aircraft with her acute canine hearing. After her ship was finally sunk, and finding refuge on an island, she helped surviving crew members find fresh water, saving them all. Upon their eventual capture by the Japanese, Judy was the only dog ever registered as a prisoner of war. Moving from camp to camp, she survived the sinking of the transport ship Harugiku Maru, and saved many passengers from drowning by bringing them flotsam. In camp, she caught small rodents for the POWs to eat for survival. Judy bonded with fellow POW Frank Williams, who shared his handful of rice, and both cared for one another until her death years after the war. Bonding with furry friends such as Judy reminds us of our Lord’s attachment to us. LORD, may we be inspired to be as faithful to You, as Judy was to Frank and all her crew mates. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen. 

The Unprofitable Servant

Ken

Jesus’ Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30) was actually about faithfulness in handling wealth and possessions (Greek, talanton, one money “talent” is the equivalent of 200 pounds of gold) placed under our control by the Father, and not a story about unique talents or abilities, which distinguish us. Each of three servants were given differing amounts of capital or property to administrate, invest, and manage with the expectation of returning the property or principal with a profit equal to the original property. The first two conscientiously took their lord’s original investment and faithfully “traded” (Matthew 25:16 KJV) or duplicated that amount, but the last was an evil, unprofitable servant, who had a low, selfish, and unkind view of his master. “Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed [scattered seed]: And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth: lo, there thou hast that is thine” (25:24-25). Why should I benefit such a boss with my labor, if he is not worthy of me? He’s only exploiting me. LORD, grant to us a willing heart for service and deliver us from Your sentence of casting the “unprofitable servant into outer darkness” (25:30). In Jesus name, we pray. Amen. 

Perfect Soundness

Ken

“And His name through faith in His name hath made this man strong, whom ye see and know: yea, the faith which is by Him hath given him this perfect soundness in the presence of you all” (Acts 3:16 KJV). Should Christians use doctors and medical science? Of course, since doctors do not heal, but only assist God to heal. It is our privilege to receive healing from God. Yes, but some healing may not be complete until we come into His glorified presence. “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is” (1John 3:2). In the meantime, we should pray, believe, and affirm our “perfect soundness” (Acts 3:16) from the top of our head to the tip of our toes, until we see the physical reality, or we’re translated into His presence. Even so, come Lord Jesus. Amen. 

Dead Reckoning

Ken

Dead reckoning is an expression in aeronautical navigation of determining your current location based upon speed, heading, and elapsed time from a previous position. “Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:11 KJV). Christians are held captive by entangling sin simply because they do not reckon, consider, picture, or imagine themselves as anything but chained to the necessity or reality of that sin. Paul showed us the beginning of our solution. Reckon yourselves dead to that sin and alive to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Some do it easier than others, but all must actively admit, confess, believe, imagine, see, and reckon that it’s so, for it to be so. How is this miracle accomplished? Through Jesus, who is God’s empowerment. It is simply God’s work in us to make it so.

Rapture: The Blessed Hope

Ken

“Looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13 NKJV). Sure, I’d like to go, if there’s a Rapture, but how do you know it’s so? Harpazō is the NT Greek for catching up or rapture. “Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up [Greek, harpazō] together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord” (1Thessalonians 4:17). Here, harpazō is understandably connected with the “coming of the Lord” (4:15). We will be “caught up” (4:17) to the Lord in the air to reunite with our predeceased brothers and sisters before we all return with Christ. Harpazō also occurs in Revelation 12:5, where the “woman” (12:1), representing Israel, brings forth the Messiah, who is “caught up” (12:5) to the throne of God. Likewise, the Church as the Body of Christ will be raptured to Heaven, after which Israel will be forced to flee “into the wilderness” (12:6). May the Spirit of Christ “comfort” you (1Thessalonians 4:18) with these words, but let us not be impatient or contentious with one another, least of all, about the Rapture. “According to your faith be it unto you” (Matthew 9:29). 

How Is Your Faith?

Ken

The only way you can prove you have faith is to presently walk in faith. “For we walk by faith, not by sight” (2Corinthians 5:7 KJV). Faith is sensitive to the present. We may have first believed in the past, but we must continue in the present, or there is no faith. We hope to walk in faith to the end, but we must continue in faith in the present to get there. Our great enemy is the deception that faith is not active. We deceive ourselves, when we are not trusting Christ for “all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that hath called us to glory and virtue” (2Peter 1:3). If we are truly in the faith, then let us avoid shipwreck by allowing Christ to direct our hopes and fears through all the opportunities and troubles of life. 

Our Jōb Moment

Ken

Our Jōb moment of why me is more common to man than we think. We are our Sovereign God’s possession to do with us as He pleases, but like David, we had rather fall into God’s hands than the hands of the enemy. “And David said unto Gad, I am in a great strait: let us fall now into the hand of the LORD; for His mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man” (2Samuel 24:14 KJV). In the end, Job quit defending his own righteousness and began acknowledging God can do what He thinks best. “I know that You can do all things; no purpose of Yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2 NET). At the beginning, Jehovah had acknowledged Job as “none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth [turns away from] evil” (1:8). God has a higher opinion of you than you think. He is willing to preserve us from day to day temptations. “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer [allow] you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it” (1Corinthians 10:13 KJV). He taught us to pray, “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil” (Matthew 6:13 KJV). We are His children, and our Father knows best. Let us remember He is the High King of Heaven, acting in the best interests of His Kingdom, but He remembers our frame as dust. O LORD, be merciful to Your children, “Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt” (26:39). Amen and amen.

And Then There Was One

Ken

Was Elijah the only faithful prophet left in Israel? Evidently not. The LORD replied, “I have reserved to Myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal” (Romans 11:4 KJV). But, when no one seems to be representing the Lord God Almighty, He must take matters into His own hands. “And I looked, and there was none to help; and I wondered that there was none to uphold: therefore Mine own arm brought salvation unto Me; and My fury, it upheld Me” (Isaiah 63:5 KJV).