Sermon Tone Analysis

By Pastor Glenn Pease

One of the longest and most sensational legal cases of all time had to do with the murder of the Secretary of State for Ireland and his under secretary in 1888.

The London times charged Mr. Parnell, the leader of the Irish Party with playing a role in the crime.

To prove the charge they published a letter in his handwriting condoning the murder.

Mr. Parnell declared immediately that the letter was a forgery, and so the Parnell Commission was set up to study the issue, and it became the center of worldwide interest.

The story had a dramatic ending.

The Times had received the letter from a man named Pigott for 5000 pounds.

Pigott claimed to have purchased the letter in Paris.

The world waited for the day when Pigott would take the stand and be submitted to merciless cross-examination of Sir Charles Russell.

The day came on Feb. 20, 1889, and to the astonishment of the court Sir Russell did not fire questions but simply hand Pigott a piece of paper and asked him if he would be kind enough to write a few words for him.

He then began to dictate several words, and finally, almost as an afterthought, he added the word hesitancy.

As all watched in silence Russell ended his strange spelling bee and took the sheet of paper.

The smile on his face revealed that his mysterious maneuver had been successful.

His assistant looked at it and said, "We got him."

Pigott had spelled hesitancy with ency rather than ancy.

The same word had been misspelled the same way in the letter the Times had published from him.

Pigott left the witness box and blew his brains out, and the case was solved.

It was solved on the basis of an e being where an a should have been.

It was such a small thing to have such a big consequence.

You are probably thinking that it is rare for judgment to turn on such a minor matter, but the fact is, little things are the primary factor in judgment.

Jesus makes it clear that this is even true when it comes to his judgment of people.

Here in Matt. 25 Jesus tells three parables of judgment, and all of them stress the vital importance of little things.

In the first parable of the ten virgins 5 of them foolishly forget to bring flasks of oil with them.

This little mistake causes them to be shut out of the marriage feast.

They had done no great crime.

They had not lost their virginity, nor had they planned any evil toward the bridegroom.

They simply neglected to take care of the little matter of having extra oil for their lamps.

Certainly Jesus does not take a minor matter like that so seriously, we have a tendency to believe, but not only the text but life demands that we pay attention to the importance of little things for good or evil.

In marriage it is the little things that add to or subtract from its stability.

Someone has said, "The grave of love is excavated with little digs."

Marriages do not disintegrate due to powerful blows of gigantic crisis, but they crumble slowly under the continuous pounding of the little hammer of complaint and criticism.

Jesus is being realistic and deeply serious when He emphasizes little things.

In the 3rd parable in this chapter He does it again.

He says that people will be judged according to what they have done, not to kings, presidents and dignitaries of every degree, but to the least of his brethren.

Whether you are with the sheep entering the blessed kingdom, or with the goats heading for destruction depends on what you have done about such commonplace things as being helpful and hospitable to people in need.

The question is not, did you give millions, but did you give a cup of cold water to one who was thirsty?

In these parables everyone is put in one of two categories.

You are either wise and faithful in little things, or you are neglectful and careless about little things.

You will search this chapter in vain to find any of the great Christian doctrines.

This is a chapter where Jesus majors on minors, and he does so deliberately because minors are of such major importance.

There are times in life when we must think small.

A cartoon had a Volkswagon dealer saying to his salesman, "Think big and your fired."

They had to think small because their interest was in what was small.

Jesus is telling us here that this is true in the spiritual life as well.

Our highest interest in our final reward hinges on how we have handled little things.

God has built this principle into all of reality.

The big is based on the little.

The vast universe that is big beyond our comprehension is all built out of invisible atoms packed with potential power.

The more man digs for understanding of the small things of reality the greater power he develops.

If you want a fascinating Bible study, look up in your concordance the word small and little, and you will see what an important place little things have in God's Word from the little stone that killed the giant Goliath to the little lad whose little lunch was used by Jesus to feed the 5000.

Goethe was right when he said that the Bible is a book that glorifies little things.

The poet has captured this truth:

It's not the big events alone

That makes us what we are;

And not the dizzy moments when

We're hanging on a star.

It's just the things that happen as

Along the road we trod.

The little things determine what

We're really worth to God.

This truth is even more clearly taught by Jesus in the second parable of this chapter that we want to examine more closely.

Jesus knew that most of His followers in history would not be racehorses among cows.

He knew they would be average men and women for the most part.

It was important, therefore, that Jesus make it crystal clear what the greatest danger was for the average Christian.

He ha taught often of the danger of the rich man, but in this parable the 5 talent man and the 2 talent man are rewarded, and it is the one talent man that is condemned.

Jesus is making it clear that no one can escape judgment if they are unfaithful in the smallest things.

This is a parable of warning for the average person, and for those little people who feel inadequate and insufficient.

Their greatest danger is in thinking that there little does not really matter.

They feel that because they cannot do great things they just as well do nothing.

They also feel that doing nothing is no great sin since they have so little to contribute anyway.

It is for those in danger of this deceptive disease of littleitis that Jesus tells it like it is.

He teaches here the doctrine of accountability that says every person will have to give an account of how they used their ability, however, small it might be.

Jesus teaches here that people are unequally endowed.

The master who went away gave his servants talents according to their ability.

The inequality of men is an obvious fact, but what is not as obvious is that they are equally responsible for the use of what they have.

The one talent person is not required to match the two or five talent person, but he is expected to produce according to his capacity, and if he does, his reward will be equal.

A maid was called to account for her sloppy work.

Her employer pointed to a dust-covered table and said, "I can write my name in the dust here."

The maid responded, "Isn't that wonderful.

That's more than I can do.

It just goes to shows what an education will do for you."

The maid was not required to write her name in the dust, for she could not do it, but she did have the ability to remove the dust, and it was for that she was held accountable.

All of us will be held accountable for what we do with what we have, and we will be classed among either the faithful or the foolish servants.

We want to look at each of these categories so that we might see which one we are heading for according to our present attitudes and actions.

I. THE FAITHFUL SERVANTS.

The first thing we need to establish about the 5 and 2 talent servants is that they were not successful because of their greater quantity of talents compared to the one talent servant.

This is evident by the fact that the 2 talent servant is given the same praise and the same reward as the 5 talent servant.

They were unequal in talent but equal in reward because they were equally faithful with what they had.

Faithfulness is what counts, and not the number of talents.

Quantity plays no role here, but all is dependant upon the quality of faithfulness.

When it comes to quantity, this parable makes it clear that even the most highly endowed servants are given only a little in comparison to the riches of their reward.

Most of the modern virgins follow the Berkeley Version, which translate verse 21, "Well done, good and faithful servant, you are trustworthy in a little, I will appoint you over much."

We need to see that every servant is being tested in this life concerning faithfulness over little things.

The big things of eternity will only be entrusted to those who have been faithful with the little things of time.

Jesus likes His will well done, and He has a pattern of promotion for those who are faithful to His will on earth.

If you want the joy of doing a great job for Jesus in eternity, you will be faithful in whatever job you do for Him now.

Nothing greater can be said of Lincoln than what is on his monument in Springfield.

It says, "He was faithful."

The goal of every believer is to hear Christ's commendation, "Well done thou good and faithful servant."

He does not say brilliant servant, popular servant, gifted servant, but he says faithful servant.