Sermon Tone Analysis
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$26,080
What if you were trusted with $26,080 of God’s money?
What if you knew that at some point He would return to see what you were able to accomplish with the money?
What would you do first?
How would you make that money push forward God’s interests?
Would you be excited about the opportunity?
Would you be nervous about the responsibility?
Another good question is, why are we talking about $26,080 precisely.
Calgary average hourly wage is $32.60.
For an 8 hour day, that equals $260.80
And if we put 100 of those days together, we get $26,080.
In Jesus day, that’s called a mina.
A mina is what a worker would make with 100 working days.
(Each day’s wage was called a dararii.
100 denari is 1 mina.)
There is a parable that Jesus tells in Luke 19 about servants who are entrusted with a mina each.
Context - Between Zacchaeus and Palm Sunday
Luke 19 occurs very near to the time of Jesus death and ressurection.
There was a group of people who travelled with Jesus, and they saw the signs that he did and they heard him teach and I think that for the most part, they were convinced that he was God’s Messiah.
He was the one who was going to free them.
They were becoming very excited about the possibility of Jesus returning to Jerusalem and the Kingdom of God appearing right then and there.
In their minds, everything was about to happen.
They were becoming enthusastic, it was becoming obvious to Jesus.
Many of the people thought that he would establish his Kingdom.
But that was not going to look like, or feel like, anything that the people expected.
The parable is to help refocus and clarify expectations.
A Nobleman travels to a far country to recieve authority.
Who do you think that the nobleman represents?
It is Jesus.
The Kingdom of God is not about to appear in Jerusalem to change everything in a moment.
Instead, Jesus is going to go away and recieve authority.
What his servants do during his time away becomes the focus of the parable.
The Servant’s Task - Engage in Business
At this point in the parable, the ruler is not yet a ruler, he does not have authority.
This means that his servants have to have some sort of faith that he is in fact comming back.
Do you think that the servants will act according to their faith?
I think that they will.
I think that the ones who believe that he is going to return with authority will be hard at work.
I think that the ones who don’t trust him to return will be acting on that assumption.
Those ones will squander his investment, they won’t take it seriously.
What is the currency?
(Not CAD, USD, silver, gold or minas)
When you become a follower of Jesus, there is not cheque written for you for $26,080.
The mina in the parable is representing something else besides financial currency.
In this parable, an equal gift is given to each servant.
What is the equal gift that is given to each person as they repent of their sin and trust Jesus for forgiveness and eternal salvation?
Every Christian has the Gospel and God the Holy Spirit to help further the Gospel.
The common gift given to all is the Gospel.
We have the best news, we have the power of salvation.
We who follow Jesus have been given God the Holy Spirit as our helper, comforter and teacher.
In this parable, each servant recieves an identical investment of one mina.
When we look for application, we need to see that we are all going to be accountable to God for this gift of the gospel in our lives.
We won’t be ablt to look to another and say that they were given more than us.
Jesus parable also has some adversity.
Those who Oppose the Prospective Ruler
When the parable is given, the Pharisees, who were both the religious and political leaders, were actively working against Jesus.
It is easy to imagine them before the throne of God echoing the words of Luke 19:14, “We don’t want this man to rule over us”.
King Herod’s Son, Archelaus
Do you remember King Herod from the Christmas story?
Well, once Herod dies its not a sure thing that his throne will be passed down to his son.
This is because, Herod was opperating under the authority of Rome.
In fact, Herod had himself travelled to Caesar in Rome to get his authority in the first place.
When Herod died, his son Archelaus did the same thing.
But the Jewish people sent a delegation with him to protest his rule.
Caesar chose to give his authority to Archelaus, but he did not give him the title of King.
Archelaus returned and rebuilt the stately royal palace in Jericho, the same city where Jesus was now telling the parable.
History tells us that Archelaus was an incompetent ruler, and that soon authority was taken back by Rome and bestowed upon a serious of procurators.
At the point in history when Jesus gives the parable, Pontius Pilate is the current Roman representative.
In Jesu’s parable, the delegation is not sucessful in their protest.
The ruler is given the authority, and returns to see what his servants have done with the investment that he trusted them with.
The Servant’s Results & Rewards
The ten servants in the parable represent all of Jesus servants, we are included in that number.
We are only given the results of three servants, which might represent three different accounts that could be given to Christ on his second coming.
Servant #1 - A 1000% Return.
The Reward is Extravegant and Proportional
One mina is 100 days salary.
10 minas’ are 1000 days salary.
In today’s dollars, that sort of return would look like $260,800.
That’s a lot of money.
Its impressive that the servant was able to get a 1000% return.
Still, $260,800 is not even going to buy you a house in our market.
But what is the reward that the ruler gives?
He gives that faithful servant authority over 10 towns.
The reward is extravagent and proportional.
The ruler has returned with authority, and he will rule his kingdom by delegating that authority to the servants that he can trust.
We see now that the time between the advent of Christmas and the advent of Christ second coming is a test for how we handle a certain currency.
Who are the ones that our ruler can trust?
He can trust the ones who have been faithful.
The Reward is Extravegant and Proportional
Its the same sort of extravegence, and the exact same proportion.
This might be a picture of God’s fairness.
He doesn’t show favouritism based on which servant he likes best, because he is God, and his love does not have favourites.
But he is proportional in his extravagence.
The servants are rewarded in proportion to their production.
The Bible teaches us that we should store up treasure in heaven, rather than on earth.
I find that I need to constantly ask myself, “Am I living for the rewards of heaven or earth?
Am I living for what will bring me a temporary, and fleeting joy on earth, or an eternal reward in heaven?
The proportional reward in Jesus parable is in response to the production of the servants.
That brings us to the third servant.
Servant #3 - No return and a Poor Excuse
What would you say if you were in this position?
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