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- What attributes of God’s character does this passage reveal?
- How does the passage point to Jesus?
- How should the truth of this passage change me?
- How do the events of today’s reading help you better understand the grand narrative of Scripture?
Matt. 25
Again Jesus said, “For to everyone who has, more will be given, and he will have more than enough. But from the one who does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him.” (Matt. 25:29). Recently we read this statement from Jesus in another situation and I pondered the question of, “has what?”. In that passage, understanding seemed to fit. I can’t say that word makes as much sense with this parable of the talents, however.
So what does make sense here? I’m not sure I can come up with a single word for it in this case. It does, however, give me a conceptual thought as to what Jesus might be talking about. The talents seem to represent something God gives us. And the ones who “have” are the ones who put those talents to use so that they bear fruit, so to speak. That sounds an awful lot like my thought about truly receiving God’s forgiveness, grace, and mercy. I have said that we haven’t really received these things until they flow through us to others. And it is when God’s character flows through us that it bears His fruit.
Thus, when Jesus says that the one who has will have more than enough, it makes me think that He is talking about those who truly receive what God gives. These are the ones who give what God has given to them. And when we freely do that, we find that we never run out. In contrast, the ones who do nothing with God’s free gift of grace never really received it in the first place.
Matt. 26, Mark 14
It seems there was no shortage of false witnesses ready and willing to step up and tell condemning lies about Jesus. Perhaps there were too many, which resulted in too much conflicting testimony to make a conviction. Interestingly, the thing they finally condemned Him for was not any of the lies but, rather, the truth. How ironic! Not only was He innocent, but He was condemned by the truth. Thus it is fully accurate to say that Jesus died on the cross because He is the Messiah. Evil’s desire and purpose always was and always will be to destroy truth. Yet even its efforts to destroy truth end up declaring it.