Sermon Tone Analysis

God of the Little Bit

Matt 25:14-30; 1 Kings 17:8-16; Mark 12:41-44

Thesis: We are inclined to think that the little we feel we have to contribute to the Kingdom is insignificant and won’t be missed.

Yet God calls us to give Him all we are in worship of Him and service to the Kingdom.

Intro:

What’s the largest gift you’ve ever given?

Any context.

Tell the person next to you.

20 seconds.

Some of you have probably given some amazing gifts.

Episode of Duck Dynasty built around giving someone a home.

Play Clip

It’s awesome to be able to give extravagant things to people, but very few people are in a position to give away a home.

Most of us have much less discretionary income than Willy Robertson.

What makes a great gift to a person?

What makes a great gift to God?

If we can’t give a large gift of any resource (money, time, talent, relationship), should we even bother to give a small one?

State Thesis.

Thesis: We are inclined to think that the little we feel we have to contribute to the Kingdom is insignificant and won’t be missed.

Yet God calls us to give Him all we are in worship of Him and service to the Kingdom.

We are going to look at three people in scripture who did not have as much to give as others and learn what we can from their examples.

Three Servants Matt 25:14-30

Vs 14-18 14

“For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property.

15 To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability.

Then he went away.

16 He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more.

17 So also he who had the two talents made two talents more.

18 But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s money.

“Talent” not a skill or ability, as in English.

This is a weight.

When money was weighed to determine value, this weight could either reflect a quantity of silver or gold.

75 pounds.

If gold, it represented a vast amount of wealth.

Roughly equivalent to 20 years’ wages for a common laborer.

For today:

75 pounds of gold in market value: $2.3M

20 years’ wage: PVBC Early Learning Lead Teacher $17/hr.

2,000 hours/year, 20 years = $680K.

The Master (Jesus) entrusts His resources to His servants to manage while He’s away.

Not given to them.

Entrusted.

Not for their own pleasure, for the growth of His estate.

First Application Point: God’s Goods are Mine to Manage.

We have to stop thinking about the resources at our disposal as ours.

They never ceased to belong to Him.

We do, however, have a responsibility to manage them.

God’s goods are neither ours to do with as we please nor out of our hands in their management.

Applies to every category of resource; not just money.

“This is about way more than money, but not less.”

Time

Skills and abilities

Relationships

Environment

Vs. 19-20, 22: 19

Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them.

20 And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here, I have made five talents more.’... 22 And he also who had the two talents came forward, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me two talents; here, I have made two talents more.’

Both of these servants had returned a 100% growth on their investments.

Notice that it did not stay with the servants but was returned to the Master.

Health, wealth, and prosperity people are wrong.

The increase goes back to God.

What was achieved is the growth of the Kingdom, not the servants’ personal portfolios.

Aren’t we glad for the 2-talent guy?

Vs 21, 23 Split Room.

Read Aloud

His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.

You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much.

Enter into the joy of your master.’

Two different servants.

Two different investments.

Two different results.

Same reward.

Second Application Point: God is Glorified in the Little or Large

The rewards that God gives are based on the devotion of the heart and the effort of the hands, not the outward apparent success.

The fruitfulness of a ministry is ultimately the work of God

1 Cor 3:6-8:

I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.

7So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.

8He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor.

Vs 24-30:

He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, 25 so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground.

Here, you have what is yours.’

26 But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant!

You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed?

27 Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming, I should have received what was my own with interest.

28 So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents.

29 For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance.

But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

30 And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness.

In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’

Burying money was a seemingly not uncommon method of protecting assets: Achen (Judges 7) and the parable of the treasure in the field (Matt 13:44).

Third Application Point: Fear is the Anti-Fruit

Our lives cannot bear fruit for the Lord if it is characterized by unrighteous fear.

The faithless servant is criticized for being “wicked and slothful,” not for having a small yield.

He did not love or trust his master.

Consequently, He was not looking forward to the coming of his master and did nothing to prepare for it.

He had an insufficient fear of his master, which locked him into inaction.

The “Fear of the Lord” has to do with the submission of all that we are to the commands of God.

“It’s way more than a fear of punishment, but it’s not less.”

This parable, like the others in this section of Matthew, ends with the rejection (damnation) of those characters who get it wrong.