“His master replied, ‘You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the Bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest.
“‘So take the bag of gold from him and give it to the one who has ten bags. For whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them. And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ Matt 25:26-30 NIV
The Parable of the Talents is a rich source of Kingdom truth (listen to or read John Bevere on the subject of multiplication, for example). I am zooming in on the end of the parable, to pick up on three bits of translation, two of which are small but significant and one of which could cause you to miss a major Key to to the Kingdom.
Does the Master call the servant “wicked and lazy”?
Πονηρὲ δοῦλε καὶ ὀκνηρέ can be translated that way, but only using both πονηρός and ὀκνηρός in their “and by extension, …” renderings – something to be used sparingly, if at all, in my opinion. So I would prefer “wretched (as in ‘oppressed by toils’) and shrinking”.
What’s the difference? Easy. If we are asked, “are you wicked and lazy”, most of us are unlikely to say “sure, that’s me!” But if instead we are asked, “is there are reason you hold back and fail to act as you should”, many of us will have a whole host of reasons why we have been oppressed by past circumstance and find it difficult to stand up and take decisive action – and that is exactly what this servant did. He listed the reasons why it was unreasonable for anyone to expect more of him than simply preserving the Master’s money. Especially since his Master was a notorious “hard man”.
If your training in life (or even in the Church) has led you to be a professional victim, it is definitely time to move on. Hard (harsh, even) as it may seem when you hear this, there are no excuses in the Kingdom; and for the simple reason that if you see and receive the Kingdom, excuses are the last thing you will need. And that is the warning Jesus is giving us here. The one talent servant sees himself as a victim, which leads in turn to his own failure and destruction.
The second “minor” translation issue is around the use of the word “worthless” in the NIV, as in “throw that worthless servant outside”. At the risk of splitting hairs, ἀχρεῖος is “useless” or “unprofitable”. I would argue we all have worth; the Master has assigned this servant to be thrown out on the grounds of failure to return a profit. Which again, is going to seem harsh if you don‘t already have a Kingdom mindset. I would merely underline that this is what Jesus said, so better to face it than smooth it over or try to explain it away.
Which brings us to the “big deal” issue: verse 29
“For whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.”
The English of the NIV may already seem confronting, but actually the Greek has been significantly and unreasonably defused, and in a manner likely to rob many of the insight we all need.
The Greek is clear: τῷ γὰρ ἔχοντι παντὶ δοθήσεται καὶ περισσευθήσεται· τοῦ δὲ μὴ ἔχοντος καὶ ὃ ἔχει ἀρθήσεται ἀπ’ αὐτοῦ.
“For to the one having everything, it will be granted, and they will be made to abound, overflow, be much more” (English lacks a good equivalent of περισσεύω) “But the one not having, even what he has will be taken up away from him.”
So, despite what the NIV suggests, this is not about the difference between those who have something and those who have almost nothing. In the first place, it refers to the now ten talent servant and the still one talent servant. The former is described as having everything, the latter as having nothing. To the former – who already has everything – “it” will be given (the recovered talent presumably, but much more besides) and he will be made to abound. From the latter who has nothing, even what he has – the bare talent he kept buried for the Master – is being stripped away.
Now you may be saying, “but this isn’t fair!” If so, you need to seek until you find this truth. For some years I was struggling, not over this verse, but rather over the truth it encompasses. I was sitting under powerful Kingdom teaching, which was clearly true to Scripture and the words of Jesus – but I wasn’t seeing it work out as I expected in my own experience. I wasn’t the only one. But whenever someone said, “Pastor, I have done all this and it isn’t working…” he would say, “well that is your problem right there.” And it took years before I got it.
The Kingdom is first and foremost about what you know in your heart. Until your heart is in full agreement with what Heaven says, then it doesn’t much matter what you do. You will find yourself saying – and believing in your heart – that it just isn’t working. And you will be correct.
When though you realise that the finished work of Jesus (“it is accomplished!”, remember?) is exactly that, and that everything God has promised – healing, deliverance, guidance, and all that you need in order to pursue your assignment – is already signed, sealed and delivered as yours, then, and only then will you be able to walk out the Kingdom. If the Master entrusts you with 5 talents or 5 cities or whatever you choose to name, you will be able to multiply that and be made to abound because you already have everything.
On the other hand, for as long as you think you are still waiting endlessly for your unfair and hard Master to give you anything, then nothing is what you will have.
Which is precisely what Matt 25:29 tells you.
Seeing the Kingdom 