The Joy of Your Master

Matthew 25:14-30

It is traditional to look at the parable of the talents as a lesson about “the obligations of those who have been granted special gifts.”[1] Those who use their gifts for the master’s benefit will be invited into the “joy of the master.” Supposedly the “master” is God, and we are the servants entrusted with gifts and tasked with working for the good of God’s kingdom. Faithful labor will be rewarded. The so-called “lazy” slave is seen as selfish and ungrateful, unwilling to work to make a profit for someone other than himself. In this interpretation we are encouraged to be more like the first two servants who go along with the master’s will, and to join the master in criticizing the third servant. I suppose you can break it down in such a way that we are called to be faithful and generous with our lives and our skills, using our talents and abilities to build up a world that serves more than just our own interests. And that’s a great lesson. We are called to serve the Lord God with all our heart and soul and meod. But I’m not sure that’s really what this parable is teaching us.

Let’s take a walk around the block, see what’s around the corner, and then come back to this parable. So, taking a quick stroll through the rest of Chapter 25, Jesus tells the parable of the sheep and goats, and all are surprised to realize that the Lord Jesus has been located among “the least of these” the entire time. This is very important. Then we get to Chapter 26, which begins, “When Jesus had finished saying all these things, he said to his disciples, ‘You know that after two days the Passover is coming, and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified.’ Then the chief priests and the elders of the people gathered in the palace of the high priest, who was called Caiaphas, and they conspired to arrest Jesus by stealth and kill him. But they said, ‘Not during the festival, or there may be a riot among the people.’”

So the chief priests and elders sit in a place of power and prominence plotting to kill Jesus. Meanwhile Jesus is, surprise, in the midst of the poor, the needy, the outcast telling parables of a powerful master shaming the poor and taking from those who have little to give more to those in positions of power and prominence. All the while, Jesus is also aware of the plot to kill him, aware that his speaking out against those in the positions of power and prominence is earning him a one-way ticket to suffering and crucifixion, aware that one of his disciples will betray him and hand him over to the authorities, aware that there will be darkness and weeping and gnashing of teeth. And as Jesus prepares for this, he goes to a garden to pray through the night, in the darkness, and as he prays he weeps and cries out. Then, as he hangs on the cross, surrounded by other criminals, who weep and gnash their teeth in pain, darkness comes over the land and Jesus cries out, “My God, why have you forsaken me?” and he breathes his last.

We assume that the master in the parable of the talents is a stand-in for God, but what if that’s not the case? We assume the servant who speaks out against the corrupt power of the master is simply selfish, and trust the master’s assessment of him as “wicked and lazy.” But what if Jesus wasn’t joking when he said he was among “the least of these?” What if we take the servant’s assessment of the master at face value, instead? What if the master in the parable isn’t supposed to represent God, but supposed to represent “a harsh man who reaps where he does not sow, and gathers where his does not scatter seed”? This master is a wealthy man who profits off the labor of others while enjoying the comfort of a life of luxury. Does that really sound like God? The master criticizes the servant for not even investing his money with “bankers” to earn interest. These bankers are to be understood more as “merchants who worked with capital in investment ventures,” and the reference to them in this parable signifies “the degree to which the economy is commercialized and money is used to make money, as well as the degree to which the master is willing to go to accumulate wealth.” [2] The master shows no qualms about lending money at interest.[3] Even though the word of God says:

“If any of your kin fall into difficulty and become dependent on you, you shall support them….do not take interest in advance or otherwise make a profit from them….You shall not lend them your money at interest taken in advance or provide them food at a profit. I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt” Leviticus 25:35-38.

“If there is among you anyone in need, a member of your community in any of your towns within the land that the LORD your God is giving you, do not be hard-hearted or tight-fisted toward your needy neighbor. You should rather open your hand, willingly lending enough to meet the need, whatever it may be. Be careful that you do not entertain a mean thought, thinking, ‘The seventh year, the year of remission, is near,’ [this is referring to the year of Jubilee when all outstanding debts shall be forgiven] and therefore view your needy neighbor with hostility and give nothing; your neighbor might cry to the LORD against you, and you would incur guilt. Give liberally and be ungrudging when you do so, for on this account the LORD your God will bless you in all your work and in all that you undertake. Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, ‘Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.’” Deuteronomy 15:7-11.

This is the word of the LORD God…do not loan at interest, do not despise the needy, do not take advantage of the poor. Thanks be to God.

William Herzog points out that the master in this parable acts against these Torah obligations[4], how then, can we comfortably claim that this master is supposed to be a stand-in for God? The master in the parable publically shames the third servant for refusing to participate in procuring him more wealth and for acting as a whistle-blower, and casts him away. The third servant, “by digging a hole and burying the aristocrat’s talent in the ground, has taken it out of circulation.”[5] This talent can’t be given or exchanged at interest, it can’t be used to make profit off of those in need of a loan. The servant knows that he will get in trouble, but still refuses to participate in his master’s greed. He understands that the participation of servants is necessary to perpetuate a process of exploitation under which “to those who have, more will be given.” These are not the words of God, but the words of greed which grease the wheels of a trickle-down economic system that breaks the back of the poor all the while enticing them to participate with a shred of hope that they might one day be invited in out of the outer darkness to share in their master’s joy. This is the system that Jesus is seeking to turn on its head by introducing a Kingdom in which the poor are blessed and extending an invitation for all to come to a table where they will be fed at no cost and where they will drink at the expense of no one else.

“No one can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.” Matthew 6:24. Which master’s joy do we serve? The master who Lords power over us, who threatens us and insults us, who exploits our vulnerability, and abandons us in our need, the master who has joy at our expense? Or the master whose power is with us and through us, who heals and protects us from exploitation, who speaks out against those who lie and cheat and steal, who prepares a table for us, the master who serves us and sacrifices his own life for us that we might see the shame of the greedy master we have been tricked into serving. God’s joy is not at our expense, rather we are God’s joy.

The Lord’s table is a joyful feast because all are welcome here, because you are invited, because the you are the joy of Your Master. Amen.

[1] Hare, Douglas. “Matthew” from Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Preaching and Teaching. 286.

[2] Herzog, II, William R. The Parables as Subversive Speech: Jesus as Pedagogue of the Oppressed. 165-66.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid. 167.