Sunday, November 13, 2011: Matthew 25:14-30

Being a pastor for 30 years has given me the chance to see both the gifts and the weaknesses of people up close. This vantage point sometimes makes mine one of the weirdest vocations as well as a rewarding one. My breath has been taken away by joy and by shame. It's the story of talents and tyrants told again and again.

The classic interpretation of Matthew's parable focuses on the importance of investing our talents (a word that in fact comes into English usage as a consequence of this parable). Read this way, the point of the story is the importance of growing the

talents or gifts the master entrusts to us. Our response may involve risk, but fruitfulness is the goal. In this interpretation, the one-talent steward demonstrates a failure of faith as well as a failure of fruit-bearing. He is the fool and the rest are wise.