Playing it Safe

Psalm 123
Matthew 25:14-30
November 13, 2011



Do you feel free to risk, to take a chance, to seek adventure? Now, I enjoy taking a risk, but only if it involves safety measures and boundaries.

Perhaps you are like me and you can tolerate taking calculated risks.

Traveling or trying Thai food have definite endings. I can tolerate this sort of risk because won’t have to wash my clothes in a sink, sleep on a floor in a hut, or savor the burning curry forever.
Do you feel free to risk?

This morning we hear the last parable in the gospel of Matthew. The parable of the talents is a familiar one to many of us sitting here today. You’ve probably heard more sermons on this text than I have preached!

Matthew 25 is nearing the end of the Gospel. Jesus is days away from traveling to Jerusalem, to be treated like royalty with a parade of palms, only to be delivered to his death. Jesus has shifted from healing back to teaching about how to live in the kingdom of God, as he did in his opening Sermon on the Mount. These parables are bookends to the Sermon on the Mount, and a literary device meant to draw the hearers and readers of the Gospel back to these early themes.

The genre for these parables is different. These last parables are apocalyptic. Apocalyptic. Say that ten times. That is one strange academic word, isn’t it? Put simply, the apocalyptic genre refers to waiting for the second coming.


In this parable Jesus tells the story of an absentee property manager or investment manager who gives generous amounts of talents or money to three slaves to take care of with no further instructions. Two double the talents and the third buries it. The master rewards the risk taking servants and casts out the third slave who played it safe.

The familiar interpretation is that talents represent gifts that we have tangibly and intangibly. Talents are something we possess. We must invest the talents, use the talents, hone the talents. Talents have come to be connected to money. If we bury our talents or hide them, we will not experience the blessing of God. Now, if you follow the logic of this interpretation, it’s easy to see how one might begin to think that wealthy people have more talent than the poor. Or, how one might see this as supportive of the prosperity gospel: blessings are linked to your hard work. Our Protestant work ethic has roots in this passage.

In recent years scholars and preachers have come to look at this parable from different angles. Looking at a familiar story from a different angle requires risk.

Consider the third slave with me. I am intrigued by this third slave, because more is written about him, and he says something different from the other two slaves. The third slave gets one talent. Now one talent was equivalent to 15 or 20 years of wages…A lifetime of wages were given to him in one lump sum. Wow.

The master returns and the third slave says something interesting: “Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed; so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground.”

Now, can you blame the third slave? He shared his view of the master as harsh, as predatory (reaping where you did not sow), as a tyrant.

If you were that third slave who had that perspective of the master, would you dare risk the one talent in a high risk investment portfolio at the risk of losing it all? No.

The third slave is prudent, is wise even. He does not want to take a chance with the precious gift that he does have. He does not spend it, but he buries it.

If you were that third slave and thought your master was harsh, would you dare to even speak to the master? Probably not. This slave speaks out boldly. For his efforts he is treated harshly. Cast out. This third slave is similar to the virgins who didn’t have extra oil last week.

That is hard to stomach. Especially if the master is God, right?
Being prudent and wise, playing it safe, when you have tremendous fear has its merits.
How many of you look forward to taking risks in this scenario?

Taking risks: taking what you have, and being willing to part with it, perhaps permanently, well that is fear inducing.

Stanley Hauerwas notes that the third slave was fearful not only of the master, but of the gift. The third slave “assumed the giver had given a gift that could only be lost or used up. The slave assumed he or she was part of a zero-sum game. Those who think they are part of a zero-sum game think that if one person receives an honor then someone else is made poorer.”

The third slave thought this was an all or nothing, either or dichotomy. Either I try to invest and lose everything and upset the tyrant master, or I bury the treasure and at least have something to show. Either I spend this and it goes away, or I save it and I still possess it. This sort of thinking brought about fear and paralysis.


What about the other two slaves? They were given the gifts and they were able to risk. They felt free to risk. They also don’t use the same adjectives to describe the master. Isn’t that interesting? They risk freely, and their risk could have resulted in complete failure and loss of everything. What was the difference?

What was different was their perspective. They saw the gift differently. The first two slaves saw the talents as generous, abundant, and limitless. The first two slaves understood that they could not possess or control the gifts, and they risked.

If the talents cannot be used up, if they are not possessions, and if they are not earned, but given freely, then what are the talents?

The traditional understanding of talent is gifts. For example, you have been given the gift of clear writing, thinking, and a passion for the law, so you study and become a lawyer. To pick a purely hypothetical example.

But, our human gifts are fleeting. They change as we age. Our gifts are also easily impacted by external factors.

Ben posed an interesting question in his Sunday School class on money earlier this fall. What if the talents given are not physical gifts like money or intellect which gives one the ability to make money, but what if the talents given are the Gospel? How does that shift our understanding of this parable?

If the talents are the Gospel, then the gospel is a generous gift given to all.
The Gospel cannot be earned, cannot be lost, cannot be used up.
What if the gospel is a freeing gift rather than just one more thing to juggle?
Isn’t that freeing? Doesn’t that take the pressure off?

Now, how do we define the gospel? Well, going back to the context of Matthew, what if the gospel is what Jesus had been preaching, teaching, and modeling to the disciples up to this point?
The Gospel is freedom to care for the least of these: welcoming the stranger, healing the sick, caring for those in prison, comforting those who mourn, feeding the hungry. This is the good news, the kingdom rule that Jesus had been proclaiming up to this point.

Presbyterian minister, John Buchanan writes about this parable, “The greatest risk of all, it turns out, is not to risk anything, not to care deeply and profoundly enough about anything to invest deeply, to give your heart away and in the process risk everything. The greatest risk of all, it turns out is to play it safe.”
“Dietrich Bonhoeffer said that the sin of respectable people is running from responsibility.”

Passing it up the chain of command, deferring, deflecting.

Running from responsibility is not a new dynamic in our world.

We’ve seen that in the news this past week with the Penn State scandal. From the news coverage, it sounds like those in power deflected, they ran from responsibility and did not report abuse to the police in part because of the risk to their power and the prestige of a football program.

“The sin of respectable people is running from responsibility.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote this quote during tremendous conflict and tension during the rise of Nazism in Germany. Some of you sitting in these pews lived through this period in time. You have your own stories of risk.

My own grandparents lived in Germany and the Netherlands respectively during WW II. I grew up hearing their stories of risk at our family gatherings.

My grandpa and grandma Sytsma lived in the Netherlands and were dairy farmers during WW II. Their Reformed church felt compelled to join the Dutch underground resistance network. This was a high risk venture as it was the Gestapo’s policy to assassinate any suspect. Yet, churches in particular played an important role in the resistance movement. The Reformed church became a hiding place. People hid under the pulpit in the floor and in the organ cavity. Farms including my grandparent’s farm also served as hiding places. People, food, radios traveled from church to farm to farm. The entire community took risks. Some paid with their life as they were killed or sent to concentration and work camps. Can you imagine?

Freedom to risk was not just theology that I read in a book, but lived by people I know.

You and I don’t live in the same context as Bonhoeffer. I struggle with that. I have the freedom to live a relatively safe and comfortable life. I go about my day like many of you, grabbing my coffee at Whole foods, reading the newspaper, paying the bills, all risk free.

Yet, there are challenges for us too, aren’t there? We still have the hungry, the poor, the imprisoned, the homeless, and the suffering in our midst.

I think you and I have the risk taking slave and the fearful slave in us. Sometimes we feel the tyranny and live in fear, playing it safe, keeping silent, refusing to see the person put in front of us, deferring or deflecting change. We cling to security and permanence.

Other times we experience the freedom of abundance and are willing to risk, to buy that man a meal, to sit with that struggling friend, to forgive that person who wronged you. Sometimes we play it safe, other times we risk.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t do so well risking on my own. Sure, I have some will power and discipline, but it is limited. I do better with accountability and a community backing me. Jesus knew that too. In fact, that is precisely why he tells this parable not to an individual, but to the disciples, the body.

What if this parable does not simply apply to individuals, but to those of us entrusted with the gospel, the body of Christ, the church?
In my first year here at Northridge I have seen and heard risk taking because of the Gospel.

Think back to 1984. That year you followed the lead of your youth, who had been going on mission trips, and decided to take an adult mission trip to Haiti. You risked: traveling to a poor country, willing to learn as a group and serve across cultural, racial, and socio-economic lines. You risked being changed as you entered into relationship with Haitians that has resulted in a 27 year partnership with a school and hospital.

Think back to the mid-1990’s East Dallas Cooperative Parish involvement: ecumenical, totally new…You did not know what to expect, and you did not have total control. You risked partnering with other churches and other denominations, investing your time and talent to impact poverty in East Dallas. The parish worked together to support a number of non-profits including English Language Ministry, Agape Clinic, the Wilkinson Center, and a legal clinic.

You risked when the Session approved the youth mission trip attendance policy. Youth felt disconnected on mission, and a couple of youth worked across generations to draft a policy requiring attendance in worship, fellowship, and service throughout the year so that mission would not be an entitlement, but a calling. We saw the fruits of that policy this summer yet again, when our youth returned from New Orleans bonded as a team throughout the year and energized by their service.

You risked when you called two new pastors under the age of 40.

I imagine there was some fear and discernment as you embraced each of those risks.
You might have wondered how things would turn out, would this fail, what are the costs?

But, you overcame that fear, and felt free to risk. You followed a bold path, because you are passionate about the gospel, because you know with all your being that the the gift of the gospel needs to be shared and requires risks on your part.

Again, you are risking by discerning whether we can welcome a mission opportunity here in our church building that would involve all generations, and that puts us into relationship with those who are different from us.

You risk in spite of the fear and because of the gospel.

You risk because you know it is not all about you, but about God and God’s gift of grace and love.

Risk taking defines us as the church, not playing it safe.
I know, it’s hard to believe as Presbyterians who like to do things decently and in order.

There is a line in our Book of Order that describes the mission or great ends of all Presbyterian churches it says: “the Church is entrusted with unique tasks. We are called to proclaim the gospel for the salvation of humanity; to shelter, nurture, and provide spiritual fellowship for the children of God; maintain divine worship, preserve the truth, promote social righteousness, and exhibit the Kingdom of Heaven to the world…”
“ The Church is called to undertake this mission, even at the risk of losing its life. “

Called to undertake this mission of shelter, nurture, fellowship, worship at the risk of losing its life. Now, that’s a tough call to follow. I don’t think I can do that alone. But together, we can risk sharing God’s abundant grace and love in some unexpected ways.



In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.





References:
-Stanley Hauerwas quote from his Matthew Commentary, Brazos Press 2006. page 210
-Buchanan quote from Feasting on the Word Year A Volume 4 page 308.
-Bonhoeffer quote Ibid.
-Book of Order references:
2011-2013 Book of Order F-1.0304.
2009-2011 Book of Order G-3.0400. This line is not in the 2011-2013 Book of Order.