Scripture
“To those who use well what they have been given,even more will be given, and they will have an abundance. But from those who do nothing, even the little they have will be taken away.”

Observation
Jesus tells the well known parable of three servants entrusted with money to invest on behalf of their master who is leaving on a long trip. One is given 5 talents (or in the NLT 5 bags) of silver, another 2 and a third is given one talent. Each servant is given responsibility proportional to their ability.

Two of the servants double their master's wealth but the third is afraid of losing what he has so he buries it in the ground, thinking he is playing it safe. When the master returns he commends the two who made money for him but condemns the servant who merely preserved what he had been given.

Application
A talent of silver was a huge amount of wealth, about 35 kg of silver. In our context we could think of a CEO of a bank giving three employees totally unfettered responsibility for investing millions of dollars. Yet the master describes them as a “small amount.”

It seems to me that Jesus is saying that we have all the resources of heaven at our disposal if only we will take hold of them. We have been given spiritual gifts, access to the throne of God, eternal life, and other things which are so beyond our imagining that they seem impossible to us, Yet God gives them to us in proportion to our faith and calls them “small things.”

This parable condemns the kind of fear of failure or fear of punishment that paralyses us into complete inaction. The master would have been content with even a small return on his investment. He would have accepted an action that led to a loss if the servant had at least had a go.

Many people are called by God to do things- preach, share the gospel with someone, run a charity project, be a missionary. But fear of failure or a sense of inadequacy prevents them from moving forward. So they do nothing and live as a person of this world rather than a citizen of God's Kingdom.

Prayer
Father grant me the courage to step out in faith and take hold of the opportunities and challenges you lay before me. Amen.