After our blessed Lord had foretold the condition and history of the Jews, up to the time of the end (24:4-14), and that which most distinctly marks the time of the end (v. 15), and then the tribulation, that characterizes the time of the end (vers. 16-27), immediately before His coming, in the clouds with power and great glory (ver. 30); He then describes the intervening period—the moral features of Christendom—a period, or dispensation, utterly unknown, even by the disciples who heard Him. And though little understood even now, through the modern mistakes of such teachers as expect the conversion of the world by the preaching of the gospel, yet the more we meditate on this great discourse of the Lord Jesus, the more exact we find the description of Christendom. And especially its present closing scenes.
What a solemn assurance this is, that the close of this dispensation wall be like the days of Noah! The very professed servants, too, saying in their hearts: “My Lord delayeth his coming.” Is it not even so? Then chapter 25:1-13, tells us that the whole professing church went back into the world, from which they came out at the beginning. And now the awakening cry goes forth, “Behold, the bridegroom! go ye out to meet him.” Can anyone deny that all this is being fulfilled before our very eyes?
We will now meditate on those words of Jesus, chapter 25:14-30. Do these words, this parable of the traveler into a far country for a long time, describe what has taken place during the absence of our Lord, from the day He was taken up, to the day He will come again? We shall find they do, and especially again in these closing days.
Mark, this parable is concerning His servants. It presents the true and the false principles of service, and their results in time and for eternity.
In another scripture, the Lord announces the principle, “For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required.” (Luke 12:4848But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more. (Luke 12:48).) So here unto one He gave a large sum, five talents. Then he that had received the five talents, went and traded with the same, and made them other five talents. The largeness of the gift produced corresponding obedience or service. So with the other servant who had received two talents.
Obedient service then flows from the riches of the grace of Christ, all through this gospel dispensation, and at its end; and this kind of obedience alone receives the reward and welcome, Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.” If this be so, then the first question is not how much are you doing for God; but, evidently, the all-important question is, how much have you received? Now dear reader, how much? Do you know the gift of God? Do you know that whilst we were yet sinners, “Christ died for us?” What grace, what righteousness! “The gift of God is eternal life.” but have you received it? Forgiveness of sins is preached to you through Jesus the sent One, the gift of God. But have you received forgiveness of sins? He who is sanctified unto obedience, is assured that he has been redeemed by the precious blood of Christ. (1 Pet. 1:2, 18-192Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied. (1 Peter 1:2)
18Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; 19But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot: (1 Peter 1:18‑19).)
There is immense importance in this principle. The spring, the source, the power of all obedience acceptable to God is what the believer has first received. Can you then say you believe the testimony of God to the death and resurrection of Christ, “In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins?” Have you redemption, have you forgiveness of sins? Remember, it is this very grace of God, that to all men hath appeared. “Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ.” (Titus 2:11-1311For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, 12Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; 13Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; (Titus 2:11‑13).) Yes, God first in His grace. Servants of God, on the true principle of obedience, can say, that God hath made Christ Jesus unto them, “wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.” (1 Cor. 1:3030But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: (1 Corinthians 1:30).) Have you received this great sum of divine grace? Is Christ Jesus your wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption? And more, not only did God so love as to give His beloved Son, but also, “Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba Father.” (Gal. 4:66And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. (Galatians 4:6).) May not the question be asked again, “Have you received the Holy Ghost?” If He dwells not in us, there can be no true, holy obedience well-pleasing to God. He that received five talents went and traded. Think of these five things. 1, Christ our wisdom: 2, Righteousness, 3, Sanctification; 4, Redemption, and 5, the Spirit of His Son dwelling in us. Look them over one by one, are they yours? Are you a son? Blessed relationship! Yes, God has separated the believer to true obedience—no longer to seek our own will, but to delight to do His will, according to the measure of the grace of Christ given to each.
You may not enter fully into the whole of these five talents. They are yours if a believer, but you may not possess them in the sense of enjoyment, so to speak, so as to trade with them. We only use these to illustrate. But two there must be, both known and enjoyed, in order to obedient service. You must have redemption through the blood of Christ, and the indwelling of the Holy Ghost. Only mark, the principle is the same. Receiving, then obeying. The more we know and believe the grace of God, the more will be the fruits abounding. Now have there not been those all through this dispensation, who have first received the grace of God, and then brought forth fruits of righteousness in devoted obedience to God? But also, has there not been among the servants of Christ another class?
Let us, then, now examine the false principles of this other class, described by our Lord. Words spoken as we know so long ago, yet how descriptive of the principle of service greatly revived in our own day! Here it is not the ripening wickedness of the last days, like the days of Noah; but principles of the wicked servant of the absent Lord. He receives one talent. It may be his educational knowledge of the scriptures of truth. He takes the place of knowledge. He says, “I knew thee.” Is there not such a class in our day, who take this place?
Now what is such a one’s thought of God? In the parable he says, “I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed. And I was afraid, and went, and hid thy talent in the earth; lo, there thou hast that is thine.” Thus this third class of servants, says, he knows God; but is really in utter darkness as to the true character of grace. He is still on the ground and principle of law. On that principle God had tried man for fifteen centuries, seeking fruit and finding none. And this pretentious servant does not know the difference between Judaism and Christianity. The gospel is the exact contrast of the law in this very particular. It is “Behold a sower went forth to sow” It is the implantation of a new life, a nature wholly new; and fruit reaped where the new seed has been sown. But this knowing servant knows it not. God to him is a hard master, reaping where He has not sown. And he is afraid of God; “I was afraid.” God, he says, justly expects righteousness from me; and I find sins, I am afraid of God. He surely expects me to keep the law in every point; I do not. A soul on this ground if conscience is alive at all, must be afraid of God. And how terrible, if such an one is a professed servant of God, a teacher of Christianity, and does not know it! What must he do to deaden conscience? Bury it, dig in the earth and bury it. True heavenly Christianity must be buried in earthly, worldly, national Judaism, and carnal forms of Ritualism.
God rich in mercy; God not imputing sins—God forgiving iniquities; God righteous in justifying from all things, by the death and resurrection of Christ. Yes, God in righteousness, commending His love to us whilst sinners; all this is utterly unknown. No, he says, “I know thee a hard master.” I am afraid. In the gospel God is seen by the atoning death of Christ, now beseeching sinners to be reconciled to Him. This servant knows it not. He thinks Christ died to reconcile God to us; reconcile the hard master to us. He will not believe the joy that God has in receiving the lost, in kissing the prodigal, in clothing him, and feasting with him. No, he says, I cannot believe God. I am afraid of Him. He will not believe that any man can thus know with certainty that God has for Christ’s sake forgiven his sins. So hard a master is God to him, that he thinks that even Paul, or Peter, or John, must wait until the day of judgment, at some remote period, before he can know with certainty that his sins are forgiven.
If you would see the proof, how deeply rooted is this unbelief in this servant, read his prayers, repeated through long years. We have had prayers of this servant in our hands that read like the cry of a slave for mercy beneath the lash of a tyrant. The very emblem of the cross in which God revealed His righteousness and love, is used to move the heart of God, as though He were as this servant thinks, a hard master, instead of the God of love. So-called sacrifices that can never take away sins, are continually offered in the sacrament, or mass. And being afraid of God, prayers are offered to, and the intercessions implored of, saints, apostles, angels, and the mother of our Lord. Such is the service of the wicked servant. He goes and digs in the earth, seeks to improve man, or grovels in worldly pleasures—never finding, but always rejecting the grace of our God. What a mistake!
“Thou gatherest where thou hast not sown.” Hence the misery and disappointment in seeking righteousness in the flesh, where there is nothing but sin.
And all this so distinctly foretold. Did He not look right on to this very day? To-day we have the two principles of service at work; the true and the false. The one receiving the salvation of God, and sealed by the Spirit, bringing forth the fruits of the Spirit, and waiting to enter the joy of the Lord at His coming. The other seeking by works of righteousness to find some good in the flesh, but ever disappointed, sinking in earth’s nationalities, digging and burying in the earth. And the end so near, when the Lord shall at His return “Cast the unprofitable servant into outer darkness, there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
Thus so far this remarkable prophetic discourse has had, and will have, its fulfillment. These are the words of the Lord Jesus, and they cannot fail.
Have you received the grace of God? then obedience is pleasing to God. “I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.”
“After a long time, the Lord of those servants cometh and reckoneth with them.” Yes, all this goes on even to the reckoning day, the coming of Christ. Some servants are described as false teachers, making professional merchandise of the saints of God. A whole chapter is devoted to their description and judgment. (2 Pet. 2) If these things are surely foretold by the Lord Jesus, and by the Holy Spirit, as marking the whole period of Christianity, even its teachers, and that right up to His coming again is it not then high time to awake out of sleep? and Christ shall give you light. Surely there could not be a more practical subject than the coming of the Lord, and the judgment of the servants. The servants’ reckoning day. Do you take that place? We do not ask what is the character of your service, but do you take the place of a servant? then do not forget that at the reckoning day one of two things is before you— “Outer darkness”; or, “Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.” Such is the sure teaching of our Lord; and this closes His description of Christendom, up to its very end. We shall find, He then returns to Israel’s future history, and the judgment of the living nations.