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Fair or Unfair?
Fair or Unfair?
“For whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have, will be taken from them. (Matthew 25:29)
How unfair can this get? Whatever happened to compassion? Aren’t we supposed to be souls of generosity? The poor man in the story of The Three Talents only received one talent; let’s say around $1 million, while his colleagues got $5 million and $2 million. Yet this man’s million was taken away and given to the one who received $5 million.
I can feel you all going indignant on the man’s behalf…so did I. But let’s examine the passage.
The master entrusted his wealth to his three servants according to their ability. He knew what to expect from each of them and distributed the talents evenly. The first two were probably aggressive investors because they doubled their master’s capital and earned his respect. The third one was a dangerous investor; he took the money, dug a hole in the ground and buried it. He then tells his master: “
I know that you are a hard man, you reap where you do not sow and gather where you do not scatter, and I was afraid . . .”
Not only had he failed his master thoroughly from the investment point of view as he didn’t even invest the money with the bankers so it could earn interest, but the man also adds insult to injury and blames his master for his shortcomings. Shouldn’t he have been thanking his master for taking a chance on him despite the odds and giving him the capital to prove himself? How many of us are that generous? Would we entrust our money to this man?
Definitely not! Who’d want to risk their wealth with a man who buries his talent and takes refuge in his fears? Who would depend on a man who doesn’t take responsibility for his actions and lays the blame for his inability on others?
And that, my dear friend, is his biggest crime…his inactivity. The master didn’t expect him to shine as brightly as his colleagues and would have forgiven him if he had made mistakes resulting in loss, but he was not ready to forgive a man who wasn’t making use of his God-given skills.
