Written on November 6, 2008

For the Lectionary of November 16, 2008: Matthew 25:14-30

“So I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours."

SIGNS OF THE TIMES by Larry Patten

I’ve known pastors who enthusiastically and literally embrace the so-called “parable of the talents.” Hey, I’ve been one of them.

One pastor I know, years ago, preached on the parable and then handed out $20 bills to parishioners as they left worship.

Go and do likewise!

It’s fun, and beneficial for the church fund, to take the parable literally. Whether it’s the Matthew version or Luke’s take (19:11-27), a “wealthy” person entrusts money with three different workers and then heads to Hawaii for a vacation. Two of the three use the money to make more money. (I suspect they didn’t play the stocks.) Ta-da, #1 and #2 double their benefactor’s “investment” in them.

So, the pastor at the sanctuary door encouraged, “Go and do likewise.” The $20 is received by the surprised church-attendees and weeks later—or whatever timeframe the challenge was—the money increased. Maybe someone purchased supplies to make cookies and sold snickerdoodles for a sugar-high profit. Another might have used the $20 to create a rag doll or quilt and sold raffle tickets for the handmade project. Person after person took their Andrew Jackson and brought back $25 or $30 or maybe even, literally honoring the Bible, doubled it to $40. Fun and faithful!

And yet often, in the telling of the parable, we ignore the third guy. Three are given talents to potentially invest. Two double the cash. One stashed it. Buried it. Luke had #3 wrap it in a cloth.

Returning from Hawaii, tanned and rested, the wealthy one praised #1 and #2 and drop-kicked #3 into, using Matthew’s tart language, the “outer darkness.”

Nasty!

I ponder #3. About the fellow with a singular talent, nervously buried in his yard. Why did he think the wealthy man, his “master,” was “a harsh man?” In this long and detailed parable, #1 and #2 have no known opinions. The reader doesn’t know if they perceive their “master” to be kind, quirky, or cantankerous.

Oh, I think I know the “point” of the story. For the community Matthew wrote to, it was: Go and do likewise . . . work hard and you will be rewarded. And Matthew wrote with enough worry about the impending apocalypse to encourage right or wrong choices. Some would be saved. Some would not. That “outer darkness” loomed just over the horizon. At this point in Matthew’s Gospel, the signs everywhere pointed to the end.

I am, though at the “outer darkness” of my fifties, still a naïve lad. I’m optimistic. I’m hopeful. I tend to believe that good trumps evil and that people (including me) can change and grow. I don’t believe the world is simplistic, only black and white, right or wrong. So I wonder why #3 thought “harshly” of the other. And why did the “master” so quickly label #3 as “wicked and lazy?”

As I write these words, the 2008 election is (finally) over. Which means the yard sign wars will also stop. My Obama yard sign was stolen and replaced. Not once, but twice. I started keeping it indoors at night. A neighbor several blocks away had his McCain sign endlessly pilfered. Proposition 8 signs—for or against—disappeared. My neighborhood wasn’t alone. I kept reading of yard sign battles elsewhere.

What amazed me, however, were the letters to the editors and blogs I read. McCain advocates cried conspiracy about stolen signs. Obama backers moaned about Republican pettiness. One irksome blog I stumbled across muttered about how awful lesbians and gays were as the “homosexual agenda” clearly included stripping yards of signs. Beware the naked lawn! People pointed fingers at others. Whining. Threatening. Belittling. Harsh. Wicked.

Why?

I suppose my wondering has nothing to do with the “point” of the parable. Maybe some day the “end times” will come. Tomorrow? A thousand years more? Industrious types will be rewarded, lazy ones condemned.

Since I’m not a brilliant scriptural scholar, I often read the parables for the simple stuff. Maybe the “signs of the times” then or now point to an impending holy judgment. But for me, I think of the signs right now and what I can do about them.

My next-door neighbor had her Obama sign replaced one night with a McCain sign. But she didn’t moan conspiracy. Didn’t get angry. “It’s probably just some bored kids,” she said. “I mean, who has the energy to stay up late and play hide-and-seek with signs?”

I’ll let God take care of the signs leading to final judgment. And I’ll happily take twenty bucks and make more for church funds. But every day, and the signs present or absent remind me of this, in thought and deed I’ll work at not being harsh or wicked toward my neighbors.

At least based on #3’s fear-based adjectives, I’ll try and not to do likewise.

in Peace,

Larry