Do Your Job

This morning I'll be using a passage from Matthew chapter 24 beginning with verse 45 if you'd like to find that in your Bibles. Matthew has a pattern in his writing the story of Jesus' life as he sees it and understands it. He has a pattern of collecting things that sort of follow a pattern, like the teachings of Jesus seem to be collected in one location for Matthew and here he gathers in one place the stories that Jesus told about the second coming when he would return again or the end of the world. And in this section Jesus makes it really clear to everyone, I want you to understand that I don't know when I'm going to come back. No one in the world knows except the Father. But he said to them, I want to warn you that just as in the days of Noah when the end of the world occurred for those people, it came as a great surprise to most. They were not expecting or anticipating what was going to happen, that's the way it's going to be with you. You'll be out in the field working, everything going on is normal. One farmer will be taken up and the other left behind. So sudden, no opportunity for preparation. Jesus said to his followers, there's only this message that I can give to you. Watch yourself and watch your life because it will be sudden and quick. Be prepared and make sure that you're ready because it will be sudden and quick. In the passage I want to read this morning, Jesus is describing for us what it means for us to be prepared. He tells this parable. Who then is the faithful and wise servant whom the master has put in charge of the servants of his household to give them their food at the proper time? It will be good for that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns. I tell you the truth. He will put him in charge of all of his possessions. But suppose that servant is wicked and says to himself, my master is saying well a long time. And he then begins to beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink with drunkards. Master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him at an hour when he's not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. There are three words in this passage that deserve our special attention. One of those words is the word servant. One of those words is the word wise. And the other is the word faithful. I want to talk about the word servant for a minute. You might think in this story that servant, the way we use it, and that's the only way we know to read the Bible, is by the way we use that word. It would be someone that you would have in the house, maybe you employed as a butler or a cook, and they would work for you. That's not the picture that's found here. The word really is translated most often in the New Testament by the word slave. That's more common to what the person really was. But it's not a slave like you would see in the 1850s here in this country. For oftentimes when a person got in debt, instead of bankruptcy, they would sell themselves to another person as a slave for a period of time until the debt was paid off. Or they might have a child that they would sell as a slave to pay off the family debt. So there were limited times of service, but the service was absolutely like a slave. You were told what to do, expected to do it, and required to do it. There was no other option other than that, because the person who was your master actually literally owned you. That's the picture of this story. So the word servant here is more common to us as the word slave. So there was a man who had some slaves. He took one of those slaves and he put him in charge of taking care of all the others. Make sure they have food when they need it, ample amount, enough food, so they can do the work that they're required to do. That was all of his job right there. One of them was faithful to do that. He used that word faithful, you see, because what he was talking about here is the slave owner said to his slave, this is what I want you to do. And the slave took the instructions and did exactly what he was told to do. So he was faithful to his owner and the instructions that were given to him. He was wise in the sense that he knew that his owner, if he didn't do that, might punish him. He was wise in the sense that he understood the consequences of failing to be obedient and responsible to his owner. So when he came back, he found that his slave had done exactly as he was told to do. He was faithful and wise in his behavior. Because he was faithful and wise in his behavior, when he wasn't even there, he knew that he was someone who was reliable. And so he gave him even more responsibility. He put this slave in charge of everything he had. A man of the kind of wealth who would have slaves and could be gone for a long period of time obviously had a lot of money, assets. And this slave now was elevated to the place of ultimate authority. He was faithful and wise. Now Jesus of course is talking about the second coming when he returns. He's talking about the time the Lord would return and the Lord would be able to look at the people who were his followers, who had committed their lives to him and were ready to say, this is your reward. The other slave was quite different. Scripture calls him wicked. Now in the story here, he didn't do anything really wicked. That is, he didn't rob anybody, he didn't steal, he didn't kill anybody. But what he was was the opposite of the other person. He was an unfaithful servant. For the slave owner had said, this is what I want you to do, and he did not do it. He's called wicked for one simple reason. He acted as if he owned everything his master owned. He acted as if there was no one over him in authority. He in a sense stole everything his master owned and used it as if it were his own. He didn't acknowledge the position he was in. He was a slave of the owner of all these things. He distorted who he was and the relationship he had with the people who were under him. And instead, out of this cockiness and arrogance that he had in usurping the place of the owner, he became what arrogant people often become, cruel and mean. And so whenever people did things that he didn't want them to do, he would lash out at them. He would beat them. After all, what consequence could there be to this behavior? The owner wasn't there. The owner didn't know. No one could tell on him because there was no internet or telephones to pass the news of his misbehavior. They were completely at the mercy of this arrogant man who assumed that he was indeed the owner and the master of these slaves under him. And his wickedness, you see, was the result of seeing himself in the place of the owner. Not acknowledging the supreme ownership of the owner. And when he did that, then his life took a different turn. But now, the story tells us why he did this. He didn't do it because he was under an illusion that he was really the owner of this property. He didn't do it because he thought that it was the right thing for him to do. He did it because he thought about the circumstance he was in. For a long time, he had done exactly what his owner told him. And no one checked up on him. He was alone. There was no supervisor. No one to whom he was accountable that he could see. And so he began to do what he wanted instead of what he was told to do. That makes an unfaithful servant. I told you to do this and instead you are doing what you enjoy. What pleases you. What makes you happy. Instead of what I told you to do. His human fleshly nature of wanting to be able to have everything on his own and do what he would like to do took over in place of the authority of the master. So he was wicked. Because in his own mind, he threw aside everything the owner told him and in place established his own rules by which he lived and governed. And so when someone crossed him, because he had elevated him to the position of ultimate authority, when someone crossed him, he had him whipped. Don't put him back in line. He didn't exercise the authority of the master will come and I'll report you, he did it on his own and chose his own way. And then because he was arrogant and proud, he began to use the resources the master gave him for himself. Now the wise servant ate his meals too. I mean he had food to eat and he gave it to the people who were under him too. So when it talks about this man began to eat, he's talking about throwing banquets I feel. Special big meals, expensive meals, fancy things that would befit a person in his position of ownership of all this property under his control. After all, if I am in charge of all this great stuff, I should act like a person who deserves it and live that way. And so he began to elevate himself in the use of the money that was given to him, not to take care of those who were there and the owner's business, but to take care of himself in the style that he would like to live in. He associated with people who were self-focused. People who simply went out and drank until they got drunk. Their idea was, I'm going to enjoy myself, I'm going to have all the fun that I want, I'm going to satisfy the desires of my body regardless of the circumstances around me. People who were focused on themselves. And so he was an unfaithful servant because he didn't do what he was really told to do. He rebelled against the authority of the owner and pretended to be the owner. And then he indulged himself. Instead of taking care of the responsibilities he had, he took care of himself. Not the master's business, but himself. And when the master came back, he really owned all of the property and he was the owner of this slave, when he came back and saw what had taken place, he punished him. The scripture says he cut him to pieces. That's sort of gruesome for us. Next it says he threw him outside to where people are wailing and gnashing of teeth is going on. Now, I'll tell you, if you cut off a person's head, the gnashing of teeth and the crying out stop. So it gives us a good clue that these two pictures together are not necessarily a literal description of God's punishment, but they do show us something. One is that the quartering in the days of the scripture was written was absolutely the worst thing you could do to a person. If you took them and cut off their arms and cut off their legs, and sometimes they would even separate them in different places so that they couldn't even be buried together, it was humiliating. It was the worst kind of humiliation that you could experience to happen to you. Whenever you defy my authority, I'm going to humiliate you in the worst way that can be done on a human basis. But now we know that Jesus is talking to his disciples and there is a spiritual message to all of this story. And then he says this person will be thrown out to the place of the greatest spiritual punishment that can come to you. So here is a picture of a slave who is punished in the most severe way that a human mind and a godly mind can bring together. It's a way of saying he was absolutely crushed and destroyed by the judgment of the master. You can paint whatever picture you have in your own life about how that might fit for a human being in our time, so that everything was lost, not only the physical, but the spiritual dimension of their life was completely blown away and completely destroyed. The judgment was final and permanent. Now Jesus delivered this message to his disciples. He was telling them simply an explanation about what it means to be prepared. You are this slave. See when you come to Christ, you say to him, I give you my life, and you give yourself to Christ saying to him, I will live in submission and obedience to you. That's the only way you can enter the kingdom of heaven. And when you enter the kingdom of heaven, you then start reading what the Bible has to say, so you'll know what the master wants you to do. And you start doing it. If you're doing it because you don't want to get caught, or you want to have good things happen to you, Satan comes alongside you and whispers in your ear and says, you know, no one's watching, and no one will ever find out. Go ahead. Do whatever you want. Nothing will happen. And all of us have tried it and found out if you do one sin and nothing happens to you, you're free to do it again and again and again. That's what happens. We get to thinking nothing's going to happen. The master's not going to come back soon. I've even heard people say, well, I'll do this all my life, and then right up before I die, I'll pray and ask God to forgive me, and then it'll be okay, and I'll go to heaven anyway. And I can have both sides of this. But you see, what the master said is I want you to obey me, not to obey me for fear of getting caught, but obey me because you see me as your owner. But God is saying I don't want you to live your life simply afraid that I'm going to punish you for misbehaving. I want you to live your life saying, God, I believe that you alone have the right instruction for me. And even though it doesn't seem like it to me, I think obeying you will always be right and good and better. That means you trust God's judgment. You believe that he is right. You believe that he has the words of life for you. If you don't believe that, you end up like this second servant saying, well, I can do what I want to because I don't see anything wrong with this, because I'm going to take care of these servants how I think they should be, and I think the master was a little bit off base when he asked me to do it his way. That's what happens to us, compromise, choosing which things we want to obey and which ones we don't. Now it might be easy for us to look at this passage and see that Jesus was talking to his own disciples. He was saying to them, this is what's going to happen when I return. And he was going to leave these 11 faithful ones that he had with his work and his ministry. I'm going to leave you with this ministry. You're to carry it on from here on. And it's easy to look at this passage and say, well, he was talking about them. He had told them that they were going to all the world and make disciples. He was told them that they were to be able to carry out his ministry. He's warning them if they don't do that, that the judgment is going to come. But it's placed in the scriptures for us to read. Not everything is placed in the scriptures, only the things God wanted us to read. So we have to understand that this is bigger than simply a story about the 11. It's a story about us. It's certainly true that pastors who are responsible for leadership in the congregation have to look at this passage and say, I'm accountable to God to do what a pastor should do, to make sure the word of God is proclaimed in its truth and in its entirety, and to make sure that my own life is an example for other people as I live in faithfulness to God and use his wisdom. It's true that pastor ought to be able to say to people, I am faithful in making disciples because that's what the master told me to do. But it's also true about all of us in some way. It's true of every Sunday school teacher in the same way it is for a pastor. If you've been given an assignment in your class, if you wake up on Sunday morning an hour early and read the lesson so you can fake it, no one in the class is going to say anything bad about you to your face, but the Lord sees your faithfulness or your lack of it. And whenever you minister to the people in your Sunday school class, you pray for them, you get to know them and encourage their faithfulness, he sees whether or not you do that. And he sees in the Sunday school class, in the church, whether or not when someone's name comes to your mind, you stop and you pray for them, or you speak to them, write that note, or to go by and visit them. The fact is, you see, that every person who's a follower of Christ has an assignment. I mean that, every single one of us. If you look at where you live, there are people that live around you, some of you may live in a distant maybe where you don't have very many neighbors close by, but most of us do. You go to work and you see people around you, you have activities with organizations and you see people around you. All of us have people around us. If you count up those people, say you had 40 people that you know, I mean you know their name, they know you, you can communicate with them. If the statistics we read are true, half of those people don't go to church anywhere. They don't have Jesus Christ as the Lord of their life. There are people sometimes that don't even know anything about God or the Bible, they just grow up in this world and living the best they know how. If you know that person, that's your responsibility. Why? Because you know them and you are to be a disciple maker. So you should look at the people around you and you should look at them and determine which of those people you know and those are the people you're responsible for praying for. Well, if you have 40 of them, you pray for one of them a day, you can get through a month praying for all of them. You pray for their needs. You pray for their spiritual condition. Because I'll tell you this, God is at work in the lives of every single person that you know by name. He is trying to bring them to a saving knowledge of Himself. And the way He does it is to put people who know Him out there with those people. And when they know who He is and they live in front of them so that their life reflects the character of Christ, then the Holy Spirit says to them, you know that person's living life and facing circumstances the way you should be, they've got something you don't have. And that's how God begins. And then He waits for you to make a relationship with them. He waits for you to invite them to a church activity. He waits for you to introduce them to some of your friends so that He can begin to build a relationship with those people that He might speak to them in a personal and powerfully life-changing way. Okay? So what if the Master comes back and you've never done any of that? I think that's what this story is about. I've got my place, I've got my food, I'm enjoying my life, why should I worry about these other people that God's given me a responsibility for? No reason other than the Master said, go into all the world and make disciples. There's not a one of us here who are not around people who need to become followers and disciples of Jesus Christ. But the Master didn't come today, did He? I can put it off till tomorrow, can't I? I'm too busy for this kind of thing. I don't know how. All kinds of excuses the unwise and wicked servant makes. Who is that real servant who's ready to be received into heaven? It's not the one who says, I'm a servant. Both of them said that. It's the one who really is a servant. Because they do the things the Master tells them to do. That's what Jesus says. There is no place in the kingdom of heaven for those who refuse to acknowledge my authority over them. If you don't acknowledge my authority over you in this world, you won't acknowledge it there. I've talked to some people who say, well, I don't worry about that because when you die and you're raised and you go to heaven, God changes your nature and your character. Well, if that were true, then every person would get into heaven if it's just a matter of that. You die, the worst person, Hitler, whoever it is, and God says, OK, I'm going to make you a saint when you're raised up out of the dead, and then you can go to heaven. But that is not what the Bible describes in terms of judgment. That's why he says this warning to us. I want you to be careful, and I want you to watch what you're doing. Does it exemplify the faithful servant, or does it exemplify the servant who does what he wants to do and justifies it? Now, in the story that's given here, these people were a long, long way from the master. No way to get in touch with him. They could only deal with it when he came to stand in front of them and say, tell me what you've done. But you're different. You don't have to rely on mail or internet or the absence of such. You can today, right now, connect your own mind and heart with God. You can say to God, would you consider me a faithful servant? And right then, in your own mind, your own thought, you will think, no, because of this or this or this. Or you can say, yes, because you've given your life to me, and you're trying to live in obedience as best you can. I know you stumble. I know you make mistakes, but you've never usurped my place in your life. You don't let your human nature and your flesh control your behavior. You let me control it. You are faithful and wise. You don't have to wait till the last day to figure this out. You can find out right now, because God wants you to know. He's not interested in tricking us, waiting till the last minute, finding us doing something wrong, then come in and say, oh, now I've got you. It's not his plan. His plan is to make sure that you have plenty of time. That's why he's waited 2,000 years. He wants you to be ready. Now today, he's given you this warning. Now today, he said, you just ask me, and I'll tell you. And when you ask God, am I a faithful and wise servant, you might get an affirmation and say, yes, you are. You feel very good about that. You should. You also may get this feeling inside of your mind, you thought, I don't have any idea what you're talking about. You need to come and talk to somebody. Always call me. Always come by and see me. Or you may say, I'm not really sure about this. You can come by and you can talk to me. But the fact that you didn't get that affirmation ought to be an alert to you. God wants to make you a faithful and wise servant of his. One thing stands in the way, your own will. The wise servant wanted to do what the master said. The unwise and wicked servant wanted to do what his human nature urged him to do. That's the difference. Would you bow your heads, please, for a moment? So I want to ask you, simply ask God this question, do you consider me a faithful and wise servant of yours? Be careful about this. Because it could be that you've made a promise to be a faithful and wise servant of yours and are really trying, but because of your weakness spiritually you might make some mistakes. What you're looking at is your intention. Am I really, Father, intending, desiring, and wanting to obey you? Or do I find in my heart a desire to do whatever feels good to me and whatever makes sense to me, am I the ruler of my life, or are you? If you have any doubt or concern about that, God has given you a way to find out. All you have to do is to say, God, with all my heart I want to follow you. And then right now, right where you are, you say to God, I want to install you as the ruler of my life from this moment on, as long as I live. Because I trust you, and your whole life will change. In a moment, I'm going to offer an opportunity for you. If you were up to make sure that Jesus Christ is the Lord of your life, I want to ask you to come to the front where I'll be here, other counselors will be here. We can help you know how to make that prayer to God. It may be that you've made that promise to God. We believe that what the Bible teaches is that you should follow by being immersed in the water, showing your old life is over and your new life under God's authority has started. We believe that every follower of God should be a part of a family of God, a church. We believe you've done all those things, but you know that there's some things in your life that need to be corrected. If God has pointed one of those out, you need to say, okay, God, I admit that I failed in this way. Forgive me. Give me strength that I need. Maybe you feel like you need to re-promise to God what you've promised in the past. This time in our service is a time when you and God talk about that. We're going to sing a song, give you an opportunity to come and say, today, I know what God wants me to do. He's my master. I'm his servant, and today I will do what I know he's asked. That will make you a good, faithful, and wise servant. So Father, I ask. I told everybody that if they asked you, you would tell them what you want. So I ask that they would know, without any doubt, what you want from each of us, and that today, as wise servants and faithful servants, we will do exactly that. In the name of Jesus, we ask for your power, your spiritual presence to guide us in this moment. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Would you stand please while we sing this song? Without him I could do nothing. Without him I'm truly safe. Without him I would be drifting like a ship without a sail. Jesus, oh Jesus, do you know him today? You can turn him away. Oh Jesus, oh Jesus, without him how lost I would be. Without him I would be dying. Without him I'd be insane. Without him life would be a mess. But with Jesus, thank God, I'm safe. Jesus, oh Jesus, do you know him today? You can turn him away. Oh Jesus, oh Jesus, without him how lost I would be. Would you be seated for just a moment please? Would you guys come and stand with me for a moment? I'm going to let you share this with everybody. So people can see you. And give me your card just a moment if you would. I'd like you, Haley, to tell us a little bit about the promise you made to God, you want to make to God today. We all came up to say that we are ready to be members of the church and rededicate our lives to God. You have made a commitment to Christ in the past. And you feel like today that you need to remake that promise to God to be a faithful servant of his. Okay. Would you mind saying that you're ready, that you come committing your life to Christ too? Say it into the mic. And if the whole city blows up, we won't blame you. I'll even stand in front of you. Have you committed your life to Christ? You're ready to let him take control of your life and live in obedience to him? Okay. It's translated yes. Nice to have shy people who blush. That's a rare commodity in this world. And tell us what promise you make to God today. To recommit my life to Christ and become a member of the church. And Chris, you've grown up around the church all of your life. What's happened different in your life? Why have you felt this need? Do you know a reason or do you just know that all of a sudden you feel that way? Just all of a sudden feel that way. Okay. God works in our lives in different times to bring us to different places. In our congregation, we ask people who come to say I've given my life to Christ to make this kind of promise. If you're going to follow Christ, you have to know what he says. So we ask you to read the Bible. We ask you to be faithful in coming to church. If you're going to follow Christ, you have to not only know what he wants you to do, you have to be prepared to do what he tells you. So we ask you to say publicly by your coming that you commit your life to Christ. It means you read the Bible, you participate in the life of the church, and you accept the responsibilities of doing what God wants you to do. Is that the promise that you guys make to Christ? Yes. Now we have an obligation. They come saying we want to start following Christ in a more dedicated way. We have to make sure that as a congregation that we promise them that the Bible will always be taught and preached in this church. Come to Sunday school class, there's not going to be a discussion about the football game or the basketball game or politics or any of that, but they're going to focus on what Jesus says and what God says to us. We also have to make a promise to them that even though we don't know them, that we extend ourselves to open our lives to them so that we get to know them. They get to know us. They become a part of our spiritual family. We also have to realize that there are times that you see people outside of this building. You may not recognize them, they may not recognize you, but when you see them and recognize them, wherever they are, that you both recognize who they are, greet them, and that your lifestyle, wherever it is, is reflective of the nature and character of God. They have a right to watch you and a right to watch me and see in us what they profess they want to live. Now, as a member of this church, if you can make that promise to them, and don't hold your hand up if you don't mean it, would you hold your hand up and hold it there for just a minute? I want you to see across this congregation, we want to be a part of your life as much as you want to be a part of ours. Thank you very much. I want to ask them to stand with me out there just a moment. I want you to tell them your name. They won't remember it, but hearing it once begins that process of getting to know who we are, and you get to know them. So would you stand, please, for a moment of prayer? This is Haley and Megan and Chris, so you'll know those names. Lord Jesus, thank you for adding to our family. What a wonderful day when you give us new brothers and sisters in you. We covenant with them. We make a promise to them as they've made to you that we will help them be faithful in being your servants because we don't know when the last day will come, but we want to help them and ourselves be ready. In the name of Jesus, we trust that this will be a great day for them and the beginning of a greater future. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. I will sing, I will sing, I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. I will sing of the mercies of the Lord. With my mouth will I make known thy faithfulness, thy faithfulness. With my mouth will I make known thy faithfulness to all generations. I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. I will sing, I will sing, I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. I will sing of the mercies of the Lord. There's more scripture memory for you there.