The stewardship of the kingdom, Luke 19:11-27

If you were here last week then you will remember that we looked at the conversion of Zaccheus in the beginning of this chapter.  Zaccheus was a man of small stature, but great faith.  Although he had been a man that employed wicked, evil business practices before his conversion, after he met Jesus he was transformed into a man that used his unrighteous wealth for the kingdom of God. 

 Jesus said about Zaccheus that salvation had come to his house, because he too was a son of Abraham.  Now last week I explained that Jesus used the phrase “son of Abraham” not to indicate that he was Jew.  Practically everyone there was a Jew, including Zaccheus, but what Jesus is indicating that Zaccheus’ salvation was the result of something that was associated with Abraham in particular. 

The Apostle Paul makes it clear that faith was the defining characteristic of Abraham. Gal. 3:6-7 says “Even so Abraham BELIEVED GOD, AND IT WAS RECKONED TO HIM AS RIGHTEOUSNESS. Therefore, be sure that it is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham.” So saving faith is the characteristic associated with Abraham. Paul is quoting from Genesis when he says that Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.  So righteousness and salvation, comes as a result of faith.  I would hope most of us would accept that doctrine.

But what exactly is faith? Listen, faith is believing the promises of God and then acting upon them.  Let me say that again.  Faith is believing the promises of God and then acting upon them.  Saving faith is not just believing that God exists.  The Bible says that the devils believe in God and tremble, yet they are not saved.  Faith is not an emotional desire, it is not wishful thinking.  Faith is not the power of positive thinking.  Saving faith is acting upon the promises of God.  Listen to what Heb. 11: 8 says, “By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out to a place which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was going.”  See, his faith was characterized by action. Abraham believed God and he acted upon that belief, trusting that what God promised He was able to provide.

So Zaccheus was a child of Abraham because he was saved by faith.  And how was his faith evidenced? How was his faith acted out?  By the fact that he was willing to give half his money to the poor and pay back everyone he had defrauded with four times as much.  Zaccheus showed true faith by his willingness to do from his heart what Jesus never told him to do.  That is in direct contrast to the rich young ruler of the last chapter, that thought he was a child of Abraham by birth, thought that he was righteous, and yet his unwillingness to divest himself of his riches in order to follow Christ revealed that his heart was selfish and unrepentant.  The rich young ruler went away sad, because he went away unsaved. Oh, he believed in God.  But he did not have faith in God to do what Jesus asked him to do.  That’s what James is talking about in James 1 when he says, I’ll show you my faith by my works.  Zaccheus’ actions were the evidence of his faith.

Now all of that is by means of introduction and is very important to understanding our text today.  Because as you can see in vs. 11, Jesus is still in Zaccheus’ house.  So after declaring Zaccheus a son of Abraham, declaring that he was saved, Jesus is going to illustrate that principle of obedient faith with a parable.  Now there is another purpose to the parable that is stated by Luke; that is, that Jesus used this to refute the common thinking that existed among the disciples, who supposed that the kingdom of God was going to appear immediately because He was going to Jerusalem.  Now that is the obvious purpose to the parable.  But as I have just pointed out, there is another very important lesson contained in this parable as well, which is how obedient faith is to be worked out in the meantime.

So let’s consider the stated purpose first; that the kingdom of God is going to be delayed.  Jesus uses a story about a nobleman that receives a kingdom in a distant country.  Now this would have been a familiar scenario for the crowd assembled there.  Jesus made the parable up, but He may have used an actual historical situation to base it on that they would have undoubtedly been familiar with.  History tells us that just before this time, there was a nobleman named Archelaus, who was one of three sons of King Herod, who had inherited kingship of the area surrounding Jericho where Zaccheus lived.   After his father's death Archelaus went to Rome to receive the sovereignty from Caesar over this part of his father's kingdom. Confirmation by the Roman emperor was necessary, because though Israel was Herod's empire, in reality it was part of the Roman Empire.  However, Archelaus was hated by the Jewish population.  And so the Jews sent a delegation to Rome to dispute Archelaus's claim to kingship.  But nevertheless the emperor decided to  appoint him as ruler over half of his father's kingdom.

Now that is the historical context.  The people would have very easily identified with the story.  But the obvious point that Luke says that Jesus is making is that the king first receives the kingdom in a distant country, and then he goes back to be officially appointed as king.   In other words, there is going to be an extended time when the king is absent.  He comes to his kingdom, and then he goes back to receive the kingdom which might have been like an official public ceremony and then one day in the future he comes back again to take his kingdom and demands a reckoning with those he left in charge and those that had opposed his kingship.

But this idea of the kingdom being delayed would have been a foreign concept to the disciples and whatever religious leaders were in attendance that day.  Both Jesus and John the Baptist before Him had been going around the country preaching “repent for the kingdom of God is at hand.”  That was the Messianic message that everyone had been wanting to hear for thousands of years.  The followers of Jesus believed that Jesus was in fact the Messiah.   The rabbis and Pharisees and the religious leaders of Israel were speculating whether or not Jesus could be the Messiah.  Most of them tended to believe that He was not.  But the massive crowds that were following Him largely because of His miracles wanted to believe that He was the Messiah.  In just a few days they would congregate in Jerusalem as He rode into town on a donkey during Passover week, and they would greet Him and celebrate Him as the Messiah.

The problem was that their Messianic theology did not match the reality of the scripture’s prophecies.  Their theology centered on a literal kingship, the physical reinstatement of the throne of David that the Messiah would sit on.  And they believed that He would overthrow the Roman yoke, defeat all their enemies, and Israel would become the greatest, most favored nation on the earth.  They believed they would enjoy unrivaled peace and prosperity in this kingdom as God would rule and reign through the Messiah sitting on the throne in Jerusalem. 

That’s why they did not understand all the talk about dying and crucifixion and that the Son of Man would suffer and be delivered up in Jerusalem.  Even the disciples did not understand it.  They would be arguing right up to the point of entering the Garden of Gethsemane about who was going to get to sit on Jesus right and left hands on thrones when Jesus received His kingdom.  And that is why both the disciples and the crowd would all fall away from Him in His moment of suffering.  Suffering did not fit into their theology. 

And you know what?  Suffering doesn’t fit into most modern evangelical’s theology either.  Modern evangelical theology has distanced itself from many doctrines so clearly presented in the Bible like judgment, hell, suffering, tribulation and sacrifice.  I believe that is why when in the end of the ages, just before Christ returns in the clouds which Jesus spoke about in Mark 12, that there will be a great falling away, which is going to be so deceitful that if it were possible it would deceive even the very elect.  I don’t want to start an eschatological debate with anyone, but I believe that the church is going to go through the refiner’s fire of tribulation.  If you follow the news, then you should understand that that fire is already kindled.  So you better make sure that your theology is founded on the  truth of God’s word and not some book you read or some movie you watched. 

So Jesus tells them this parable to illustrate the correct eschatology.  And that eschatology has not changed in two thousand years by the way.  We are still living  in the “in betweens,” the time between His first coming and His second coming.  So let’s consider then what our responsibility is in this time in between.  That is I think the real point to this illustration.  Zaccheus’s utter transformation was the catalyst for this parable.  His willingness to respond from the heart with even more than the law required him to do revealed that he had been truly saved.  The law required that he give his tithe to the temple which would have been about 23 percent if you added everything up, and he said I’ll give half; 50% of all that I have.  The law said if you defrauded someone you were to repay them twice as much, and Zaccheus said I’ll even double that.  That was illustrative of the faith of Abraham.  It’s illustrative of saving faith.  It’s proof that his heart has been transformed from greedy to giving.  From selfish and prideful to loving and humble.  Those are the characteristics of someone who has been saved.

Jesus illustrates that kind of saving faith with this story.  Now before the nobleman goes back to officially receive the kingdom, he calls 10 servants and gives them a mina each.  Now a mina is equal to 100 days wages.  And he says to them, “Do business with this until I come back.”  Now there are three types of people that are represented in this parable.  Three types but only two categories.  And I believe every one of us here today are represented by one of these three types of people.  The first group is the faithful slaves.  That is the guy that made 10 minas and the guy that made 5 minas.  They both are in the faithful category.  They were obedient to the king and give him a return on their stewardship.  The second category is the citizens that hated the king and said “we will not have this man rule over us.”  These are the ones in flagrant rebellion.  But the third category is the guy who did nothing with his mina.  He is not any different from the second category actually.  He isn’t in open, flagrant rebellion, but he reveals in his unfaithfulness that he was not willing to have the king rule over him either.  Now as I said, I believe the Bible makes it clear that there are really only two categories of people in the world.  Those that are saved, and those that are lost.  There is no almost saved, no sort of saved, you cannot serve God and mammon.  You are either in the kingdom or you are not.  So even though there are three categories in this parable, there are really only two types of people.

And this is verified in scripture by the way.  The most obvious parallel to this is an almost identical parable known as the parable of the talents found in Matthew 25 vs. 14.  The parables are very similar.  But the scripture is clear that they are in fact different parables given at different times in different places, even though a lot of the verbiage is the same.  A talent by the way is a unit of money.  It amazes me how people interpret that parable as God giving them talents like singing, or art, or acting or whatever.  And then pastors will give seminars on how to discover your talents.  Then they make the mistake of equating some natural or physical talent to a spiritual gift.  And the next thing you know, the church looks like a version of American Idol. 

Let me digress here for just a minute and say that your natural talent and your spiritual gift are not always interchangeable.  In fact, I’ve found that God may give you a spiritual gift that is not something that you are naturally talented in.  Your natural talent may actually hinder you from doing the work of God.  It’s too easy for pride to get involved when you have a natural talent.   A spiritual gift is when God equips you to do something by the power of the Holy Spirit that you could not do in the flesh.  Got that?  It has nothing to do with whether or not you think you are talented in a particular area.  It has something to do with being obedient to do what God wants you to do when you can’t do it in your flesh, when it doesn’t come easy for you. 

Paul is a great example of that.  This was an extremely talented, intelligent man.  But  Paul said all those things that had been gain for him, he now counted them but rubbish.  And God gave him a thorn in the flesh, he said, to keep him from exalting himself.   It’s commonly believed that the thorn in the flesh was a condition of near blindness, marked by a running infection in his eyes.  And so it was said by the churches that in physical appearance Paul was contemptible, but his letters were weighty and strong.  Now that characterizes a man that did not rely on natural talent, or charisma, or good looks, or great physical abilities, but relied on the wisdom and the power of God and was able to do amazing things.

But back to Matthew 25, in the parable of the talents you see an almost identical situation to the parable in Luke. Three men, each of them given a unit of money.  And at the reckoning two are rewarded by their master, but one hid his talent.  So when the slave tells his master that he hid his talent in the ground, the master’s response is to say, “You wicked, lazy slave, you knew that I reap where I did not sow and gather where I scattered no seed. 'Then you ought to have put my money in the bank, and on my arrival I would have received my money back with interest.  'Therefore take away the talent from him, and give it to the one who has the ten talents.”  But here is where the text is different.  Jesus says in Matthews parable,  "Throw out the worthless slave into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”  See, Jesus reveals in Matthew’s parable that this unfaithful slave is considered as an unsaved person.  He shows by his actions that he is not really saved.  So in the parable of the talent there are only two possible categories; either saved or unsaved.  Either of the faith, or of the faithless.

Now let’s go back to our text in Luke and look at the first type of person that Jesus mentions.  And that is the flagrantly rebellious found in vs.14.  These are the ones who send out a delegation saying, “We do not want this man to reign over us.”  First of all, note that they are citizens of his kingdom.  The fact that they do not like their king, or want to serve their king, or respect their king, does not invalidate the fact that he is still their king.  You know, I may not like whoever happens to be in the White House from time to time.  I may not agree with them, or even respect them, but that doesn’t change the fact that they are the President of the United States, and I am a citizen of the United States.  And as such I am subject to the laws of the United States.  In fact, Peter tells us this is the Lord’s will.  1Pet. 2:13-14  “Submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every human institution, whether to a king as the one in authority, or to governors as sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and the praise of those who do right.”  We are told to pray for those that are in authority over us.  We are not told to rebel against authority.  We are told to pay our taxes.  Now that is even to an ungodly king or ungodly president.

But the point Jesus is making here is that even people that hate God and rebel against His rule are a part of His kingdom in the sense that they belong to Him.   I find it ironic that the very breath with which these God haters rail and rant against God is given to them by Christ. Col. 1:16-17 says,  “For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities--all things have been created through Him and for Him.  He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” 

Yet Jesus says in this parable that even though they were part of His kingdom, they rebelled against Him and did not want to submit to His rule over them. John 1:10-12 “He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name.”

So even though they do not accept Him as God, nor worship Him as God, yet they will still give an account to Him one day.  The Bible says that one day every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.  But for that confession to be effective, it must be a confession of faith.  That which is seen is not faith.  When they are brought before the Great White Throne judgment, and they see the Lamb of God who was slain, the Savior that they rejected, they will believe then.  But it will be too late. 

Jesus says as much in the last verse of the parable in vs. 27 "But these enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slay them in my presence." This is correlated in Rev. 20:12, 14-15 “And I saw the dead,(that is the unsaved, spiritually dead) the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds. ...  Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.  And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.”

Now the second type of person in the parable is that of the faithful.  Jesus says that the slaves were each given mina.  I believe that what the mina represents is not money or talents or even necessarily time, but the gospel – the full counsel of the word of God.  In John chapter one Jesus is referred to as the Word.  It says the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God.  And all things were made by Him.  And then skipping down it says, “and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.”  So the gospel is nothing less than all the scripture, all the Word of God.  Jesus said in John 6:63, the words that I have spoken unto you, they are spirit and they are life.  The Word of God is the greatest treasure, the gospel, the power of God unto salvation.  It is the means by which the Holy Spirit teaches us and guides us.  It is the Word of Life.

So these faithful slaves then represent those that are faithful to the Word of God.  They have accepted it by faith, they are obedient to the Word by faith, and they bring about fruit in keeping to their measure of obedience.  Now to prove that I remind you of the parable of the sower.  I’m sure you are all familiar with that parable found in Matthew 13.  Jesus says a farmer went out to sow seed.  And some seed fell on good ground, some on rocky ground, some by the hard packed road, and some fell among thorns.  You know the story, I hope. I won’t go through it all.  But Jesus gives an explanation, because the disciples didn’t know what it meant.  And Jesus explains that the seed was the Word of God.  And the seed which fell on good soil produced a crop, some one hundred fold, some sixty and some thirty.   See, the crop is the evidence of their salvation.  The Word of God enters into an obedient, faithful heart and produces fruit. 

And then look at the reward.  The king says to the one who returned ten minas, “Well done, good slave, because you have been faithful in a very little thing, you are to be in authority over ten cities.”  And to the one who returned five minas, he said, “And you are to be over five cities.”  Listen, do you realize that in the eternal glory we will rule and reign with Christ?  That those who shared with Him in the fellowship of His sufferings here will also share with Him in His glory?  The point here is to be laying up treasures in heaven, where moth and rust does not corrupt.  God has promised to reward those who are faithful.  So it behooves us to remember what Paul says in 2Cor. 9:6 “Now this I say, he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.”  Listen, there will  be varying degrees of reward in heaven.  Eternity lasts a long, long time folks.  I hope that you are investing in heaven.  Jesus’ last words to the church is found in Rev. 3: 21 “He who overcomes, I will grant to him to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.”

Finally, let’s look at the unfaithful slave.  He said, “Master, here is your mina, which I kept put away in a handkerchief; for I was afraid of you, because you are an exacting man; you take up what you did not lay down and reap what you did not sow.”  The Greek word that is translated as exacting there is actually the word that we get austere from.  It means harsh, severe, stern.  This guy is revealing what he really thinks of his Master.  He doesn’t like Him.  He doesn’t want to submit to Him.  He doesn’t really want this man to rule over him.  He thinks he is too strict, too harsh.

The unfaithful slave says, you collect what you did not deposit, you reap what you did not sow.  In other words, he thinks that God is over reaching his authority.  God doesn’t really own everything.  It’s kind of like the man who thinks that God can have my ten percent tithe, but the 90 % belongs to me.  God can have an hour or so on Sunday mornings, but  the rest of the week belongs to me. 

There is even a bit of licentiousness in there.  There is a hint of antinomianism couched in this rebuttal by the unfaithful slave.  He says, you know, grace means that I don’t have to be concerned about works.  You do the works with or without my help.  You reap where you didn’t sow.  You have the power that is supposed to be doing everything, and so I can do nothing.  He excuses his disobedience by claiming that his master is so powerful that he doesn’t need his help.

Listen, I think that every generation has it’s pet heresy.  There may be no new heresy under the sun, the devil just keeps repackaging them for each subsequent generation.  But I think that one of the pet heresy’s of the 21^st century is that of antinomianism.  It’s the belief that the grace of God is so overpowering, so encompassing, that it eliminates every human responsibility.  And so there is no sin, there is no need to confess your sins, and there is no human responsibility.  And though very few people are brash enough to come out and say it quite that frankly, the modern day false prophets are all teaching a version of it.  Joel Olsteen, Joseph Prince, Joyce Meyer, they all have taken the prosperity gospel to it’s obvious, inevitable conclusion, and that is that God only wants you to be happy and prosperous and successful and healthy and all you have to do is have some form of faith and God removes all sin from you forever, and puts all the resources of heaven at your personal disposal and you never have to suffer, you never have to sacrifice your personal happiness, you never have to repent, or ever have anything bad happen, it’s all good, all the time.  And people buying into that false doctrine by the thousands and they are being deceived that salvation doesn’t require surrender of this world, salvation doesn’t require repentance, salvation doesn’t require obedience, salvation doesn’t require sacrifice, salvation doesn’t require morality, and salvation doesn’t require righteousness.

Listen, Jesus uses this parable to teach that salvation is marked by obedience from the heart, and obedience is evidenced by your deeds.  I could give you dozens of scriptures that emphasize that.  But let me just quote a few quickly. James 1: 22 “But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves.”  James 4:17 “Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.” Matt. 12:50 "For whoever does the will of My Father who is in heaven, he is My brother and sister and mother.” Rom. 2:13 “for it is not the hearers of the Law who are just before God, but the doers of the Law will be justified.” James 2:17 “Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself.” 1John 2:3 “By this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments.”  And 1John 3:7  “Little children, make sure no one deceives you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous.”

Don’t be deceived folks.  We can’t always tell the wheat from the tares.  But the Lord of the harvest will be able to tell the wheat from the tares, because it will be obvious by their fruit.  I don’t know how many people are deceived into thinking that they can be right with God and not have to be obedient to what He commands.  But I’m afraid that many people today fall into that camp.  Jesus said in Matthew 7, “many people will say to Me in that day, “Lord, Lord, did we not do all these things in your name?”  And He will say unto them, “'I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.”

Listen, I think that this unfaithful steward thought that he would be ok when the king came back.  He was presuming upon the grace of God.  He didn’t think faith was much more than a feeling.  He thought God was supposed to serve him, he didn’t think it was necessary for him to serve God.  But he failed to realize that obedience is the means to sanctification.  And Hebrews 12: 4 says that without sanctification, no one will see the Lord.  Sanctification is the fruit of your salvation.  It is the working out of your salvation with fear and trembling.  It is what Zaccheus was doing when he promised to make restitution to all he had wronged.  It was a zeal for righteousness that came out of a transformed heart.

Jesus says about that unfaithful slave, that they will take away what he has and give it to him that had 10 minas.  And when they questioned the wisdom of that, Jesus gave them the principle; “I tell you that to everyone who has, more shall be given, but from the one who does not have, even what he does have shall be taken away.”  This is the principle of spiritual life.  The one who has real life, abundant life in Christ, life through the Spirit, new life, the life that brings forth fruit, that produces growth, the one who has that kind of life, more shall be given to him.  At the Bema seat judgment, when God rewards the faithful, he will give those that were faithful more responsibility.  He will give those faithful in little things, great things.  Oh, the value of being faithful in little things. Zech. 4:10 says, “For who has despised the day of small things?”  Be faithful in little things, ladies and gentlemen, if you want to be found faithful at the judgment. 

But for the one who does not have that kind of life that produces fruit, that evidences new life, that is born of the Spirit and by the power of the Spirit works the works of God, that is obedient to the Word of God, to that person that does not have spiritual life, even the life that he has will be taken away.  His physical life will end and all that he has worked for here on this earth will not serve him in the next.  And his spiritual life will be forever destroyed.  He will be forever separated from God because he said “I will not allow this Man to rule over me.”  He placed himself on a higher pedestal than God.  Everything that he worked for will be taken from him and he will be cast into the Lake of Fire. 

Well, the question I would ask you in closing is; if your spiritual life was to be judged by the evidence, would you be counted among the faithful or the unfaithful?  Are you gladly responding to the rule of God over your life, being about the business of the kingdom until Christ returns, looking forward to your reward?  Or are you rejecting the absolute rule of Christ?  Have you tucked away a bit of religion that you hope is enough, presuming upon the grace of God, while indulging in your sin?  I hope that you are in the first group.  But if you honestly examine yourself in the light of God’s word and you recognize by the conviction of the Holy Spirit that you are not living a life of surrender to Christ’s rule, then I beg of you, surrender yourself to Him today.   Call upon Him while He may be found.  Today is the acceptable day of salvation.  Today Jesus is calling you.  I pray you will answer that call by repenting of your sins, and faith in Jesus Christ as Lord, resulting in obedience.