<p>25:16&nbsp;<em>Immediately he that received-</em>&nbsp;Continuing Matthew's common theme of immediacy of response. We have freely received s.w., and are to freely give (10:8). The context is of giving the things of the Gospel to others. This is the incredible wealth of silver we have been entrusted with. We &ldquo;receive&rdquo; s.w. the seed / word of the Gospel (13:31,33), just as in the previous parable the virgins receive s.w. &ldquo;took&rdquo; their lamps (25:1) when we &ldquo;received the knowledge of the Truth&rdquo; (Heb. 10:26). The emphasis upon their &lsquo;receiving&rsquo; the talents (:16,18,20,22,24) shows that the talents are not natural abilities, but what is given by the Lord. And straight after this teaching, the Lord uses the same word to urge His followers to take or s.w. &lsquo;receive&rsquo; the bread and wine, the symbols of His life given to us (26:26,27). But that is ongoing- we receive s.w. &ldquo;of His fullness&rdquo; (Jn. 1:16), all that He is, He has divided amongst us His servants; different aspects of His personality and work in this world. This is achieved practically through the medium of the word and the Spirit- for again He uses the word about us &lsquo;receiving&rsquo; the Father&rsquo;s words (Jn. 17:8) and receiving the Holy Spirit (Jn. 20:22). There are specific things we are called to do- Paul surely alludes here when he speaks of how what he &ldquo;received of the Lord Jesus&rdquo; was the ministry of testifying to the good news of His grace (Acts 20:24).</p><p><em>The five talents went</em>- This may seem a superfluous word, until we perceive a connection with the great preaching commission, to&nbsp;<em>go&nbsp;</em>into all the world with the Gospel.</p><p><em>And traded</em>- The same word is translated &quot;work&quot; in the parable of the sons working in the vineyard (21:28). Whilst salvation is on the basis of grace and not works (Rom. 4:4,5), there is all the same a fundamental call to &quot;work&quot; in response to that grace. If we do not, then we have to remember that &quot;faith without works is dead, being alone&quot; (James 2:17). And this is a severe temptation. To believe, to assent to Christian and Biblical ideas, but not to respond further, thinking that the mere possession of the ideas is enough. This was the one talent man; his faith remained &quot;alone&quot;. The &quot;work&quot; was to be done within the vineyard. The ecclesia of Christ, the body of Christ, is merely a structure enabling our response in practice. The &quot;work&quot; was to harvest the fruit of the vine- to work with others bringing them in to the final harvest of salvation. In another metaphor, we ourselves are to bring forth fruit on the vine; but the metaphor of harvesting used in 21:28 and in other parables of the vineyard surely speaks of harvesting others for the Kingdom. The same word has just been used by the Lord in saying that the Son of Man has left his house and given to each man in the household his &quot;work&quot; (Mk. 13:34). We each have a specific work or trading to do, tailored personally to what the Lord has given us. Sadly, the structure of church life has often become so developed and defined that the average church member assumes that the work is being done by the specialists. &quot;Get professional help&quot; is the comment made on so many cases of personal need encountered; &quot;Read the book... come to the seminars... to the meetings&quot; can all be a passing up of our personal responsibility to work. The judgment seat is largely about presenting to the Lord our work in this life. And yet John uses the same word in recording the Lord's comment that the deeds 'trading', s.w. of the faithful are even now &quot;made manifest that they are wrought in God&quot; if we come to the light of the cross which is the basis of all self-examination and self-understanding (Jn 3:21).</p><p>We can indeed prove / examine our own work s.w. even in this life (Gal. 6:4). People are never better than when they perceive clearly their calling and the work they are intended to do- and give their lives to doing it. Barnabas and Saul were 'called' just as the servants here were 'called' (:14) to do the 'work' s.w. 'trading' of spreading the Gospel (Acts 13:2), and experienced the Spirit confirming them in the &quot;work&quot; s.w. they were 'fulfilling' (Acts 14:26). The idea of 'fulfilling' a work given suggests that they were fulfilling God's intention for them. And again we note that the work was related to bringing others to Christ. Just as the servants 'went' to 'trade', so Paul talks of 'going' to &quot;the work&quot; s.w. 'trade', again in the context of missionary work (Acts 15:38). God will render to every man according to his &quot;works&quot; (s.w. Rom. 2:6). Our trading is the basis upon which we will be judged. The gift has been given by pure grace, as it was to the servants; but we have to respond to that grace, lest we have believed and accepted in vain. It is the works&nbsp;<em>of the law</em>&nbsp;of Moses which will not justify (Rom. 3:20); rather our works are to be those in response to the Lord's great gifts to us. 1 Cor. 3:13-15 uses this same word for 'working / trading' and again applies it to our work in building others up- and the day of judgment will declare the quality of that work. The Corinthians were therefore Paul's &quot;work in the Lord&quot; (1 Cor. 9:1), even though he baptized virtually none of them, his efforts for them were his attempt to trade / work with the talents given him. God clearly has intended works / trading for each of us, &quot;Good works s.w. which God has before ordained that we should walk in them&quot; (Eph. 2:10). And the NT usage of the idea of works / trading is nearly always in the context of preaching or caring for others. Paul may well have himself in mind when he promises the Philippians that &quot;He who began a good work in you Paul's initial preaching at Philippi will work at finishing it right up to the day of Jesus Christ&quot; (Phil. 1:6 cp. 22). The key is to be open to God's leading. Thus Paul urged Timothy to purge himself from bad company so that he might be prepared or ready &quot;unto every good work&quot; (2 Tim. 2:21), and to devote himself to the Scriptures that he might be &quot;equipped unto all good works&quot; (2 Tim. 3:17). These works are surely those &quot;Good works s.w. which God has before ordained that we should walk in them&quot; (Eph. 2:10). And we should be &quot;ready to every good work... thoughtful to be ready for good works&quot; (Tit. 3:1,8), thoughtfully open to God's leading in response to our prayer to be shown what exactly is the work / trading intended for us. A functional church will be a place where the members are all devoted to this principle personally, and thus will &quot;consider one another to provoke unto love and good works&quot; (Heb. 10:24). And God will confirm our openness and willingness; He will &quot;frame you in every good work to do His will&quot; (Heb. 13:21 Gk.).&nbsp;</p><p>We cannot be passive on receiving the opportunity to serve God. We will urgently seek to do something with what we have been enabled to do for the Lord: &ldquo;The servant who got five bags&nbsp;<em>went quickly&nbsp;</em>to invest the money and earned five more bags&rdquo; (Mt. 25:16 NCV). The law of the peace offerings was designed so as to encourage the person who decided to make such a freewill offering to execute immediately- they were to eat it the same day they offered it, and the sacrifice would be totally unacceptable if it was killed but left for some days (Lev. 19:5-7). If we have an impulse to respond to the Lord, we should respond to it immediately. This isn&rsquo;t mere impetuosity. It&rsquo;s a spirit of always having an immediacy of response, which empowers us to overcome the procrastination which holds us back so much.</p><p><em>With them-</em>&nbsp;The idea surely is that we are to trade / work with what the Lord gives us to do, with those same things; rather than decide that our natural talents, which were not given at conversion but rather are an outcome of our own environment and experience, are to be developed just as everyone in the world does- and then claimed as work for the Lord.</p><p><em>And made another five talents</em>- &ldquo;Made&rdquo; translates&nbsp;<em>poieo</em>, a very common word; but it has just been used by the Lord, again in talking about His servants, in saying that the faithful servant will be found &lsquo;doing&rsquo; care to his brethren (24:46). And the word is twice used later in this chapter about &lsquo;doing&rsquo; good unto the least of Christ&rsquo;s brethren, and this being the basis for our judgment (:40,45). Again we see that our work / trading involves fruitfully sharing the spiritual riches we have received with others. It&rsquo;s worth noting that this teaching is followed by the record of the woman anointing the Lord&rsquo;s feet; and all the records of it use the same Greek words to describe it. She &ldquo;did it&rdquo; (<em>poieo</em>, 26:12,13), she &ldquo;worked&rdquo; (s.w. &ldquo;traded&rdquo;) a good work &lsquo;trading&rsquo; on the Lord (26:10). It&rsquo;s as if her humanly senseless pouring out of her wealth for the Lord was in fact smart trading in the spiritual sense. The story line implies that we can add to the total wealth of the Lord Jesus. Yet the extension of His glory, the progress of His work, depends upon us, and we are left to our own initiative in this. This is the meaning of the element of &lsquo;absence&rsquo; of the Lord, and the immediacy of His leaving the servants with such huge amounts of silver without instructing them specifically how to use them.&nbsp;</p>