<p>19:13 <i>And he called ten servants of his- </i>A picture of how the Lord considers us to be His very own.</p><p><i>Gave them ten minas and said to them- </i>A mina or &quot;talent&quot; was worth 6000 denarii, or pennies. And a penny a day was the going wage for a worker in time of harvest, according to another parable. This is therefore in total about 20 years&rsquo; salary. The element of unreality in this parable is that this was a huge amount of money to entrust in cash to only ten servants. And they are asked to &quot;trade with this&quot;, to take the initiative, apparently without much prior instruction by their master. All is in their court. He has no mechanism in place to check up on them nor practically advise them on a day to day basis. They as slaves would not have been accustomed to taking much initiative. The only pattern they had was the example set by their master in <i>his </i>trading whilst he was with them. All this speaks of the huge and risky delegation that was and is made to God's people. In a personal sense, according to the promise of the Comforter in Jn. 14-16, the Lord is no absent from us. He is not distant, He is with us by His Spirit, so that He is just as really present with us as He was during His ministry on earth. But for the purposes of the parable, emphasizing the huge extent of freewill and initiative required from us, He is 'absent'. He doesn't tell them to simply keep his property intact and maintained. He asks them to proactively trade and increase His wealth. This idea vastly broadens our horizons. Such work is to be our career, the ideal, Divinely intended outlet for all our creativity, resources and abilities.</p><p><i>Trade with this until I return</i>- How far His affairs prosper is dependent upon the zeal and initiative of us His stewards (Lk. 19:12,13; 1 Cor. 4:1,2). In this parable, the servants as a group are given the wealth, but they trade with it as individuals. This is a helpful way to view all that has been given to the community of believers. Division and argument between them, arguing over who has what, is a sure way to impede the overall intention of the nobleman who has so trusted us on both a collective and individual level. All the riches are hidden &quot;in Christ&quot; and are displayed in the entire unity of the body of Christ across both Jew and Gentile (Col. 1:27; 2:2). What has been given to the church collectively is the Holy Spirit, in order to build up the church and powerfully witness in the world. The one talent man is in denial of this, without the Spirit, and simply holding onto the mina without using it.</p><p>As a whole, the church of all ages will fully have manifested His character, His total riches. This is why it may be that the true church has been concentrated on different aspects of spirituality at different times. It also explains why the final date of the coming of Christ is in some way dependent upon our spiritual development. And it also explains why the whole body of Christ is told collectively &quot;trade until I return&quot;, using the Greek <i>pragmateuomai</i>, i.e. be pragmatic, be realistic, and develop these characteristics, so you may as a body reach the full reflection of Christ. See on Eph. 4:15.</p><p>The believer is called to his Lord to receive his minas, and yet is also again called to Him in judgment at His return (Lk. 19:13,15). The repetition of the idea of being called to our Lord surely suggests that our calling to Him in the first place is in fact a calling to judgment. We are being gathered to judgment <i>now </i>(Mt. 13:47; 22:10; Jn. 11:52) although we will be gathered then to meet the Lord (s.w. Mt. 3:12; 13:30). The point is, we must act now as men and women will do when they are on their way to judgment, and the meeting with their ultimate destiny. Then we will not be bickering amongst ourselves or worrying about our worldly advantage; then, only one thing will matter. And so now, only one thing matters. The Christian life is likened to a man on his way to his judge along with his adversary (Lk. 12:58); and evidently, he ought to settle his differences with his brother before he arrives, for this judge will be extremely hard upon those who cannot be reconciled to their brethren.</p><p>We notice that in this parable, the Lord hints nothing about His death. He simply says He is going away and shall return. This was a concession to their weakness; He had explained His upcoming death many times, and they had ignored it. He accepted their blindness to His death, and worked with it by not featuring His death as part of the parable. We too need to work with an acceptance of others' blindness on some points.</p><p>The same word for &quot;trade&quot; is translated &quot;work&quot; in the parable of the sons working in the vineyard (Mt. 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 will be 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' (:13) 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;<i>of the law</i>&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>