Rewards For Faithfulness

Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things.
–Matthew 25:21

In the parable of the talents in Matthew 25, Jesus taught us two important truths: God has given us differing opportunities for service, and we all respond differently to those opportunities. That leads to a third truth: we will be judged according to the use of our opportunities. Verse 19 says, “After a long time the master of those slaves came and settled accounts with them.” When Jesus returns, we are all going to be judged. Even though right now Christians and non-Christians are sitting together in the pews, there is going to be a time of separation. True believers will be welcomed into everlasting paradise, and unbelievers will be sent to an eternity of hell.

But there is a judgment for Christians as well: a judgment of rewards. We read about this judgment in 2 Corinthians 5:10: “We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.” The word for “bad” here is “phaulos” in Greek, which means “worthless.” We are going to be judged according to what we have done with the resources, time, and gifts God has given us. Have we spent them on ourselves, or have we spent them investing in eternity?

The first two slaves doubled what had been entrusted to them. When they showed their master the talents they had gained, the master said to each of them, “Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master’” (vv. 21, 23). When the master left on his journey, he did not divide all his wealth among those slaves; he only gave them a sliver of it as a test to see if they could be counted on. And now that they had been faithful in those few things that had been entrusted to them, the master said, “I am ready to give you management over a great many things.”

God says the same thing to us. Did you know this life is a test of our faithfulness to God? And of all the things God tests our faithfulness with, perhaps at the top of the list is money. In Luke 16:10-11, Jesus said about money, “He who is faithful in a very little thing is faithful also in much; and he who is unrighteous in a very little thing is unrighteous also in much. Therefore if you have not been faithful in the use of unrighteous wealth, who will entrust the true riches to you?” To God, money is a very little thing. And God says if you are faithful in this very little thing called money, one day He will entrust true riches to you. If you are faithful in how you use your time and your gifts, one day God will give you great responsibility for all eternity.

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Today’s devotion is excerpted from “Talent Search” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2005.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.lockman.org