The Parable of the Pounds — Luke 19

0:00 So we're continuing in Luke chapter 19 and I'm going to be attempting by the grace of God to cover verses 11 through 27. And so, I'm gonna commit our time again to the Lord in prayer and then we'll start with that. Father, we come to you now and we are so thankful for what you've given us. You've given us your word. You've given us your spirit.

0:33 You've given us the body of Christ. You've given us the wonderful privilege of Christ in us, the hope of glory. And you've given gifts to the church. And so we pray that we'd be grateful for what we have been given by you. And now Lord, we pray that you'd give clarity and understanding to me so that I could speak in a way that is honoring to your son, the lord Jesus, but also helpful for the lives of your saints here.

1:08 We pray this in Christ's name. Amen. Verse 11, and as they heard these things, he added and spake a parable because he was nigh to Jerusalem, and because they thought that the kingdom of God should immediately appear. And he said, therefore, a certain nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and to return. And he called his 10 servants and delivered them 10 pounds and said unto them, occupy until I come.

1:46 But his citizens hated him and sent a message after him saying, we will not have this man to reign over us. And it came to pass that when he was returned having received the kingdom, then he commanded the servants to be called unto him to whom he had given the money that he might know how much every man had gained by trading. Then came the first saying, lord, thy pound hath gained 10 pounds And he said unto him, well, thou good servant, because thou has been faithful in a very little, have thou authority over 10 cities? And the second came saying, Lord, thy pound hath gained five pounds. And he said, likewise to him, be thou also over five cities.

2:33 And another came saying, lord, behold, here is thy pound, which I have kept laid up in a napkin. For I feared thee because thou art an austere man, thou takest up that thou layest not down and reapest that thou didst not sow. He saith unto him, out of thine own mouth will I judge thee, thou wicked servant. Thou knewest that I was an austere man, taking up that I laid not down, and reaping that I did not sow. Wherefore then gavest not thou my money into the bank, that at my coming, I might have required mine own with usury.

3:07 He said unto them that stood by, take from him the pound and give it to him that hath the 10 pounds. And they said unto him, Lord, he, he hath 10 pounds. For I say unto you, that unto everyone which hath shall be given. From him that hath not, even that he hath shall be taken away from him. But those mine enemies which would not, that I should reign over them, bring them hither and slay them before me.

3:35 Now, the first thing that we notice about this is that the reason he gave this parable was because his disciples were thinking they're on their way to Jerusalem and there's a feast coming. It's the big feast, the feast of the Passover and so this surely is going to be the time that the lord Jesus reveals himself as Messiah, overthrows the Romans, and sets up the kingdom of God here on this earth. And the Lord Jesus tells them this parable to dispel that notion. Now it's interesting to me that the Lord Jesus all the way to Jerusalem has been saying, the Son of Man is delivered into wicked... The hands of wicked men and they shall slay him and crucify him but on the third day he shall rise again.

4:33 And he's been saying this over and over and over and over and over. And there's a song by a favorite band of mine, Simon and Garfunkel, one of the lines in that song says, A man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest. And so many times in life, that's what we do. That's what these people had done. Now I believe there were several people that there's good evidence understood.

5:01 I think Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea understood and I think Mary of Bethany understood and those are the only three that I think got it. As far as I can tell from Scripture, they're the only ones that did anything that evidence that they had understood what the Lord Jesus said and made preparation for it. And we can talk about that at another time. But everyone else missed it. And so He gives them this parable.

5:28 Now, this parable is very much like another parable which we have in Matthew 25 which is the parable of the talents and we're going to talk about that. We won't go to it and read it again but in that parable, he gives three of his servants, three servants, only three and he gives them talents instead of what is translated pound here, a pay was actually what's called a mina. And a mina is a very small amount of money. It's not like a denarius, which is one day's wage. It's the equivalent if one day's wage would be equal to our dollar.

6:11 This is just a proportional thing. A mina would be about worth $66 So it's not much. And the talent in the other parable was worth 60 of these minas. So it's a much larger amount of money. That's the first thing to notice.

7:01 Now one of the things that's important for any person that's studying the Scripture and sometimes there are people that think only people that stand up in the platform can study the Scripture. No, that's not true. This is something that's good for everybody to do but one of the things that's important to notice when you're studying the Scriptures is the things that are different. And so you have two very similar parables, but there are a bunch of differences and so we can learn things from those differences. So I want to point out that these parables, this parable was specifically told because they thought that the kingdom of God was going to immediately appear and it wasn't.

7:43 And so this parable and the two parables in Matthew chapter 25 are the only parables in the scripture and that that Jesus gave that hint at the idea of the church age. He doesn't come right out and say it, but these these three, those three parables and perhaps also the parable of the vineyard, but that's given to the leaders of Jerusalem foretelling their destruction and not to the disciples. So, that's kind of iffy. Why is that important? Well, Most of the parables that the lord Jesus gave were directed at the nation of Israel in an attempt to get them to convert and to trust him and believe in him and this now he's coming to the end of his ministry and his disciples still think he's going to take over and so he's giving them parables about his expectations for them after he's gone.

8:49 And so this is very kind of... It's forward looking, but it's not something they would have understood until the spirit descended on them at Pentecost. So we have to make some distinctions. Okay, why? I ask questions.

9:06 This is how I understand the scriptures. I ask, okay, why in this one were they given a really small amount of money and everyone given the same amount? And there's 10 of them. Now, we're only told about three, the results of three, but it's a small amount and they're all given the same amount and then in the other one, they're given, three of them given different amounts and in this one, the reward says, the reward is directly proportionate to what they did with the one thing that they got. Whereas in the other one, says, You've done well.

9:44 I will make you ruler over many things. Isn't that interesting? So there's differences and I would like to suggest that there are two things that every believer has that are different from each other, but that we have responsibilities to work with as believers in Christ. And the first one, the obvious one, is one that we talk a lot about, which is in Matthew chapter... I believe what Matthew chapter 25 is talking to us about, are the gifts of the Spirit.

10:23 And it's pretty clear that not all of us have the same gift. Correct? And not all of us... There are some people that have the same gift, but they have it in different proportions. And there are some people that have the same gifts and have it in different spheres.

10:41 So for instance, I'm a good Bible teacher, but I'm not as good at being a Sunday school teacher. I'm really bad at it actually, please don't ever ask me to do that. I'm really bad at that because questions derail my train of thought, and children ask a lot of questions. I don't know if you've spent any time with children, but I was a terrible Sunday school teacher because we never finished the lesson because they knew they could derail me. And they did it with great glee and gusto.

11:13 And, we learned a lot, but we didn't learn about what was in the lesson. I'm not gifted in that way. There are some people who are absolutely gifted at teaching children. And they can take the questions that are asked, answer it, and bring it right back in to the lesson. I I do not have that ability and god hasn't given me that ability, but I can stand up and preach like this.

11:37 There are other people who have the ability to sit down one on one with people, open the scriptures, and teach in that way. I'm just picking teaching because that's the one I've got. That's my main gift I think and so there's different different ways of doing it and people have different amounts of it and it's true that there's coming a day in which the lord Jesus is going to require an account of the stewardship of the gift that he's given gifting that he's given to us And each one of us is going to have to stand up before the Lord and say, Well, you know I taught as best as I could to the... As faithfully as I could. And of course, we'll have to answer for the times when we didn't prepare adequately or we coasted or whatever we did.

12:25 And in all of you, each of you who has a spiritual gift and that is every person who's been born again, the Holy Spirit, God the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit have foreseen what you could do for the church and they have divinely put a spiritual ability into you that you would not have in your natural self. And you are responsible to God for ministering to the believers or preaching to the lost in the exercise of that spiritual gift. That one's fairly obvious, Matthew 25. I kind of hemmed and hold and tried to figure out and I will tell you, I was going to tell you what what commentators helped me in this passage and I will have to say that none of them helped me. Not a single one.

13:22 They all either said, well, it's the same thing but just a little different which it's clearly different. It's a much smaller amount and everyone got the same amount and so I prayed along and hard about it and something that I have been recently speaking on came back into my head and we've been looking at in the book of numbers the gifting of the Levites to the priesthood. And I noticed that the gifting of the Levites to the priesthood, the Levites are a picture of the believers in their exercise of their spiritual gifts. I had never seen that before. And I won't go into that, but you can take it up, look at it.

14:42 And so I realized that the priesthood has three responsibilities and every believer in Jesus Christ is a priest. And how do you get to be a priest? When you trust the lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior, you receive salvation and I believe the pound is your salvation. Every single one of you that has trusted Christ has been given something that is termed and I'm gonna read it to you so I don't mess it up. In second Corinthians chapter four, we'll read in verse five, for we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the lord and ourselves your servants for Jesus sake.

15:32 For god who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of god in the face of Jesus Christ but we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power may be of god and not of us. We each of us have been gifted at salvation with the light of the glory of god in the face of Jesus Christ in our hearts. So, what do we do with that? Well, the first thing that a priest does and this is something that you do I should should have stayed there. In second Corinthians chapter three, the last verse 18 says, well, we'll we'll read in verse 17.

16:28 Now, the lord is that spirit and where the spirit of the lord is, there is liberty but we all be with open face beholding as in a glass, the glory of the lord are changed into that same image from glory to glory even as by the spirit of the lord. The first result of our salvation as we look more and more into who the lord Jesus is, who is this person that has taken up residence inside my heart? Why is this one whose glory, the glory of god in the face of Jesus Christ is a treasure that I have in the earthen vessel of my body. Who is he? And the more we look into that, the more we are changed into that glory, even as by the spirit of the Lord.

17:16 So sanctification, sanctification is something that does not require any spiritual gift to achieve. You do not need any spiritual gift. You could be the one Christian in all the world that the lord decided, you know what? I don't think I can use that guy. So, I'm not going to give him any spiritual gift and you could still achieve a sanctified life.

17:40 By looking into the face of Jesus Christ in the scriptures, communing with him as day by day on a spiritual level. You could become like the Lord Jesus Christ. Thankfully, we've all received the spirit of God and we've all received giftings. And our giftings of course are not for ourselves but for others. And it's interesting as we exercise the gifts of the Spirit, oddly enough we act like the Lord Jesus because He came to give Himself for others.

19:19 The only thing you need to worship God is a relationship with Him. And in that relationship with him and understanding of just who you are without the savior and just who the savior is that loved you and gave himself for you. And if you understand just who you are and you understand who the savior is and you realize that now you're in a relationship with him, my goodness, that ought to just rip your heart out of your chest and worship to him. Because you do not deserve to be in a relationship with God. I do not deserve to be in a relationship with God.

19:56 And he loved us and gave himself for us. And that should drive us to our knees. And you could every believer has an a responsibility but it's not just a responsibility. It is a rare privilege. The angels can only praise god.

20:16 They can only praise god The animals and the animal kingdom can only praise god. We can worship god because we're in a relationship. Only people in a relationship can worship him. A lot of you probably don't know this. One of the worship, we think of worship as only a religious thing.

20:37 In the old English, it had the idea of an understanding of the worth of someone. And so one of the lines in in the Scottish marriage ceremony, the husband and the wife say, with my body, I thee worship. What that means is it's not a spiritual worship, but we save ourselves only for the other and commit ourselves only to the other and it's it is a line in in the marriage ceremony and it is a giving of oneself to that person holy and in this case it's equal in the marriage ceremony, in the Scottish marriage ceremony. But here the idea of the worship that we have of God is we understand just how much worth He has. And well, let me rephrase that.

21:38 We begin to see the amount of worth that God has. I don't think we're ever going to get to the end of just how worthy the Lord Jesus is to be praised, but every believer can get to know the Lord Jesus. And as they get to know the Lord Jesus and get to know who He is and what He's done, we'll be more and more overwhelmed with how worthy he is. And our salvation is all that we need to do that. And the third thing in verse nine of first Peter, you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people that ye should show forth the praises of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous life, which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God, which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.

22:34 And the thrust of this is that we have the opportunity to witness. And again, a person without any spiritual gift. Not that there's any out there. You can tell what the Lord Jesus did for you. You can tell people that once I was lost but now I'm found.

23:40 Matter of fact, with a group of people this size is probable, probable. Someone here is not saved. You haven't received the gift of salvation and it is a gift and it maybe that the things that we're talking about don't make a lot of sense to you. I want to talk to you about this this king that has gone away and is coming back with a kingdom. The lord Jesus Christ is the best person to reign and rule over this earth And He's the best person to reign and rule over yours and my life.

24:38 But most of us, before we were saved, we didn't think that. We thought, you know, I really I've got this. I don't need god. I'm okay. And fortunately for me, I was nine years old when I trusted Christ as my savior but there are a lot of people who go through life and they don't see the value of the lord Jesus Christ.

25:07 And the other thing, now it says here that they were to invest till he came and one of the things about investments is that sometimes they grow, most of the time they grow. When I was first saved, the reason I got saved was because I did not want to go to hell. That was about it. I knew that I was a sinner. I was on my way to hell.

25:37 Now there are some people that don't think they're sinners. Okay? They don't think they're sinners. They think they're pretty good people. They're fairly nice.

25:49 There's an easy way to determine whether or not you're a sinner. It's real easy and we'll do this test. Have you ever been about to do something and looked both ways to make sure nobody could see you do it? Why did you do that? Because you knew what you're about to do was wrong.

26:15 Have you ever done anything that if you knew that if your mother saw you doing it, she would be dreadfully ashamed of you? Test number two. Have you ever done anything? Number three, that you excused yourself doing it, but you knew that it actually violated your own standards of what was right and wrong and if you saw someone else doing it, you would think badly of that person for doing that thing. You see sometimes we think that sin is something like murder or robbing a bank.

26:59 Sin is anything that doesn't line up with what is pure and right and good. And unfortunately, every single one of us has done that. The Bible says the wages of sin is death, but then it says the gift of God. What we were talking about salvation. The gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord.

27:29 You see what I'm talking about with the folks here that are saved, if you're here and you're not saved, is that God has given himself to us in a relationship. God himself as a relationship and it's not a relationship of a slave and a master. It's a relationship of a loving father and a loving friend and an empowering spirit that gives you supernatural powers to do things that you would never imagine and the most important one is to live a life where you start to stop sinning. You start to stop doing those things that you're ashamed of. That's the most amazing thing in my life that since I've been saved.

28:14 I have sinned less. Isn't I'm not sinless but I have sinned a lot less. So if there's anyone here who has not trusted the Lord Jesus Christ and understands that they themselves are a sinner or even suspects that they might be a sinner, We'd love to talk to you afterwards and talk to you how you could get this gift, this pound that we're talking about. Let's move on and talk about it some more. Now, what are we to do with it?

29:17 And a lot of people have them and then they die and their kids get it and everyone says, just invest, invest, don't sell it. And so it goes through generations and on paper, they're worth millions of dollars but you gotta sell the thing. I don't think that's what this kind of investment is. There's another one that pays what are called dividends. And this investment of our salvation is something that I think really a dividend, the more you put into it every year, well it does, they send you a percentage of however much you invested.

29:51 They send you a percentage and you... It's money. They give you a check. Now in The United States, you have to fill out a bunch of tax forms about that, but it's your money, you get it, and it keeps coming, and you can you can reinvest it and make your initial investment get better, or you can take it and buy a car or pay your down your... You can do whatever you want with that money.

30:12 And I think that the salvation when we invest into our salvation. Yes. The lord's going to come back and he's going to say, look at that. You made £10. Good for you.

30:26 Here's 10 cities for you to rule. But one of the wonderful things about salvation is how it it changes your life and the investment pays dividends. Just think about all the people in this room that you're friends with like brothers and sisters. If you were not a Christian, would you be friends with any of these people? Would you?

30:50 Most of you wouldn't know each other. Some of you live great distances from each other. You would have not met each other in the general run of things and you would never be as close as you are right now. One of the dividends of our salvation is you get the family of God. It's amazing.

31:08 And you know what's interesting is the more you put into exercising your salvation the more you get out of the family of God. This is... It's not so much a spiritual gift thing, but the more love that you have for Christ, the more you love the brethren. And that if you want to understand about that, look at first John. First John talks about our salvation and it talks about our salvation through the lens of how well you do you love your brothers and sisters in Christ.

31:40 It's all about your salvation. But the lens of that it's looking through is, are you really saved? Do you love your brother? How do you love your brother? Here are ways to love your brother.

31:53 If you see him without meat and food and well, that's in the book of James. But you understand what I'm saying. One of the things that just comes out of the salvation, and again, the dividends, no requirement for a spiritual gift. It does not require me to have any spiritual gift to love all of you guys as brothers and sisters in Christ. And the reason I do it is because the Lord Jesus saved me and He saved you.

32:20 And His Holy Spirit is living inside of you and we correspond with each other. We've got the same spirit. And so when we see each other, when you're out on a job, when I'm out on a job, I'm a truck driver, a local truck driver and I run up against a Christian guy, you can almost smell them. It's amazing. There's a different demeanor and you get talking and you bring up the Lord and then, Oh, are you a believer?

32:45 And then you just have a brief moment because that's all you get when you're a truck driver. A brief moment of sweet fellowship around the Lord Jesus Christ and then you're both off on the trucks and away you go. And just one of the many dividends. And again, no spiritual gifting required, and it's something that all of us can have. But again, the more you invest into it, the more you seek to love the brethren because the Lord Jesus loved you, the more you'll get out of it.

33:21 It's a sort of a self reinforcing cycle. The more you put into loving the fact that you're saved, the more you put into thinking about how wonderful it is that you're saved, the more you will be conformed into the image of Christ and you'll be more sanctified. And the more you have that in your mind, the more you will worship. And I want to make an important point. Worship is not something that is just restricted to the four walls of this building or wherever it is you have your midweek meeting.

34:27 It takes a good time of devotion in the morning and sometimes for prayer. It takes having your heart more apt to think about the lord Jesus than it is to think about yourself but again, you can worship through the day and you can certainly be ready to have make an answer to those who ask you about the hope that's within you. Now, want to tell talk about that one because getting up in a meeting or having an attitude of worship while you're in the meeting, sometimes for some people is easier than the idea of witness. Now, some people it's the other way around. I've known some people that are really good at witnessing and they come in and they don't say anything in the meeting.

35:22 And just because you don't say anything doesn't mean you're not worshiping. But I do think that it is... It says, Let the redeemed of the Lord say so. And I think if you're redeemed of the Lord you really ought to say so. And tell people about it.

35:37 Share it with the saints. But also out in the world, I have to recommend a book by Doctor. John Lennox that's called Have No Fear and it has some really good tips about how to start conversations in a non confrontational way that lead to the gospel. I can talk to people about just about anything, but I struggle to remember that I want to lead people to the gospel. So it's an excellent little book.

36:10 It's a very little book. It's called Have No Fear and he's got all sorts of tips to turn the conversation to the gospel and just to throw that out there for free. So we have this, he calls the them back and we have this one fellow here that didn't do anything with the pound and I would hate for that to be you. It says in first Corinthians chapter three that other foundation hath no man laid than that which is laid. The lord Jesus has laid a foundation for our service for him.

36:55 And we understand that we're to build on that foundation and we have the ability to build with either gold, silver, or precious stones or wood, hay, and stubble. Now, in this parable, the man has what he was given, the enjoyment of what he was given I believe taken away from him and given to someone else. And I really think that we have that in first Corinthians chapter three, there's people that are saved but as by fire. They got saved and they were truly saved but they lived for this world. And they ignored all that the Lord had done for them in saving them.

37:41 And when the lord Jesus Christ brings them to the judgment seat of Christ, they have nothing to show. Their sins are gone but they haven't lived a sanctified life and so their life was basically a waste. They haven't taken the opportunity to worship or get together with the saints to worship and so they they don't feel comfortable with the saints because they didn't spend any time with them. And then here they got to spend eternity with this bunch of people that they never spent any time with. And they didn't care enough about the fact that they had been lost and now they're saved to go out and tell anybody else about it.

38:23 And so they're in heaven and it would be good for them to be in heaven. That's rather be in heaven than in hell any day of the week. But they'll suffer loss. They'll be saved as by fire. And you have the choice.

39:09 Live in practical atheism and you'll suffer loss. And I have to think you won't enjoy heaven very much because the rest of us who've cared about our salvation are gonna have a really good time. We're gonna... I am going to really enjoy heaven. To be with the Lord Jesus who I've been loving and worshiping on all these years and understanding that he has loved me so much more than I could ever love him.

39:40 I'm looking forward to seeing his face. I have witnessed to people. Done a lot of evangelism. Don't know. I never really I never actually led anyone to the lord but it didn't stop me from going out and doing it and I'm I'm hoping by the grace of god that some of those people that I talked to will have been saved because of something that I said.

40:01 That it will have led them a little closer to the lord. You know, you may not ever see someone saved in your witness. That does not mean you should stop doing it. You have this gift of god. This precious treasure, the relationship and knowledge of the lord Jesus Christ and you can pass that out.

40:24 I like that phrase that it says, we're to hold forth the word of life. I've gone out and given out gospel tracks in fairly hostile situations and I prayed the entire time, oh lord, I am holding forth the word of life. I'm holding forth the word of life. Let somebody take it. Please let someone take the word of life and let them be saved.

40:45 And I've given out thousands and thousands of tracts and I've never ever heard that anyone trusted Christ as a result of that. If you're one of those people that does that, don't stop doing it. Requires no spiritual gift. All you got to do is buy some tracks and stand somewhere and put them in people's hands. That's all you have to do and pray hard.

41:08 None of this requires any gift. None of this requires any ability. All it requires is believing the truth about who you were and who you are now. And the one who took you from where you were to where you are now. And not only that, but that you have a relationship with that person.

41:31 I want to look one more thing at this relationship that you can have. I just wanna... This is a prayer that Paul prayed for the Ephesians and this again does not require any spiritual gift, but it's something that you can pray for. Ephesians three fourteen, For with this cause I bow my knees under the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you according to the riches of His glory. Okay.

42:03 So the extent that God can do this is only limited by how much riches He has in glory. Okay? So if you can figure out how much riches Christ has in glory, God has in glory, that's the amount that God can answer this prayer. Okay? To be strengthened with might by His spirit in the inner man.

42:24 So the amount that you can be strengthened by might in the inner man is a... Is in direct proportion to the riches that God has in glory. Okay? So if you think you can overdraw that, you're thinking a little small. It says that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.

42:45 And then we're going to skip this next biz. And it says in verse 19, to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge. So here's another thing that's beyond our ability to know the love of Christ. And then here's this one. That you might be filled with all the fullness of god.

43:03 Do you know what all the fullness of god is? He can't, he fills time and eternity and space and and is beyond all of that. And Paul prays that we could be filled with all the fullness of God. That's what's available from that little initial gift of your salvation. You trusted Christ.

43:21 You said, you know what? I don't want to go to hell and I understand that the Lord Jesus has died for me so that I don't have to go to hell and I'll trust him. And for most of us, that's all we understood. And it just keeps... It's like one of those little boxes that keeps unfolding and it's more and more and more and more.

44:31 And again if you're here today, you have not trusted the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior, there are many people here that would love to talk to you about that. You do not want to delay. You do not know how long you have. You don't know if today could be your last day. We have received this priceless treasure and we would like to share that with you.

44:55 And so take advantage of that if you aren't saved here today. Thank you father that we have received this gift and we look forward into the future and we know that there's a coming the judgment seat of Christ. We're thankful that the judgment seat of Christ doesn't have anything to do with sin or salvation. It just has to do with what we've done with what you've given us. And oh Lord, we pray that you would help us to have joy in working with what you've given us.

45:24 That you would make it so that we have a great love for the fact that we've been saved and a desire to live sanctified lives, to worship you, and to witness to your great salvation. We pray that you would give us the strength and ability to do it as by your spirit. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.