Talents and gifts and God

This week we’ve been asked in our services to think about the 2020 vision of the Church in Wales – next week there is a conference being attended by 30 people from each diocese with the theme being, “The time is now”. The 2020 vision is almost a relaunch of the Church following the extensive review. You will have heard of mission areas, and an increased awareness of, and recognition of new forms of church and ministry. 

As Helen mentioned last week we’ve been here very nearly a year now and I’ve spoken about change on a number of occasions in different settings and in sermons – and change isn’t something that is just my particular hobby, it is something that is happening in the church today. 

Having said that, I don’t want to hide behind that fact and just say that change is being imposed, because I think change in every part of our lives is inevitable and necessary. The world has changed hugely through history – massive changes have taken place even in the past 20 years. 

In the church there have also been many changes – heating, lighting, the language and type of services, the type of seating, the people leading services, music and the list can go on and on. There are changes that we all appreciate, but we’re also very often afraid of change and we like to keep things just as we like them. 

But that is not the purpose of the church. One of the big questions for the church to ask is ‘What is its purpose ?’ Answers to the question can fill books, but let’s start with just a few things – to worship God, to be a family and to be the body of Christ sharing his message of love…

Today’s New Testament readings help us to look a little bit more closely at our challenge as Christians today. In Paul’s 1st letter to the Thessalonians (5:1-10) Paul is looking forward to the return of Jesus, but he is reminding people to look forward to that day not with inaction, but with lives lived out in love and service. 

There’s a story about a gardener who had worked in a country house for 20 years. A visitor spoke to him and commented on the wonderful gardens and said the owner of the house must be really pleased with them. The gardener said that the owner was away and, in fact, hadn’t even seen the gardens for many years. The visitor replied that it looked ready for the owner to return tomorrow, and the gardener corrected him saying, ‘today, I hope they’re ready today’. 

As a church we too are to live ready for Jesus to return, but again, not with inaction, but with an urgency that encourages us to work for Jesus with a passionate commitment. 

We are to be a church seeking always to display the love of God for everyone – not just those within our family, or friends, or our church, but everyone…  

And we are to live and be a church recognising that Jesus could walk in at any moment – and if that doesn’t focus our work and all of our lives I’m not sure anything will !  

Somebody once wrote ‘You are writing a gospel, a chapter each day, by the deeds that you do and the words that you say.’ The challenge for the church is to live out a gospel of peace, love, hope and joy – a gospel that begins from God and works through us. 

And then we have the gospel reading (Matt.25:14-30) and the well known parable of the talents. A man is about to go on a journey and gives three slaves different amounts of property to look after in his absence. He gives 5 to one, 2 to the next and 1 to the last. Talents were a precious metal used for trading. It was the name for this measure that became the origin of the word “talent”, meaning gift or skill that we use now.

The first two slaves trade what they have and double their investments; the third buries his talent and on his master’s return he simply gives him back the same talent that was entrusted to him. The first two slaves are warmly praised for what they have done but the third slave is cast out by his master in punishment.

Many interpretations have been made of different parts of this story that Jesus told, but I think the simplest and most obvious is the most powerful. Jesus is teaching people about using their gifts – two used the gifts wisely, but the one took no risks and did nothing. 

The church today is challenging all of us to recognise God’s call in the book of Isaiah, that God calls us by name. What an incredible privilege – with all of our weaknesses, as we have our doubts, as we forget to love our neighbour, or even willfully fail to love our neighbour, as we bicker, as we seek power for ourselves, as we live self centred lives, as we worry about stupid trivialities – God calls us by name. He knows us. He loves us… 

And he gives us gifts – different gifts for different times, different talents for different moments and as the church looks to the future we do so seeking to recognise the talents of all, the talents given by God not to be ignored but to be used for his glory and for the growth of his church… 

And like the third of those people who were given the talents we are not to be timid about trying things out. We are not to bury our talents worrying about the consequences of using them. We are to try new things for God. 

That is the vision the Church in Wales is seeking to develop with the power of the Holy Spirit – it is a vision that calls on all of its congregations to recognise that we have a much bigger picture to look at than what’s inside our buildings – we are called to look at the world… Again, what a calling but what a privilege… 

A teacher was once talking to a child who was being a bit of a pain. He said to the boy that by his age George Washington was head of his class, to which the boy replied quickly, ‘by your age, he was President of the United States.’ 

God gives us all different gifts and different talents. God equips the church because it is his church and whilst we may have missed so many gifts, let’s pray that the church of today and of the future will be a church of vision, a church inspiring hope, a family gathered together drawing others in, and a family that loves indiscriminately and extravagantly. 

God calls us by name… we are his – every one of us. Let’s thank God for the privilege and ask that he uses us in his church in whatever way he wants, and that as he does, we will be part of his growing kingdom. 

And let’s always remember the words of a young priest from the Church of South India wrote the following prayer – 

“I asked God for Strength

And He Gave Me Difficult Situations to Face

I Asked for Brain & Brawn

And He Gave Me Puzzles in Life to Solve

I Asked God for Wealth

And He Showed Me How to Work Hard

When I Asked God for Peace

He Showed Me How to Help Others

God Gave Me Nothing I Wanted

He Gave Me Everything I Needed.”

AMEN