Word of the Quarter - Being a Good Steward

The Word of the Quarter from Volume XV Issue II of the PCC Scroll. The issue continued with the calendar year's overarching theme of "Walking Out Your Purpose" with a theme of "Being a Good Steward."

As a noun, the word steward is defined as, “a person employed to manage another’s property, especially a large house or estate.” As a verb, the word steward means, “manage or look after (another’s property).” From these perspectives, it’s a great reminder that our gifts, abilities, and talents are not ours, they are God’s. He placed them in us that we would use and cultivate them in His Kingdom.

In Matthew 25:14-30, Jesus tells the Parable of the Talents. In the parable, a man was going on a journey. He gave three servants different amounts of talents according to their abilities. The English Standard Version of the Bible uses the language that the servants were entrusted with his property. The word entrust deals with being assigned specific duties and responsibilities.

From the scripture, we do not know if the man left his servants with any instructions on what he expected to be done with the talents. We are not sure if he made it clear that he wanted his talents invested and that he expected the amount he gave returned with interest earned.

What we do know is that the servant who was given five talents came back with five additional talents and was told, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master,” Matthew 25:21 ESV. The servant who was given two talents came back with two more talents and was told, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master,” Matthew 25:23 ESV.

Then we come to the servant who was given one talent. This servant choose to hide his master’s money. He returned with the one talent he had been given. He was so scared of losing the talent, that he hid it. He was then called wicked and slothful by his master and cast into darkness. Hmm, he was scared to lose it. And in some ways, many of us are scared to use our talents. And by not using them, we lose them.

As children of God, we can liken ourselves as the servants in the parable. We were entrusted with property (in this case our gifts, abilities, and talents) from our Master (with God being the Master in the parable). Although unspoken, God does expect us to make use of, grow, and develop the talents He placed in us when were born. This growth comes from usage as well as taking the time to train and develop in the natural to cultivate the talents that are in us. The greatest athletes take the time to train and practice, and so should we.

God did not entrust us with our gifts, abilities, and talents for us to hide and bury them. We become good stewards by using what we have to serve those around us. None of our gifts, abilities, and talents have ever been for us. They have always been there to serve others.

We don’t know about you, but we want to use our gifts, abilities, and talents to the fullest. We want to hear God say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” We think we all want more of God. In order to get more, we have to be faithful over what we have right now. Then we can watch as God gives us more.