Proper 28, Year A
The Rev. Rob Fisher
St. Dunstan’s, Carmel Valley

Texts: Judges 4:1-7; Psalm 123; 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11; Matthew 25:14-30

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

There is a family that my family was friends with when I was growing up, and one of the children had cancer in his eyes as a child.  He lost his first eye by the age of three, and his second eye by the age of five.  His name was Tyler.

My mom was his elementary school teacher when he was around the age of eight.  By then he was pretty well adjusted to a life of being completely sightless.  As often happens with people who lose one of their senses, his remaining senses were heightened.  He was an amazing young boy.  He would play basketball with his friends during recess, where the other kids would give him tips about aiming a little more to the left or to the right.  He would go boogie boarding in the ocean, usually with a buddy.  Most impressive of all, he used to go rollerblading.  Rollerblading is scary enough, even with vision, just imagine doing it without being able to see where you are going.

His buddies in the classroom saw how he could tell everything that was going on around him, and some even became convinced that he wasn’t really blind.

Luckily, Tyler had a sense of humor, so whenever people became convinced that he was faking it, he would just reach up and pull both of his glass eyes out of their sockets.

Sadly, Tyler lost one of his legs below the knee to cancer while he was a student in my mom’s class, but he got a prosthetic leg and carried on.  He continued boogie boarding because he asked for one that he could swim with.

Tyler still cannot see, but as of the last time I saw him when I was back home in Carpinteria, he is now a Stanford graduate, and he has studied so that he can build state-of-the-art prosthetic limbs for athletes.

Tyler does not have the gift of sight.  That much is clear.  But Tyler is gifted in other ways.  He has a talent for adapting to challenge, and he uses this talent in a way that inspires others.

***

The word in the English language “talent” actually comes from the King James Bible passage of Matthew 5 that we heard this morning.

A “talent” was a standard weight at the time of Jesus.  It is hard to say exactly how much weight it was because the standard changed from time to time and from place to place, but it was probably around sixty pounds.  Unless specified otherwise, it is assumed that a talent meant sixty pounds of silver.

According to one calculation, a talent of silver was worth 6,000 denarii, and each denari was worth one day’s wages.  So, that would make one talent worth twenty years of wages for an average laborer.

This parable about the talents catches our attention.  The first servant takes his five talents, and he doubles it and returns it to the master.  The second servant takes two talents—still a great deal of value—and doubles it and returns it to his master.

The last servant, however, takes his one talent and hides it in the ground for safekeeping.

This was not an unusual practice, in fact.  Archeologists have unearthed coins hidden in the ground for safekeeping from this time in history, and it is a boon to them because the earth has preserved them for millennia.

But the master does not like what the third servant does, and he reacts very harshly.

It’s hard to think that God would act like the master acts here.

I would have thought that if one of the servants was lacking, and even fearful—and at least he did not lose his master’s money—the master would not punish him for it.

But near the end of the parable comes the troubling line: “For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.”

That is jarring for those of us who believe God is kind and fair and forgiving.

But the parable is not really about money or accumulation of wealth.

The treasure that the talents represent is not material.  It is the treasure of love and faith—a treasure that is worthless is if is not used and invested.

And if you do not invest it but turn your back on it, you will find that you will lose it.

Love and faith are things that cannot be collected.

They cannot be stored or saved for a rainy day.

They are meant to be used.

What good is a great wine collection if the bottles are never opened?

What good are great works of art if they are kept in a closet, hidden from the world?

What good are our own talents if we never use them.

***

There is an organist I know whose name happens to be Steve, and he happens to be sitting right in front of me right now.  And I hope this doesn’t embarrass him, but I want to share with you that he can do some amazing things as an organist.  Obviously, he can play with all four limbs at once.  Almost all organists can do that.

But on top of that—and on top of the fact that he plays with prayerfulness and with feeling—he has the ability to transpose the music up or down a half step while he’s reading it if it needs to be in a higher or lower range.

Obviously, if most of us tried our best to learn to do this, no amount of practice would take us to that level.

Steve has a talent.

I was speaking about this one morning before our services, and he candidly and humbly said that he recognizes that God gave him a talent for playing music, and it wouldn’t be right to not offer that talent up to God.

***

The third servant erroneously thinks that if he merely preserves the money for his master he has done his duty.

But he misunderstands what his duty really is

Perhaps he is like the scribes and Pharisees, who have inherited the rich treasures of faith, but who jealously defend their tradition, rather than courageously engage their religion to bring light and faith into a dark world.

That is what puts them at odd with Jesus.  It’s not their Jewish faith, but what they do with it.

***

 Faith is not static.  It is not like a badge that you wear.

Rather, it is something you are entrusted with so that it can be used, actively, to enrich your own life and the lives of those around you.

Don’t hide your talent!

We who gather in places like this are in the minority.

It used to be the case that people who are not churchgoers usually had left the church at some point in their lives.  But nowadays, increasingly, I meet people who never left the church because they never went in the first place.

Brian McLaren calls these people the “nones.”  Spelled “n.o.n.e.s.” meaning that as for religious upbringing, they have none.  And he believes that we should reach out to the multitudes around us who are nones, because they, too, have a deep longing within them even if they have no words for it.

We have a treasure put into our hands.

We are not better for it.

We are luckier for it.  We are truly blessed for it.

But it is also up to us to invest this precious talent, to grow it, to use it to reach out and spread faith by living it.

***

 Scholar and preacher George Buttrick noted that we all have different gifts from one another, and some people may feel that their small gift isn’t that important in the bigger picture—but no matter who you are, your gifts are unique.

You are like a single piano key among the rest of the keys of the keyboard.

Have you ever tried to play a piano when one of the keys was not working?

When you do, you realize that every key matters—and only with all the keys can you really make the music that is meant to be made

For instance, some people may feel that because they can’t pledge a lot they shouldn’t pledge, but even a humble pledge makes a difference.

All of the servants were given different amounts of talents, but their responsibility was equal, in proportion to what they received.

On a piano, every key matters, just as every life matters.

And it is a small miracle the way that each of our lives matters more precisely because of the other lives that we share our existence with.

Only you can play that specific note that you were given the gifts to play.

***

 Before he died, I was very fortunate to be able to see Ray Charles perform twice—both times at the Ventura Theater, a beautiful old venue, not too large and not too small.

Without the gift of sight, but with the gift of music in a very big way, he was an impressive presence.  He did not have a perfect life, but to see him at the keyboard was an inspiration—to see someone so completely gifted, and to be so thoroughly engaged in the sound only he could make.

The very best part of all, though, was the moment he came out onto the stage, wearing a surprisingly shiny suit and bowtie that would look dorky on anybody else, and clutching the arm of the person beside him, whose job it was to guide him across the stage and to his piano bench.

And after shuffling over to his instrument, with his large band assembled behind him, before sitting down and doing his thing, he paused and turned toward the audience who were already roaring with applause.

And he spread out his arm wide, then drew them around himself as if he was hugging the entire crowd, at which point the cheers multiplied to a great roar.

Love is not a static commodity.

Love really can grow, and we can step out in faith to make it happen.

That is how Jesus asks us to live.

—Amen.