How Can We Use Our Talents

            There was a story reported this past week about how some people in Fort Lauderdale, Florida were arrested for feeding the homeless because the community had passed a resolution making it unlawful to do that.  Among those arrested was an Episcopal priest and some others from the religious community who commented that they were just doing what was required by their faith.  The mayor of the city replied to the criticism that followed that he was sorry that this had happened and that the city was not trying to keep those without food from being fed. 

            This was another example of how our political process sometimes trumps our faith; but that is certainly nothing new.  Religion has often been something that stays on the sideline until it is needed to bolster somebody’s idea of how we ought to live. 

            The story that we can take away from this is don’t fool around with what God has asked of all of us. God knows what we need and what God wants.  And God will have his way in the end.  That is what we are being told in the parable of the talents in Matthew’s Gospel.

            The master gave various amounts of his property into the hands of his slaves.  To one he gave five talents, to another two and to a third, he gave one.  He then went away.  Two of the slaves invested their talents and doubled them.  The one with one talent was afraid and buried his in the ground.  When he master came back, he wanted an accounting of his property.  The two who had invested the talents gave back the talents and the profit.  The one who had hidden his talent confessed of his fear and returned the one talent.  The master was furious with him over this and ordered him to be thrown into outer darkness.  The message is that we are to use what we have been given and not be afraid.  This is not a story for those in need, it is a story for those who have been given much. The master in this story is God and the people in need are the object of the story.

            I know that the people on the street living homeless who have to struggle every day just for essentials are those who need our help.  Helping them is how we, who have much more, are to use the talents that we have been given.  To restrict our use of what we have been given to us with foolish law is, I think, to laugh in the face of God.   But this isn’t the end of Matthew’s Gospel.  He goes on in the last part of this chapter with the most eloquent statement of God’s command to all of us; how we are to feed, clothe and house one another when we have nothing, and when we do this, we do it for Our Lord.  That is what we are about in this life: taking care of those in need because we are commanded to by our God. That is what investing our talents means. It is why we are given what we have.  It isn’t for us, it is for all of us in community to share because the Love of God makes us the hands of the Almighty, and we can make a powerful difference in this world.