SERVANTS READY AND UNREADY
BY DAVID MARTIN PANTON, M.A.
Dr. R. A. Torrey, in language of admirable lucidity and force, expresses the urgent
need of readiness for the advent; though it is doubtful if the good Doctor
(like countless other Christians) sees the far-reaching implications of his own
words. He says :- " 'Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be
accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to
stand before the Son of man' (Luke 21: 36).
According to this passage there is only one way in which we can be prepared for
the coming of the Lord when He appears, that is, through much prayer. The
coming again of Jesus is a subject that is awakening much interest and much
discussion in our day; but it is one thing to be interested in the Lord's
return, and to talk about it, and quite another thing to be prepared for
it. We live in an atmosphere that has a constant tendency to unfit us for
Christ's coming. The world tends to draw us down by its gratification’s,
and by its cares. There is only one way by which we can rise triumphant
above these things - by constant watching unto prayer, that is, by
sleeplessness unto prayer. 'Watch' in this passage is the same strong word used in Eph. 6: 18, and 'always' the same strong
phrase 'in every season.' The man who spends little time in prayer, who is not
steadfast and constant in prayer, will not be ready for the Lord when He comes.
But we may be ready. How? Pray! Pray! Pray!" *
[* How to Pray, P. 25. Put in our Saviour's language, and in respect not to preparedness but to removal,
it is not wheat which is reaped, but ripe wheat; not
stalks, but grain: "when the FRUIT
IS RIPE, immediately he putteth forth the sickle, because the
harvest" - the end of the Age (Matt.
13: 30) - "is come" (Mark 4: 29).]
Now
a tremendous question, momentous for us all, arises, and (as ever) is voiced by
Peter; for within earshot of our Lord were Apostles, disciples, and a great
multitude: and Peter says - "Lord, speakest thou
this parable" - of the burgled house (verse
39) - "unto us or even unto all?"
(Luke 12: 41). Whose house,
Lord, is liable to be broken through?* Is the unready servant a disciple, or one of the
unbelieving multitude? is he regenerate, or
unregenerate? is it a saved man who is here required
to be watchful, or an unsaved?** The Lord, not answering directly,
counters, so as by another question to compel us to answer the question
ourselves. "Who then" -
for this will answer your question, Peter - "is
the faithful and wise STEWARD" - a steward is a specially
commissioned servant - "whom his lord"
- therefore he is no stranger but an engaged servant - "shall set over his household?" - the
[*
"The essential difficulty which occasioned
Peter's question could only apply to the last-mentioned and doubtful
threatening of verses, 39 & 40. He deems the threatening of instant judgement too
strong for disciples who had been once made true believers." (Stier).
** It is difficult to see how the dead could be told to 'watch'; nor could the unsaved be told to 'make ready' in a context where there is no summons to faith in
Christ, and where genuine discipleship is assumed as already possessed.
*** Still
more germane is the future sense - "shall set" - as expressive of rulers of the Church
from Pentecost onward, some of whom would, whether ready or unready, actually
confront the Advent.]
Our
Lord, having so countered Peter's question as to show that even apostles are
embraced in the warning - and the Holy Spirit, recording it, adds His
witness that it is disciples whom our Lord is addressing (verse 22) - now drops the figure of a steward, and
broadens out the principle to cover all disciples;* and Jesus, knowing
that His disciples needed no convincing that the inconceivably splendid rewards
He had named (verse 37) were for themselves if faithful,
now discloses that so are the penalties that are threatened.
The Steward's case He turns into a Church-wide application. "And that servant" - 'servant' is one of the favourite self-descriptions of
the Apostles in their Letters (Phil. 1: 1, 2; 2
Pet. 1: 1; Jude 1, - "which knew his Lord's
will" - this is true only of children of God: the unsaved know
neither God nor His will - "and MADE NOT READY"
- who prepared not what was necessary to receive his Master according to His
wishes (Godet) - "nor did according
to his will" - did not shape all action by the known revelations of
Christ - "shall be beaten with many stripes;
but he that knew not" - for honest ignorance can extenuate -
"shall be
beaten" - for, nevertheless, ignorance in a child of God is
culpable - "with few stripes" -
for as exactly as reward is graded, so exactly is chastisement.
Thus the Lord embraces in the parable the whole Church; for as
the Apostles are included at one end, so also is the last Steward to be found
by the returning Lord at the other -
a proof past denial that the entire Church is swept into the Lord's strong and
solemn words.
[* "Every believer is a 'servant of
God,' and must watch for the coming of the
Lord. Accordingly, Jesus so answers the question that in a full and
literal sense he applies what was said to the disciples as the representatives
of those called to be instructors in the Church. In the next place, however, he transfers it to all 'servants'."
(Olshausen).]
For
let us pause for a moment to ponder a singularly conclusive fact. The
principles of righteousness compel an exact and comprehensive equipoise.
The Lord had said (verse 37) - "Blessed are those servants, whom the Lord when he cometh
shall find watching: verily I say unto you, that he shall come and
serve them"; - no utterance, it has been said, holds before
the faithful so rich and ravishing a reward (Lange); but of the unfaithful
steward He says - "He shall cut him asunder,
and appoint his portion with the unfaithful" R.V.* - a mortal mutilation already actually
experienced, among the regenerate, by Ananias and Sapphire, and those deceased
through misuse of the Lord's Table (1 Cor. 11: 30).
Thus reward and penalty are balanced one against the other in an indivisible
system of recompense: either award is stated as impossible for the same
steward: it is wholly impossible to mutilate the justice, accepting one
recompense and rejecting the other: if we deny the penalty, we must abandon
the reward; and if we expect the reward, we must equally acknowledge the peril.** It is a studied antithesis between
faithfulness and unfaithfulness, not between regeneration and un-regeneration;
and whether we take the 'stripes' as figurative
of Tribulation sorrows, or as literal infliction’s at the Judgement Seat, the
closely-knit balanced statement of our Lord makes it certain that it is a
punishment which falls strictly within the area of the Church.***
[*
(See Greek word ) 'those who
cannot be trusted' (Godet): it is obvious that the word here are
those who have been unfaithful (Stier). "Liddell and
Scott give its first meaning as - not to be trusted; not trusty,
faithless, 'Hypocrite' (Matt. 24: 51) - a man whose creed exceeds his
practice - our Lord uses both of believers (Matt.
7: 5) and of unbelievers (Matt 23: 27).
** A
negative proof is also of great force. If the Steward, together with the
evil servants, in the Pounds and Talents, are unregenerate men, we are
confronted with the inexplicable fact that on the unfaithful regenerate servant
our Lord is totally silent: the servant who has failed in his trust (and the
existence of such will hardly be denied) is, in that case, conspicuously absent
from all parable and prophecy: dealing, as He does, with the judgement of every
class, for this class and its judgement the Lord (if we make this
assumption) gives no revelation whatever.
*** "No
proper recompense can be held out, as a motive to the performance of a certain
duty, without involving, over and above, the assurance of a proper punishment,
as a dissuasive from its non-performance." (Greswell).]
Our
Lord finally enforces the solemn lesson by revealing its controlling principle.
"And to
whomsoever much is given" - so far from the principle
applying less to a child of God, or not at all, penalty is a recoil in
inverse ratio - "of him shall much be required"
- in fidelity, in watchfulness, in activity, in sanctity: "and to whom they commit much" - that is,
commissioned servants, abounding in talents, in opportunities, in influence, in
gifts - "of him they will ask"
- in the day of reckoning - "THE MORE";
a principle which works also among the lost; for where nations have been most
gospelled, there also they are most damned (Matt.
10: 15). But it applies not least to the Church. The
greatest prerogatives bring the greatest responsibilities (Lange): Christ shows that the more highly favoured disciples must
be visited with severer punishment (Calvin):
if ye, my servants and stewards, should prove unfaithful, your punishment shall
be all the more severe on account of the graces and gifts which ye have
received (Stier). So the unprepared servant has stripes, few or
many; but the untrustworthy steward, as more responsible, is cut asunder.
For
the Lord reveals the inmost heart of the unfaithful Steward - "that evil servant
shall say in his heart"; and what he reveals is not fundamental unbelief - "I will not have this Man to reign over me"
(Luke 19: 14); but [ Millennial and] Advent
unbelief - "My lord" - a
confession of faith - "delayeth his coming." Moreover, most
remarkably, it is an excommunicating sin (1 Cor. 5:
11) into which he falls - "To be drunken"
(verse 45) - but for which either he
is too powerful, or the Church too corrupt, for action to be taken. "The first cause," as Greswell says,
"of the mal-administration of the power entrusted
to the servant in the absence of his master is traced to the forgetfulness
of the fact of responsibility; that is, to the presumptive assurance that
the time when any personal account for his conduct was to be exacted by his
master, if it was ever to arrive, was still distant; and that the immediate
liberty or freedom from restraint might be used with the consciousness of
safety and impunity." *
[* How far a believer, by general holiness, can
be 'making ready' without accepting the Second
Advent at all - or at least an Advent contingently approximate - is a problem
that must be left to the Lord; neither 'watching'
nor 'waiting,' it is manifestly a most dangerous
experiment, and an experiment being made by a vast section of the regenerate in
all the Churches. Even the evil
servant never denied the Advent: all he said was - "My Lord delayeth his coming." How
much bolder IS THE
Magnificent
beyond dreams is the alternative vision. "The
reward which is proposed in Scripture to Christians is an elevation TO A
SHARE OF THE [MILLENNIAL]
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