5 Leadership LessonsSample

Stewardship

We are going to focus on Jesus and the Parable of the Talents. 

 A master was getting ready to go away for a while.  Before he left, the master entrusted talents (a measurement of money) to 3 different servants, giving them each different amount, the next one greater than the other.  

Some of us start reading this parable and focus on what seems unfair to them and get hung up on asking “why?” Why did one servant get 5 talents and another just one? Why do you get to go to college, and I can’t afford to?  Why are you able to purchase a home and I can barely afford to rent?  Why is your business successful and I can barely keep the door open on mine?  Why? 

Before you know it, we are caught up in comparison.  Instead of focusing on what God has entrusted to us, we focus on what God has entrusted to others. 

God entrusted Moses to lead His people out of Egypt.  Armed with a staff in his hand he led the Israelites out of bondage.  What do you have: a staff, a stick, or a scepter? What has God entrusted you to steward? Whatever it is, pick up what God has given you and start what He has called you to do.  

Often, we want God to show us the whole plan for our lives.  We want God to show us where we will  end up.  The truth is, if we saw the end point, it could be overwhelming and scare us to death.  So, he doesn’t always show us the ending.  He calls us to start where we are, with what we have in our hands, right now.

We all begin on different playing fields at different times.  Our journey is more than just being born and dying.  We steward the time in between. It’s more about what we are becoming, instead of what we are doing. What do you need to walk through today, in order to become who  you need to be for tomorrow?  

Stop focusing on what someone else has in their hand, that is their journey, their story.  Start writing your own.  

“Don’t worry about things you can’t control because they may adversely affect the things you can control.” -John Wooden

In the parable, the servant who was given five talents went and invested them. He stewarded what had been entrusted to him and put it to work and earned double. The servant who was given the two talents did the same. But what happened with the servant given only one talent? Fear came upon him. He was afraid of losing what he had, so he buried his talent. When the master returned, He told the two that had invested, well done and he called the last servant wicked for not putting what had been entrusted to him to work. Faith without works is dead. What have you been given? Will you choose to bury or invest it?  

We are not owners; we are stewards and managers. We are responsible for investing and putting to work all that God has entrusted to us.