The Faithful Steward

Today on Renewing Your Mind… In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus teaches that servants who are good stewards will be blessed, but those servants who squander what's been given to them, who aren't prepared at the time of the Lord's return, will be punished.

Today on Renewing Your Mind, R.C. Sproul reminds us that the Christian life requires diligence. Well this morning we're going to continue our study of the Gospel according to St. Luke. We're still in the 12th chapter, and I will be reading verses 35 through 48, and I would ask the congregation please to stand for the reading of the Word of God. Let your waste be girded and your lamps burning, and you yourselves be like men who wait for their master when he will return from the wedding, that when he comes and knocks they may open to him immediately. Blessed are those servants whom the master, when he comes, will find watching. Assuredly, I say to you that he will gird himself and have them sit down to eat and will come and serve them. And if he should come in the second watch or come in the third watch and find them so, then blessed are those servants.

But know this, that if the master of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not allowed his house to be broken into. Therefore, you also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect. And then Peter said to him, Lord, do you speak this parable only to us or to all people? And the Lord said, Who then is that faithful and wise steward when his master will make ruler over his household to give them their portion of food in due season? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes.

Truly, I say to you that I will make him ruler over all that he has. But if that servant says in his heart, My master is delaying his coming and begins to beat the male and female servants and to eat and drink and be drunk, the master of that servant will come on a day when he's not looking for him and at an hour when he's not aware and will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the unbelievers. And that servant who knew his master's will and did not prepare himself or do according to his will shall be beaten with many stripes. But he who did not know yet committed things deserving of stripes shall be beaten with few, for everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required. And to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more. Again, we have teaching that comes to us carrying the full weight of the authority of God Himself.

So please receive it as such and be seated. Throughout this 12th chapter, we've seen a common theme, a theme in which Jesus speaks forcibly about the focus of our lives. And He follows this instruction by a couple of very brief parables that we find beginning in verse 35, where He begins with this command, Let your waist be girded and your lamps burning.

Of course, He's speaking to people of the ancient world whose customary mode of dress was long, flowing robes that made it very cumbersome to move with any alacrity, unless these robes would first be hitched up above the knees and a large belt would encircle the waist to which the lower portion of the robe would be tucked in, now giving the legs freedom to move and to move rapidly. And we find this admonition elsewhere in the Scripture where men are told to gird up their loins, to prepare themselves for action, soldiers for battle, others for labor. And so Jesus said, Let your waist be girded and your lamps burning. Oh, the darkness has come, the night has already fallen. It is the time to light the lamp. But as the evening progresses and weariness comes in, then the tendency is to blow out the light and retire to your bed. Jesus said there are certain circumstances where you don't put your pajamas on. You put your belt on, and you keep your lamps lit. Let your waist be girded, your lamps burning, and you will be yourselves like men who wait for their master when he returns from the wedding. That when he comes and knocks, they may open to him immediately.

So you see the picture. The master of the house has gone to a wedding. The wedding is being held in the evening. His servants are at home waiting for him to return. They don't know what time he will be back. It's almost certain that it won't be in the first watch because the wedding will still be going on. But they didn't know whether he would come in the second watch or if the wedding would go into the wee hours of the morning all the way into the third watch.

But the point was even if it took all night. It didn't matter what time the master would return, that whenever he came it was the duty of the servants to be awake, to be dressed, have the lights on, and be ready to answer the door as soon as the master knocked. And he says, blessed are those servants whom the master when he comes will find watching. Here Jesus pronounces his benediction upon servants of the master who are ready for their master and for his return at any moment, morning, noon, or night. This could be a new beatitude. Blessed are those servants who are ready when the master returns.

Listen to what he says. This little statement now, the coming from Jesus, is almost unbelievable. It is so astonishing. And yet as much as it strains our ability to comprehend, Jesus prophecies it with words of total assurance saying, Assuredly I say to you that he will gird himself and have them sit down to eat and will come and serve them. What? The master of the house for whom these servants labor, when he comes back late at night and finds them ready for him and opening the door immediately to him, he comes in and girds his loins and invites them to sit down, and he prepares a meal for them.

What a master! Instead of bouncing in the door and saying, Okay, get ready. I'm hungry. Get me something to eat.

I don't care what time it is. He says, Be at peace. Sit down.

Let me serve you. You know we talk all the time in theology about our being justified by faith, that it is by faith in Christ that we are redeemed and that we are called to be faithful to him. But in that consideration we often forget the other side of the coin, namely his faithfulness to us.

Christ asks us to put our faith in him and promises at the same time that he will be faithful to all who are his, even as this master who comes late at night and serves the servants. But know this, that if the master of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched. If he knew that two o'clock in the morning his house was going to be burglarized, that somebody was going to break in, he wouldn't have gone to bed at ease at 12 o'clock and set the alarm for six. He would have stayed up and would have been ready to repel the invader when he tried to break into his house at two o'clock in the morning.

If he would have known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, and he would not allow his house to be broken into. Here's the conclusion of this brief parable. Therefore, you also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect. Now, this last warning that Jesus gives has to do with his appearing. Frankly, I don't know if Jesus was speaking here to his first-century contemporaries, to the suddenness of that judgment coming that would come upon Israel in the year 70 A.D., or if he were actually speaking about his final consummate return at the end when he would establish the fullness of his kingdom.

But in either case, the admonition remains the same. You don't know when he's going to come, which means there's no time that you can relax. You must be ready and prepared at any moment. Now, Peter was puzzled. Is this a warning you're giving to us as your disciples, or is this a message that you mean for everybody? And so Jesus responds to this question with another parable. "'Who then is that faithful and wise steward whom his master will make ruler over his household to give them their portion of food in due season?'"

And now another beatitude. "'Blessed is the servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes.'" The first little parable was about watchfulness.

The second one has to do with faithfulness, particularly in the area of stewardship. Jesus here talks about a master who appoints a steward over his house. That's what a steward was in the ancient world. He ruled and managed the affairs of the house. He was the one who managed the staff of servants in the house. He didn't own the house.

He didn't own any of the things that he was called to manage. All of these things belonged to the master. But it was the task of the steward to take care of these things in a wise, in a gracious, and in a godly manner. Again, by extension, the whole concept of stewardship that we talk about is this, that there's nothing that we own that does not belong to God. Everything He entrusts to us, He gives to us as stewards, always with the responsibility of due diligence, always with the responsibility of honoring the master with how we handle the things that He entrusts to us.

My money is His. My house is His. My life is His. We are stewards of the very air that we breathe because it all belongs to Him. And so He says, blessed is the servant whom the master will find being a good steward, so to speak. Truly I say to you that He will make him ruler over all that he has. But then there's that servant that says in his heart, my master is delaying his coming. And so while the cat's away, the mice will play. He hasn't come so far. In fact, it's been 2,000 years he's still not here. Why should I expect him tonight? Why should I expect him tomorrow?

It seems to me that this delay may just continue on and on and on. So instead of caring for the male and female servants, I'll beat them. I'll abuse them and use them for my own glory. And I will eat and drink and be drunk. The unfaithful steward is a mirror image of the rich fool who said, I'm going to eat, drink, and be merry.

Only added to this frivolous life of partying and hedonism is the element of cruelty to others. The master of that servant will come in a day when he's not looking for him. He will come in an hour when he's not aware. And he will set him down and speak to him and say, I'm really disappointed in you. I really expected greater things from you. He really let me down.

No, no, no, no. That's not what Jesus said. He said, the master is not even going to have a conversation with this man. He's going to cut him in two. Now that's a bloody judgment if there ever was one. He said he will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the unbelievers.

Now here's where it gets scary. This one who will be cut in two, who will have been a poor steward, obviously was one who professed faith. He was not numbered with the unbelievers. He was not a rank pagan. He didn't distance himself from church and the things of God.

This steward probably was in church every Sunday, maybe taught Sunday school, very possibly the pastor, a pastor who gave no real commitment to the stewardship entrusted to him, to the care of the master's sheep while the master was in a far country. And when the master comes back, he not only cuts him in two, but he sends him out to be numbered with the unbeliever because, beloved, an unfaithful steward is an unbeliever. You cannot have saving faith and live like this. You can pretend to have saving faith.

You can profess to have saving faith, but you are altogether unconverted and on your way to hell. I mean, there are things that are worse, dear ones, than being cut in half. And what could be worse than on the day of judgment to be numbered with the unbelievers? But wait a minute, there's more.

It gets worse. Not only will that person who is a poor steward be numbered with the unbeliever on the day of judgment, but his judgment will be worse. The servant who knew his master's will and did not prepare himself or do according to his will shall be beaten with many stripes. But he who did not know yet committed things deserving of stripes shall be beaten with few. For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required.

And to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more. Hearing the Word of God never leaves anyone in a neutral situation. You're either blessed by it or you're cursed by it. You keep hearing the Word of God over and over and over again and remain hardened in your heart. The greater the stripes you will receive on the judgment day. The people in this room right now who are here all the time hearing the Word of God and are unfaithful stewards are in a far worse situation than those people out there who never darken the door of a church. That's what Jesus is saying here.

That's what's so scary about this. There's no neutrality with the Word of God. You hear it to your joy, to your delight, to your everlasting felicity, or you hear it to your judgment for everlasting darkness. Now again this isn't my preacher's warning here. This is Jesus talking.

This is His warning. Friends, I hope that you'll think today about this question. How much has God given you? God grant that your hearts will be fully inclined to make your entire lives a message of thank you to the God of grace who has redeemed your soul.

R.C. Sproul loved his congregation at St. Andrew's Chapel. He loved them so much that he was willing to give them this sober warning—a sober warning that is infused with great hope. If we remember God's goodness to us, if we faithfully prepare for His return, our reward will be great. Thank you for joining us today for the Lord's Day edition of Renewing Your Mind.

I'm Lee Webb. Each Sunday we return to Dr. Sproul's series Through the Gospel of Luke, and today's message brought us face to face with the fundamental reality of the Christian life—we must live intentionally for Christ. In the coming months we will finish this sermon series, and let me recommend that you take advantage of our resource offer today.

If you contact us today with a donation of any amount, we will be glad to provide you with a digital download of R.C. 's commentary on Luke. You'll find helpful explanations for each verse.

To request it, just go online to renewingyourmind.org. Here at Ligonier Ministries, we teach the Word of God so that His people can grow in faithful service. Dr. Sproul put it this way, it is the teaching of Christ that makes His disciples blossom and bloom, producing fruit in their season. Every outreach of this ministry is intended to proclaim this message. So we thank you for joining us as we seek to proclaim the holiness of God in all its fullness. Your financial gifts make it possible. I'm Lee Webb. Thank you for being with us today, and I hope you'll make plans to be with us again next Sunday for Renewing Your Mind.