Now we need to fellowship concerning our practice of being faithful in service. In what way should we be faithful in the service? What shall we do? First, in Matthew 24:45-51 we are told clearly that the Lord commissioned us to take care of His household. His household refers to the believers (Eph. 2:19), who are the church (1 Tim. 3:15). The church today is the Lord’s house and also the Lord’s household, what we refer to as the folks. We are His house, and at the same time we are His folks. The Lord charged us, commissioned us, to minister something to His household, that is, to the believers in the church.
According to verse 45 what we minister is food. Verse 45 says, “Who then is the faithful and prudent slave, whom the master has set over his household to give them food at the appointed time.” At the appointed time we have to minister food, the life supply, to the Lord’s people. Do not say that others have a gift of teaching to teach you the Word of God and minister spiritual food to you, but that you do not have such a gift. There is not such a thought here. All the Lord’s servants received the gift for their commission.
In the second section in 25:14-30, the Lord says that He is as a master going into another country, who delivered his possessions to his servants (v. 14). In the next verse he gave talents to the servants. Possessions and talents are the items of this parable. “His possessions” signify the church (Eph. 1:18) with all the believers, who are His household (Matt. 24:45). The church with the believers is a real inheritance, a possession of the Lord. “Talents” in this parable signify spiritual gifts (Rom. 12:6; 1 Cor. 12:4; 1 Pet. 4:10; 2 Tim. 1:6). Verse 14 says, “For it is as a man who, going into another country, called his own slaves and delivered to them his possessions.” Verse 15 continues, “And to one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one.” The reader of these verses may think that the five talents refer back to possessions. Possessions are the Lord’s church, His believers, and talents are the gifts. The Lord not only gave the possessions, but He also gave the talents. Has the Lord not given you the church with so many believers? The Bible does not refer to the church of the apostles, the church of the elders, the church of the prophets or the church of the evangelists. The New Testament rather speaks of the church of God (Acts 20:28; 1 Cor. 1:2), the church of Christ (Rom. 16:16), and the church of the saints (1 Cor. 14:33). The church is the possession of all the saints, the believers.
The Lord, before going to the heavens, delivered to us His church with all the believers. If He had only given to us the talent to minister the life supply, then to whom would we minister? However, He gave us two categories of things: one is His possessions, the other is the talents. Today we have the church with all the believers as the possession, the portion to us, to which we can give something, and we have the talents as the spiritual gifts. You cannot say you are not gifted. Actually, you are much gifted. For this reason I have always encouraged you to function. Some may consider this to be merely my practice. They may say that in all of Christianity they only saw the practice of good preachers speaking to a crowd. They never saw a meeting with so many standing up to speak. Some have even called this a “popcorn” meeting. One after another stands up like popcorn popping. It is very good to have a “popcorn meeting.” This is altogether what we expect to have. This is not my teaching; this is the Bible’s teaching (1 Cor. 14:24, 26, 29-32). We all have to learn to function. This is the reason that even in a ministry meeting, I always like to leave half an hour for you to “pop up.” Do not just be stuck to your chair. It seems as if there is a strong glue to keep many of you stuck to the chair. You have to jump up to say something. For you to speak is to minister food to the Lord’s household at the appointed time.
Whoever serves food knows the appointed time. If you are serving food every day, you have to make breakfast, lunch, and dinner. To prepare a cup of coffee and buy a doughnut for breakfast is the lazy way. If we are like this in the spiritual realm, we will be poor servants to minister the life supply to the master’s folks at the appointed time. The appointed time in the morning is breakfast. Also, good wives prepare the best sandwiches for their husbands to bring to the office for lunch at the appointed time and are accustomed to preparing a big dinner for their family.
In like manner, whenever we meet together, this is one of the appointed times for you to minister the proper food to the Lord’s folks. Suppose, however, that I was sloppy, not reading the Word. If I did not labor adequately in the Word and came to speak to you, I would just be ministering to you “a cup of coffee and some doughnuts.” To cook a nourishing, good breakfast, requires your diligence. According to the context of this parable, the faithful one is the diligent one. Faithful here equals diligence, and slothful equals lazy. We must be diligent in seeking the Word that we could prepare to serve good food when we come to the meeting. The eating time is the appointed time, and the meeting time is the appointed time. We have the appointed time on the Lord’s Day morning, on the Lord’s Day evening, Tuesday evening, and Friday evening. The meeting times are the appointed times when we all have to minister some portion of the life supply to our folks, to our fellow believers, to our possessions.
The Lord has given us the church as the object for us to serve, and He has also given us the ability, the skill, the gift, to care for our obligation. We may also enlarge the interpretation of the term possessions. Do you not believe that all the sinners belong to the Lord? All the sinners belong to the Lord; they are all the Lord’s possessions, and the Lord has given them to us. The translators of the Recovery Version were very careful in their translation of this portion. In verse 14 the possessions are delivered, and in verse 15 the gifts are given. The Lord did not give us the church with the believers; the Lord delivered these to us. In the same sense the Lord has delivered all the sinners to us. The possessions not only denote the church with the believers as the Lord’s possessions, but also all the sinners. The Lord has surely delivered to us the church with all the believers and all the sinners that we may take care of them for His sake.
To care for them is simply to feed them, to minister food to them. To the sinners the proper food we minister is the gospel of Christ. The nurses in the hospitals know that they must serve the patients with different meals. Different food is ministered to different patients to meet their specific needs. It is the same with us. The entire earth is a hospital, full of sickness and full of all kinds of sick people. Even the church in a good sense is also a hospital, full of sick people. Therefore, we have to minister different words to them at the appointed time. The Lord’s possessions are always around you. The believers, the churches, and even the more all the sinners are around you. It is your duty, your obligation, to minister food to them. If they are sinners, you have to minister the gospel of grace to them as the food they need. If they are believers sick of something, then you need to minister some word from the Bible that suits their condition, either to nourish them, to heal them, to strengthen them, or to wake them up. To do this is to be a faithful and prudent slave, ministering the proper food to the Lord’s possessions, which are all kinds of persons, at the appointed time. When you enter into your office, you must realize that this is one of the appointed times to minister the proper food of the gospel to the unbelieving ones. When you go to school, even if you are not going there to teach but to attend classes, all the classmates around you are the Lord’s possessions delivered to you that you may take the opportunity, the appointed time, to minister the gospel to them.