Every few years
someone makes a dire prediction the world is coming to an end on a specific
date. Each prediction is vehement,
expressed with certainty, and wrong. Jesus makes it quite clear that No one
knows the day or the hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the son, but only
the father[1].
The Father, the Creator, is the only one who knows when his creation will come
to a conclusion. But that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t be prepared for the
end. In today’s second reading, St. Paul
tells the people of Thessalonica that the day of the Lord, the end of time,
will come like a thief in the night when people least expect. Some of these people took Paul too literally
and quit working and caring for their families, just bracing themselves for the
end. He had to write them again and tell
them that those who refused to work should not eat[2].
Perhaps time
will not end before we die, but when we die; our own personal time comes to an
end. We spend the month of November
praying for our loved ones and all the souls of the faithful departed who have
died. Death is a reality everyone has to
face. How then, should we prepare for the Lord to come whether it is at the end
of all time or the end of our own personal time? Instructions are available throughout the
Bible, but particularly in today’s Gospel, which, by the way, comes in the
section of the Gospel of Matthew where Jesus is speaking about the end of time.
Today’s Gospel is the Parable of the Talents. The master entrusts his
possessions to three of his servants, and then goes on a journey.
To the ancients,
a talent was a unit of weight[3], but
I think we can use our definition of talent to best explain how we need to
prepare for the Lord to come into our lives. Our definition of talent is the
natural aptitude or skill someone has. Some have musical talent. Some are
talented technicians. Some are talented athletes, and so forth. We all have natural gifts. We were given these talents by God. We are expected to develop them to serve God
and his people.
Quite often an
athlete will begin an interview after a sporting event in which he or she
excelled with, “First of all, I give all glory to God.” The athlete is right. God is the source of all our talent. The athlete sees his or her developing this
talent as returning the gift to God. To
the athlete the focus should be on God, not him or her. We all need to do this regarding the many
talents the Lord has entrusted to each of us. Perhaps someone has said to you, “You are such a good mother, such a
good father.” Or perhaps someone has
said to us, “I’m nowhere near as good at this as you are.” Our response, at least to ourselves should
be, “Whatever I do well, I credit God as the source of the talent. All Glory
belongs to Him.”
The Lord tells
us in the parable that the Master will come for an accounting of how we used
the particular talents He has given each of us.
The first two servants in the parable returned more than they received,
allowing the Master’s possessions to grow. God is calling us to develop what we
are given to allow His Kingdom to grow!
So, will the
world end soon? Maybe yes, maybe no. We
can’t be concerned with worrying about the exact day or hour. That is none of our business. But what we have to be concerned with is
doing our part to prepare for the Lord’s coming, either at the end of all time
or the end of our time. If we develop
the talents he has entrusted to us, the day will come when He will say to us, well done, good and faithful servants ■
[1] Matthew 24:36
[2] 33rd Sunday of Ordinary Time A,
November 16, 2014. Readings: Proverbs 31:10-13, 19-20, 30-31; Responsorial
Psalm 128:1-2, 3, 4-5; 1 Thessalonians 5:1-6; Matthew 25:14-30.
[3] The weight was determined by the
amount of water needed to fill a vessel called an amphora. Since the various
ancient people had different sizes of amphoras, a talent for the ancient Greeks
was 57 pounds, for the Romans 71 pounds, and for the Egyptians 60 pounds.
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