Luk 19:11-27 | KingComments | STEP | The disciples hear the Lord Jesus speak of salvation. That reminds them of the kingdom of peace. They see in Him the Messiah. All their thoughts are that He will go to Jerusalem to sit on the throne of David and establish the kingdom of God in public glory and majesty. Because they are always busy with this, they understand nothing of it every time He speaks about His suffering and death that await Him in Jerusalem. Again, they assume incorrectly that He is going to Jerusalem to ascend the throne and accept His reign. The Lord knows their thoughts, and so He tells a parable. He Himself is the nobleman. He is the Son of God, also as Man. He came to the earth to establish the kingdom of God, but He was rejected. Now He travels to a distant country, heaven, to receive the kingdom there. He is truly King with a real kingdom. He reigns not yet publicly, but in the hearts of those who profess Him as Lord. But He comes back to establish His kingdom on earth. Before He goes to heaven, He gives to ten of His slaves – who are those who profess Him as Lord – ten minas, i.e. each slave one mina, with the instruction to do business with it. He adds “until I come”, i.e. until He comes back. All slaves, who are expressly called “His” slaves, are entrusted with the same sum. The number ten represents responsibility. All slaves are responsible to do business with what the Lord has given them. The fact that they receive the same sum means that the difference in results is the result of their diligence, commitment, motivation and the like and not of their capacities. In Matthew 25, the Lord tells a parable that is very similar to this parable. However, there is a difference. There He speaks of a lord who goes abroad and who entrusts to his own slaves each a different sum ( ). In Matthew 25 He emphasizes the power and wisdom of the Giver Who distinguishes in His gifts, according to the ability of each slave. The result is a yield in accordance with the difference in the gift, but an equal reward ( ). Whereas in Matthew 25 the sovereign power of the Lord is more in the foreground, here it is more about the responsibility of the slaves. In the mina we can see the entrusted deposit ( ). What is entrusted to us is the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ ( ), with the purpose that we make it visible in our lives. In the Gospel according to Luke this means that we show the grace given to us in Christ to those around us. If the grace from us goes to others, it will also work in others and thereby increase the effectiveness of grace. So we can do business with grace. Apart from slaves, there are also citizens. The citizens are the Jews. They have rejected the Lord Jesus, for they hate Him. Their hatred is so great that once He is gone they even send a delegation (or: an embassy) after Him to emphasize that they do not want His kingship. This happened when they stoned Stephen who, in the power of the Holy Spirit, offered them, as it were, a last chance to accept Him as their King ( ). By killing him, they sent Christ the message, as it were, as a statement that they wanted nothing to do with Him. With this they signed their own verdict which was later, in the year 70, executed by the Roman armies under the leadership of Titus in the destruction of Jerusalem.

‏ Luke 19:11-27

A Nobleman

The disciples hear the Lord Jesus speak of salvation. That reminds them of the kingdom of peace. They see in Him the Messiah. All their thoughts are that He will go to Jerusalem to sit on the throne of David and establish the kingdom of God in public glory and majesty. Because they are always busy with this, they understand nothing of it every time He speaks about His suffering and death that await Him in Jerusalem. Again, they assume incorrectly that He is going to Jerusalem to ascend the throne and accept His reign.

The Lord knows their thoughts, and so He tells a parable. He Himself is the nobleman. He is the Son of God, also as Man. He came to the earth to establish the kingdom of God, but He was rejected. Now He travels to a distant country, heaven, to receive the kingdom there. He is truly King with a real kingdom. He reigns not yet publicly, but in the hearts of those who profess Him as Lord. But He comes back to establish His kingdom on earth.

Before He goes to heaven, He gives to ten of His slaves – who are those who profess Him as Lord – ten minas, i.e. each slave one mina, with the instruction to do business with it. He adds “until I come”, i.e. until He comes back. All slaves, who are expressly called “His” slaves, are entrusted with the same sum. The number ten represents responsibility. All slaves are responsible to do business with what the Lord has given them. The fact that they receive the same sum means that the difference in results is the result of their diligence, commitment, motivation and the like and not of their capacities.

In Matthew 25, the Lord tells a parable that is very similar to this parable. However, there is a difference. There He speaks of a lord who goes abroad and who entrusts to his own slaves each a different sum (Mt 25:14-15). In Matthew 25 He emphasizes the power and wisdom of the Giver Who distinguishes in His gifts, according to the ability of each slave. The result is a yield in accordance with the difference in the gift, but an equal reward (Mt 25:19-23).

Whereas in Matthew 25 the sovereign power of the Lord is more in the foreground, here it is more about the responsibility of the slaves. In the mina we can see the entrusted deposit (1Tim 6:20). What is entrusted to us is the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2Cor 4:6), with the purpose that we make it visible in our lives. In the Gospel according to Luke this means that we show the grace given to us in Christ to those around us. If the grace from us goes to others, it will also work in others and thereby increase the effectiveness of grace. So we can do business with grace.

Apart from slaves, there are also citizens. The citizens are the Jews. They have rejected the Lord Jesus, for they hate Him. Their hatred is so great that once He is gone they even send a delegation (or: an embassy) after Him to emphasize that they do not want His kingship.

This happened when they stoned Stephen who, in the power of the Holy Spirit, offered them, as it were, a last chance to accept Him as their King (Acts 7:54-59). By killing him, they sent Christ the message, as it were, as a statement that they wanted nothing to do with Him. With this they signed their own verdict which was later, in the year 70, executed by the Roman armies under the leadership of Titus in the destruction of Jerusalem.

Reward of the Faithful Slaves

The citizens did not want Him to be King over them, but that did not prevent Him from receiving the kingdom. After He has received it, He returns. Luke does not speak about the time that has passed between His receiving of the kingdom and His return. Now, some two thousand years ago, He received the kingdom, and He has not yet returned, but the moment of His return is ever closer. When He returns, He wants His slaves to whom He has given money to be called to Him. He wants to know what they have earned from the business. That is His good right. He gave His slaves that money to make profit for Him.

The first to come before Him says to Him that His mina – the slave speaks of “Your” mina – has yielded tenfold profit. He is one who, with dedication to his Lord, has been occupied with the mina entrusted to him. The profit is not the number of converts that someone can show or the number of speeches that someone has made, but what has become visible of Christ in the slave’s entire life.

The life of Christ brought abundant praise to God. Wherever people saw and heard Him, they glorified God, even though many of them did not accept Him and even rejected Him. The more the life of Christ is seen in the life of a believer, He will reward it. This is not a question of possessing a special gift, but of a mind that does everything for Christ. This is open to every believer without distinction. It is about a choice to be made or not to be made.

As has been said, it is about responsibility. This slave receives the Lord’s approval. The Lord praises him and says to him “well done” and calls him a “good slave”. The Lord also rewards him. Because the slave was faithful in a very little thing (cf. Lk 16:10), much is entrusted to him. He may reign in the kingdom together with Christ (Mt 19:28; 1Cor 6:2-3; 2Tim 2:12; Rev 2:26-27) and rule over ten cities. He has shown in his life that he has dealt well with the goods of his Lord. The reward he receives is a part in the kingdom in accordance with his work.

The second slave comes. He also speaks of “Your” mina and can give his Lord five extra minas. He too has been diligent in his service to the Lord, but not with the same dedication as the other. The Lord, therefore, does not express His approval in the same way as with the first. However, this slave also receives the reward that matches his profit. He also gets his share in the kingdom and may rule over five cities.

The Worthless Slave and the Citizens

Then comes the next slave before his Lord. He also calls Him “Master” and thereby acknowledges His authority, and he also speaks of “Your” mina. He thereby acknowledges that what he has received is of His Lord. But it is all just a lip confession. In their inner being, there is no connection between him and his Lord. Therefore, there has been no dedication to Him at all. There was nothing in his life that led people to glorify God. He put the mina he had received in a handkerchief. He did not intend to work hard for his Lord. So he didn’t do that.

His conduct resulted from a totally false perception of his Lord. He did not understand anything of His grace, he never got to know Him. He was afraid of Him, and found Him exacting and unrighteous. He had his own view of that Lord and thought that you’d better not have to deal with Him. He did not face the fact that he would have to deal with Him anyway. Living for such a Lord seemed unbearable to him. There were a lot of things you were not permitted to do and there were a lot of things you had to do. It was all ‘not permitted’ and ‘had to’. In that view on his Lord, he did not want to be corrected either. He held on to it and it determined his life.

With his statements about his Lord, the slave makes his own judgment. If he really was afraid of that Lord, and if it really was so that He was exacting and, to his judgment, dealing unrighteous, that should have led him to act differently from what he has done now. The Lord calls him a worthless slave because he has not done according to what he knew. He used his idea about Him as an excuse to do nothing at all with his mina. If he had been really scared, he would have given His money to a bank. Just thinking soberly would have led him to the conclusion that the money would at least have been a little bit profitable for Him. After all, it was His money and the task was to do business with it.

The Lord does not blame him for not having done business. If he had no energy to do business, by bringing the money to a bank he would have acknowledged that his Lord was entitled to profit. Because he was led by selfish fear, he showed that there was no love for his Master (1Jn 4:18). He lacked not so much the power to act, but the right spirit or mind to act. He did not know grace. If we have a legalistic mind, we serve only ourselves.

The worthless slave not only does not receive a reward, he also suffers loss. What he was entrusted, he loses because he did nothing with it. He never really possessed it because he had put it away. Yet he knew he had it, for he could give it to his Lord, but it was something outside of him, not in him. The external appearance, the beautiful appearance, is taken from him. What was for him a covering for his inner depravity is for the faithful, dedicated slave the decoration of the authenticity of the faith that is in him. That is why the faithful slave gets what the evil slave has abused.

Those who stand by point out to the Lord that this slave already has so much. He already has ten and now he gets another one. The answer shows how much the Lord appreciates complete faithfulness and dedication and commitment. Such a person cannot be rewarded enough. From those who have no inner connection with Him, but only the appearance to possess something, also that appearance will be taken away.

At the end of His parable, the Lord returns to the citizens whom He spoke of in the beginning (Lk 19:14). He calls them here His enemies. He reminds us that they did not want Him to rule over them. For them, too, comes the day of retribution. For them there is an appropriate judgment. They must appear before Him like the slaves, but there is no conversation with them. They must be slain in His presence. His kingship is a righteous kingship. He rules in righteousness, both in reward and in judgment of evil.