Luke 19:11-27--The Parable of the Ten Minas

Luke 19:11-27
English Standard Version
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The Parable of the Ten Minas
11 As they heard these things, he proceeded to tell a parable, because he was near to Jerusalem, and because they supposed that the kingdom of God was to appear immediately. 12 He said therefore, “A nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and then return. 13 Calling ten of his servants, he gave them ten minas, and said to them, ‘Engage in business until I come.’ 14 But his citizens hated him and sent a delegation after him, saying, ‘We do not want this man to reign over us.’ 15 When he returned, having received the kingdom, he ordered these servants to whom he had given the money to be called to him, that he might know what they had gained by doing business. 16 The first came before him, saying, ‘Lord, your mina has made ten minas more.’ 17 And he said to him, ‘Well done, good servant! Because you have been faithful in a very little, you shall have authority over ten cities.’ 18 And the second came, saying, ‘Lord, your mina has made five minas.’ 19 And he said to him, ‘And you are to be over five cities.’ 20 Then another came, saying, ‘Lord, here is your mina, which I kept laid away in a handkerchief; 21 for I was afraid of you, because you are a severe man. You take what you did not deposit, and reap what you did not sow.’ 22 He said to him, ‘I will condemn you with your own words, you wicked servant! You knew that I was a severe man, taking what I did not deposit and reaping what I did not sow? 23 Why then did you not put my money in the bank, and at my coming I might have collected it with interest?’ 24 And he said to those who stood by, ‘Take the mina from him, and give it to the one who has the ten minas.’ 25 And they said to him, ‘Lord, he has ten minas!’ 26 ‘I tell you that to everyone who has, more will be given, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. 27 But as for these enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slaughter them before me.’”

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The large crowds know that He is going to Jerusalem which was the place where the rightful king was to rule from, and they imagined that Passover would be the time when He would once again set His people free from those who had captured them and their land.  While they lived in the land, they were not really free under the Roman Empire because there was always the threat of Rome coming in and destroying them, and Rome had put it own governance in place--from the Herods to Pilate, Agrippa, and Festus, and even in some ways the Sanhedrin was loyal to the Romans and tried to help maintain a certain status quo on the religious front to make sure that the Jewish people who were very religious people didn't riot.  When the Sanhedrin (of which the Pharisees are a part of) see that the people are ready to try to make Jesus king by force and that they are going to use Passover as an excuse to riot while all the Jews are gathered together in Jerusalem, then they fear for the lives of the people and they fear for themselves that they will lose their power and authority (and wealth) if Rome once again has to come into Jerusalem to quell a riot.  In fact, we will see them use this fact that the people are stirred up and ready to riot to their advantage at the time of the trial of Jesus before Pilate in future passages.  For now though, Jesus is trying to teach the people that while He is about to bring in His kingdom, it is a kingdom not of this world, and it is definitely not one that they will fight for with the weapons of this world.

Jesus' parable sounds a bit like ones that we've heard before where there is a master or king who goes away, and he gives authority and stewardship of his kingdom to a small group of people and Jesus uses amounts of money entrusted to these slaves to represent the value of what had been left in their care and stewardship, but it's going to take a different twist because it's also going to sound a bit like the Parable of the Tenants where those who were left in charge are going to rebel against their master while he is away, and they will try to seize that which has been left in their care for themselves (so the religious leaders are doing with the people that God has entrusted to them).

The one who was their master went away for his coronation and returned after he had been made king. He then called all his servants who he had entrusted with stewardship of what belonged to him to account and both the righteous and the wicked will be revealed in this "judgment."  The righteous servants who had invested what had been entrusted to them and done with it what their master would have done with his own money saw a return on that investment that they could present as an additional offering to their master (they did not imagine for instance that they only needed to give back to him what originally belonged to him and they could keep the rest for themselves, because all of it belonged to him since none of the money they invested belonged to them in the first place).  We see similar conversations between the master and the slaves as we did with the parable of the talents.  One had a 100% return on investment, another had  a 50% return on investment, but then there was one wicked servant who did not invest the mina they were entrusted with and buried it in the ground only to return to the master what had originally belonged to the master with no return.

​Jesus says that the man who buries what has been given to him like this and doesn't invest it because he is afraid he might lose it and face the wrath of an angry master--that man will be judged by his own words that he knew the nature of the king and that he would be judged harshly if he did not do what the master wanted, and yet, he did not obey his master's command to do business with what was entrusted with them until he returned.  The master says that the wicked servant should have at least deposited the money in the bank where the banker would loan the money to someone else and earn interest on the loan and share a bit of the earned interest with the account holder--at least in that way the master would have earned even a little return on investment when he returned and the servant would have sort of followed instructions by letting someone else do business with the money, but we see that all those who obeyed and invested had no fear of losing the master's money, and all of them had a significant return on investment.  The only way to "lose" in this economy that we're talking about here is to never make the investment to start off with.  God's economy does not run by the same rules of probability and random chance that our world markets do.

The faithful servants will be given even more responsibility and authority, being made rulers over cities in the kingdom of their master, for they have been shown to have been faithful with the little things and can therefore be entrusted with much larger things.  But for the one who was controlled by fear and never obeyed the will of his master and hid the mina that was entrusted to him in the ground....that man will have the little that was entrusted to him given to someone else, and he will not be entrusted with anything of equal or greater value in the future (and if we look at other similar parables there is evidence that this unfaithful servant gets thrown out of the kingdom altogether proving that he was never a true servant of the king to begin with because he did not obey his master's command).  So it will be in the day of judgment when the Lord comes into His kingdom, but this was not that day.  However, there would be a day when they all would be held to account, and some would be found faithful and given an even greater treasure than the truth of God's Word that had been entrusted to them and they would receive the inheritance of eternal life and be made co-heirs with Jesus.

I won't spell out all the things with the power and authority granted to those who were faithful--that's spelled out more clearly in other passages I hope to get to later, but there is some truth to the mater that we won't just be sitting on a cloud strumming a harp.  We're going to actively be involved in the stewardship of the coming kingdom in the same kind of way that Adam and Eve were actively involved with stewardship of The Garden of Eden and caring for and keeping that which God had put in their care.  So then, we too in the future will be restored to this proper role of being not only princes but priests and judges.  We will be ministers of the gospel engaging in and leading in the worship of God and teaching others how good and great He is (that will take all eternity by itself), and also we will be given authority to judge the angels--likely the fallen angels called demons.  More on that later though--just do not read that promise as a "here and now" promise because currently the demons are very powerful and they are subject to the name of the Lord and His will here on earth for sure, but we should not enter into spiritual warfare in a way that is arrogant thinking that they must listen to us because of who we are, for it is clear in Scripture that the One they fear is the One they know that made them and will one day judge them--yet He will entrust some of that judgment to us at the proper time.