Friday, October 4, 2013

Week 40 - Day 6

Matthew 23-25; Proverbs 8

*Click here to read these passages:

All over our community I keep seeing people in these green t-shirts that say, “Live on Purpose:  #TeamSatty+1”.  Todd Satterfield who recently passed away was known for this motto: Live on Purpose.  He was 33 years old and had terminal esophageal cancer, but he was determined to make every day he had left count.  The +1 was because he said, “Each day I live I want to bring one more person to God.”  He knew that “we should live each moment for each second because we are not promised anything.”

I think this is the main message Jesus is trying to send in these chapters in Matthew.  The disciples are asking about the end of time, and Jesus tells them that no one knows the day or hour, but it is going to happen.  Then he teaches them in parables.  The parable of the ten virgins is about being ready.  The parable of the talents is what to do while we’re here, and the parable of the sheep and goats is about how we’re going to be judged when it is the end.  The thing we need to realize is that it is not only the inevitability of the end of the world at some point but the end of our own life is inevitable.  It is all a mystery as to when and how, but it will happen, and we need to live in light of that.

The parable of the talents really challenges me to not be afraid to invest what God has given me instead of hiding it and wasting it away.  God has given every person some kind of gift … it is not ours; it was given to us.  Our very life is not our own; it was given to us.  In the parable God rewarded those who invested and multiplied the gift He had given them; He punished the one who buried the gift.  I also find it interesting as well as comforting to know that God does not give the same gifts to each person, and you are only responsible for what God has given you.  There is no reason to compare to anyone else.  The reply was the same for the one who was given 5 talents and earned 5 more as it was for the one who was given 2 and earned 2: “Well done, good and faithful servant!”  The point was and is to invest what you’ve been given … to live on purpose, not wasting a single day because no one knows what day will be their last. 

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