Close with the word from Matthew chapter 25.
It's a long portion, but I'll try just
to read it quickly.
And we'll start reading from verse 14.
Something which the people also said there, that
they said, look, we have Christians in our
country, but it's a superficial Christianity.
Please bring us a Christianity, the gospel that
will go deep.
But how can we, we can never teach
others about a gospel and a Christianity, a
faith that goes deep, if we haven't experienced
it ourselves first.
We'll start reading from verse 14.
For the kingdom of heaven is like a
man traveling to a far country who called
his own servants and delivered his goods to
them.
And to one he gave five talents, to
another two, and to another one, to each
one according to his own ability.
And immediately he went on a journey.
Then he who had received the five talents
went and traded with them and made another
five talents.
And likewise, he who had received two gained
two more.
But he who had received one went and
dug in the ground and hid his Lord's
money.
After a long time, the Lord of those
servants came and settled accounts with them.
So he who had received five talents came
and brought five other talents, saying, Lord, you
delivered to me five talents.
Look, I have gained five more talents beside
them.
And the Lord of those servants said, Lord,
I have gained five more talents beside them.
His Lord said to him, Well done, good
and faithful servant.
You were faithful over a few things.
I will make you ruler over many things.
Enter into the joy of your Lord.
It's gone
to
verse 24.
Then he who had received the one talent
came and said, Lord, I knew you to
be a hard man, reaping where you have
not sown and gathering where you have not
scattered seed.
And I was afraid and went and hid
your talent.
in the ground.
Look, here you have what is yours.
But his Lord answered and said to him,
You wicked and lazy servant, you knew that
I reap where I have not sown, and
gather where I have not scattered seed.
So you ought to have deposited my money
with the bankers, and at my coming I
would have received back my own with interest.
Therefore take the talent from him and give
it to him who has ten talents.
For to everyone who has, more will be
given, and he will have abundance, but from
him who does not have, even what he
has will be taken away.
And cast the unprofitable servant into the outer
darkness, there will be weeping and gnashing of
teeth.
Today is Pentecost, the day where the Holy
Spirit was poured out.
Many people pray and say, O Lord, pour
out your Holy Spirit, fill us with your
Holy Spirit.
But remember God's word where he says, if
you are not faithful in the small things,
you won't be entrusted with greater things.
You need to be faithful in the small
things.
One was given five talents, the other two,
and the other one.
It was not the same.
The way God does things is different.
Even people of one family will not all
have the same gifts and talents.
Now one can start a fight among brothers,
and the one saying, well I only got
one, you got two, or the other one
got five, it's not fair.
And we start fighting each other because the
devil is in us.
Eventually the Lord even said the one who
had received the one should have that one
taken away from him, given to the one
who has five.
Where he says the one who has, more
will be given.
The one who doesn't have, even what he
thinks he has will be taken away.
Why does he give the one five and
the other one only one?
Does he love the one with the one
talent less than the other one?
He loves everyone in the same way, for
he gave his only begotten son to everyone.
God is not evil, or doesn't do an
evil thing when he does it in that
way, but in his love he realizes that
the one is capable of handling five, the
other one only two, and the other one
only one.
So he gives them according to their ability.
So don't blame God and say he's unfair,
unjust, forgiving in different measures.
No, it's only because God realizes that he's
only capable of doing that one.
And to the one, if he gives the
one with the one five, he wouldn't know
what to do with it.
It would just go wasted.
So don't say, oh God, why did you
only give me one, I want five.
Just a simple example, maybe you want a
whole farm, but you've got a plot, or
a piece of land, and it's full of
weeds.
You don't even make use of that.
How then do you think you'll handle a
farm if you can't even handle that little
piece of land that you've got?
How can you expect to have more when
you're failing to be faithful in that little
bit that you've got?
Now when the Lord returned, he came and
he settled accounts with each one of them.
They personally had to give account.
So he started with the first one, who
had been given five.
Now he had been diligent.
Soon after the Lord left, he got to
work and he multiplied what he had.
The one with the two said, Lord, you
gave me two, and I managed to double
it.
Now you received double what you gave me.
The third one said, Lord, you gave me
one talent, and I know you to be
a hard man, and you don't want any
mistakes to happen.
So I took that talent you gave me
and I buried it, so that it doesn't
get harmed and doesn't go lost.
Here you have what is yours.
And the Lord answered and said to him,
you wicked, you wicked and lazy servant.
You see why he buried it?
He was lazy.
You knew that I reap where I have
not sown, and gather where I have not
scattered seed.
So you ought to have deposited my money
with the bankers, and at my coming, I
would have received back my own with interest.
And he said, take away what was given
him, because he didn't make good use of
it.
He said, take away what was given him,
because he didn't make good use of it.
Now here in the first place, we're not
speaking about money and about silver and gold,
but we're speaking in the first place about
that which the Lord has given us, those
spiritual gifts which he's given us.
That which the Lord has given you, has
entrusted to you, he wants you to quickly
go and use it.
But maybe you say, well what is it
that the Lord's given me?
He hasn't really given me anything significant enough.
But what about that which the Lord did
give you?
He entrusted something to you, those words, that
word which he gave you to share with
others.
But maybe you were lazy, you didn't want
to sanctify yourself, you were lazy in doing
that which the Lord has commissioned you to
do.
But he didn't give you something, he gave
you a seven days.
But what about what was given you as
it is given to you?
And what about the one which was given
you, as it is given to you?
You didn't give it.
We're not giving it to God.
We're not giving it to false evangelists.
We're giving it to Satan.
He's given you what was given to you
by Satan, and he's given you another seven
days.
to you.
What have you done with it?
You've just been lazy and you've been an
unprofitable servant.
Are you unprofitable for the Lord?
Who do you profit then?
Are you profiting the devil?
If you're not profiting the Lord.
The Lord returned and he said, I will
call them to account.
I'll tell you a secret.
Maybe I shouldn't even tell you this, but
I will.
When I was in the hotel there, there
in the Congo, I took my Bible and
read it.
His Lord said to him, well done, good
and faithful servant.
You have been faithful over a few things.
I will make you rule over many things.
And when
I
read this that the Lord said you have
been faithful over a few things or little
things, and when I read that my heart
broke.
I'm not a woman, I'm not a child,
but I cried and I said, oh Lord,
have I only been able to be faithful
in little things?
I wept tears, I cried.
I said, oh God, forgive me for having
done so little for you.
Forgive me, God.
I've only done so little for you.
Such a small thing.
My heart
broke
and I said, oh Lord, have I only
been able to be faithful in little things?
It's all that I could do in 70
years.
And over 70 years, so little that I
have done for him and been faithful to
him.
Now you look at what you have done
And that cut very deep where I said,
oh Lord, that I've only been able to
do so little for you.
Help me, Lord, to be faithful, to be
faithful that I can do more for you.
Don't be distracted.
There's something God has entrusted to you.
He's given you something.
Even though you may think it's small, but
the big question is, have you been faithful
in it?
If you haven't been faithful, then you're on
your way to hell.
Are we faithful to God?
Let us be faithful in that which God
has entrusted to us.
If we're faithful in that, God will entrust
more to us.
Now Jesus is amazing.
He says, you've been a good and faithful
servant.
You've been faithful in that, those little things.
Now I will make you responsible for greater
things.
It even says, I will make you ruler
over many things.
That's going to happen one day when we
meet him face to face.
But you can have the foretaste here already.
Here, in this world, he can put you
over many things.
So many that you say, oh God, it's
only your grace.
Why?
Being faithful just a little.
Is there faithfulness in us?
Faithfulness with our tongue in what we say.
Faithful in just guarding our heart that we
don't sin.
All that we've got is what he has
given us.
Only your sin is yours.
That's what you've got out of yourself.
The others, it's all that he has given
us.
And even that servant who only got one.
It was the easiest, was the lightest, was
the easiest to handle.
You just need one more and then you've
got double already.
He, we could say, was the most blessed
of all.
The one who had five had such a
responsibility that he had to get another five
to get double.
And the one who had one, just one,
maybe it would have just been a kind
word.
Not gossip, not talking about others.
Those are satanic people.
But only that which is good.
Only small, a nice word.
Not a word that hurts and kills and
breaks down.
Look at your fruit and see whose child
you are.
Gods or the devils.
This servant's problem was that he was lazy.
So, if you want the Holy Spirit to
fill your life, be faithful in that which
God has entrusted to you.
God can't put you in charge and make
you responsible for greater things.
When you are failing to be faithful in
a small thing, check your faithfulness.
In your speech, what you say, are you
faithful?
In your prayer life, are you faithful?
In your singing, are you faithful?
In your worship and serving, are you faithful?
When it gets to helping other people, are
you faithful?
In furthering the gospel, are you faithful?
We can go on.
Are you faithful?
That's what the Lord expects from
you.
And the Lord said to this man, you
wicked servant, you knew that I was a
hard man and that I reaped where I
have not sown.
Why then didn't you go to the bankers,
invest the money there?
At least when I returned, you could have
brought back that talent with interest.
And you would have been thanked for that.
Now what does that mean?
Maybe you say, well, I can't preach.
I don't know how to speak before people.
I'm too shy.
I was just given something small.
I can't say it myself.
Or maybe you see something.
Or maybe you heard something.
Or maybe you read something.
And when you read it, it was a
blessing to you and you thought, well, this
could actually be a message.
Now what?
What you can do is, you can then,
with that which you have read, you can
go to the bankers.
You can go to those who do preach.
You can go to people.
If you see something that's been a blessing
to you and you cannot use it, bring
it to me.
Maybe I can use it.
People can be blessed by it.
And then you will get the credit for
it.
And then you won't be cursed one day
when the Lord says you've been unprofitable.
The one with the five talents immediately got
up and got to work.
He was diligent.
And the second one, too.
But the third one who got one.
I don't know.
But the third one who got the one,
he was wicked.
He was lazy.
His heart was also not right.
There was something wrong.
Like many people who are hypocritical.
They are there, but their heart is not
right.
Their heart's not in it.
They're just following their own aims and ambitions
and goals.
Their heart isn't in the work of the
Lord fully.
And there's something wrong inside.
You better make that thing right before your
Lord comes back and calls you to account
for what you've done.
And be faithful.
Live a holy life.
Live a
holy life.
And I thought, well, in the Congo, you
can't just send anybody there.
I said, Lord, who will we send here?
Because when you're there, there are prostitutes all
over.
Someone who hasn't died to the lusts of
the flesh will never survive there.
He'll fall in a short time.
Wherever you go, they wait at the gate.
They wait at the door for you.
And if you are not dead to sin,
you're hell bound.
If you're not dead to sin, pray and
ask the Lord to work in your life.
And if you're not dead to sin, pray
and ask the Lord to work in your
life.
And if you're not dead to sin, pray
and ask the Lord to work in your
life.
And he even repeated that.
He said, has everybody heard that?
These people do not allow sin.
And if that's what they like, we want
to open the doors for them.
And he said, is that really what you
believe?
I said, that's what we believe.
And if anyone doesn't live up to it,
send them away.
And he said, you can come, do what
you like.
Now, are you faithful?
Now, are
you faithful?
You can stop praying, asking the Lord to
fill you with His Spirit, if you are
not faithful.
If you don't live a holy life.
Because if you pray and ask to be
filled with the Holy Spirit and you don't
live a sanctified and holy life, then it's
like someone trying to pump a bicycle tire
or tube and it's got a hole in
it.
You pump it and the air leaks out
straight away.
When I asked them there, the people of
that organization, I said, are there no charismatics
within your ranks?
They said, no, they're not.
They say, we want people who go deep
in their faith.
We don't want something superficial.
We want people that are faithful and upright.
We don't want the Toronto people here that
just laugh.
We want sincere Christians and genuine ones who
practice what they preach.
It's not what I say, it's what people
outside say.
And when you go to be a missionary,
you've got to be like that.
And I say, even if you're not a
missionary, if you're a Christian, you've got to
live a spotless life and be a good
example and faithful in that.
Otherwise, you're furthering the cause of the devil.
That's
what
I say.
And if there's sin in your life, you
need to repent from it.
There are people that say, well, we just
never seem to get past that point.
But there are people who don't even get
to that point.
Let us bow our heads.
I pray, Lord, that your word will not
be in vain.
But may, Lord, everyone who calls himself a
Christian be a true Christian, a sincere Christian,
without spot or wrinkle.
That his eyes will be pure.
And that his mind, his thoughts, will be
sanctified.
And that the heart will be pure and
clean.
And that the lips will be sanctified and
faithful, with no deceit and no wrong words
coming out of them.
Lord, go through our midst with your double
-edged sword that cuts on both sides.
And if there's someone who hasn't broken totally
with sin, that he will break with it.
Who hasn't been sanctified, Lord, that he will
be sanctified, that he may be holy as
you are holy.
Amen.
God's word says, God was and is and
will be forevermore.
If you meet up with God, you will
meet up with the one who was there
when you did those old things.
When you meet with God, you meet with
your past.
And don't say, oh, the past is past.
It's not past.
If you didn't settle it with God.
He's the God of the present.
And He's also the God of the future.
Those future plans, those ideas you have for
the future.
You will meet up with Him who, in
that moment, will bring together everything that was
in the past, that is now, and what
you're planning for the future.
And suddenly you'll see it in His light.
So may everything that is of the past,
and even which is of the future, and
that which is of now, may it all
be sanctified.
Let us pray.
Lord Jesus, please reveal yourself to us
as the one who was there in the
past.
It doesn't help us if we just try
and cover it up and that we deny
it.
And you being the God of the future
as well, you who will be those thoughts,
those plans we have for the future.
And you are the God of the present,
that which is now.
Lord, may we know you as that God.
Amen.