“A man going on a journey called in his servants and entrusted his possessions to them…” (Mt 25,14) The beginning of this parable of the talents that Jesus tells his disciples signals a change in relationship that is offered to the servants of the Master. This opening statement brings to mind the statement of Jesus to his disciples: “You are my friends if you do what I command you. I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father.” (Jn 15,14f) As the life of discipleship progresses, the disciple grows into a true friendship with the Lord. The love that the disciple has for the Lord changes from a relationship of servant, motivated by servile fear into one of friendship, transforming love into the love of friendship, and eventually will lead to “filiation” or to becoming a child of the Father, and to the love and trust that a child has for a loving Father. This mystery of “divine filiation” reminds us that God shows his great love for us in calling us to be “children of God.” “See what love the Father has bestowed on us that we may be called the children of God. Yet so we are.” (1Jn 3,1) “Now they know that everything you gave me is from you, because the words you gave to me I have given to them and they accepted them and truly understood that I came from you, and they have believed that you sent me. I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for the ones you have given me, because they are yours, and everything of mine is yours and everything of yours is mine, and I have been glorified in them.” (Jn 17,7-10) The Master in the parable entrusts his possessions to his servants and is giving them the status of children and heirs to his divine life. As St. Paul reminds us in his letter to the Thessalonians: “For all of you are children of the light and children of the day. We are not of the night or of darkness.” (1Thes 5,5)

God shows his love for us by entrusting to us a share in his divine life and his work of love and redemption. As children we need to understand the great gift, privilege and opportunity the Lord is bestowing upon us in calling us to share in his divine life of love. We have to trust in the love that God the Father has for us. We can not truly love him if we do not trust in the love that he has for us. God gives to each one of us gifts in the measure that he knows us and that we are ordained to use. What he gives is a sign of his personal love for each of us. He doesn’t give us too much or too little.

The first two worthy servants set off “immediately” to cooperate with the work of God’s grace and their lives immediately begin to bear fruit. They believe in the power of God’s love and grace and they are eager to see how it will bear fruit in their lives. The third unworthy servant digs a hole and buries his gifts. The third servant fails to trust in the love of the Master. He operates out of fear rather than love. He has a great fear of failure and he sees the Master as harsh, distant and demanding and this as just another opportunity for failure in his life. He fails to do even the minimum in his service to the Master.

The reward of sharing in the divine life of the Father and bearing the fruit of love and grace is a share in the Father’s joy. “Come, share your master’s joy.” Joy is not a passing emotional state with God but it is his very being. To share in his joy is to share in his divine being. To enter into his joy is to enter into a new state of life as a child of God. Jesus tells his disciples at the Last Supper: “I have told you this so that my joy might be in you and your joy might be complete.” (Jn 15,11) The Christian life of discipleship is meant to be complete joy. St. Paul encourages us in his letter to the Philippians: “Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice! Your kindness should be known to all. The Lord is near. Have no anxiety at all…” (Phil 4,4ff) The fruit of our trust in God’s love is a joy in life and a love that removes all fear.

Are we slaves or children of a loving Father? Do we operate out of fear or out of love? Do we make the most of the opportunities the Lord gives us in grace to participate in his divine life of love or do we throw his grace back at him, unfruitful and untried, muttering, “Take back what is yours.”? Do we live in joy or in the anger of mistrust and resentment? The great fail in life is not to have tried and failed but to have never tried at all. Our failure to trust and to believe in the love of God, to know his kindness and generosity and to share in his divine life of joy is to live forever in the darkness of our own fear. God has given us grace, may we give back to him a fruitful life of love and joy!