The King and His Retribution, Part 2 | When the King Returns

Luke 19:20-27

Well, you can turn in your Bibles to Luke 19 as we finish up the parable of the minas, Luke 19:11-27. “As they heard these things, he,” Jesus, “proceeded to tell a parable, because he was near to Jerusalem, and because they supposed that the Kingdom of God was to appear immediately. He said therefore, ‘A nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and then return. And calling ten of his servants, he gave them ten minas and said to them, ‘Engage in business until I come.’ But his citizens hated him and sent a delegation after him, saying, ‘We do not want this man to reign over us.’ 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.

“The first came before him saying, ‘Lord, your mina has made ten minas more.’ And he said to him, ‘Well done, good servant. Because you’ve been faithful in very little, you shall have authority over ten cities.’ The second came, saying, ‘Lord, your mina has made five minas.’ He said to him, ‘And you’re to be over five cities.”’

“Then another came, saying, ‘Lord, here is your mina, which I kept laid away in a handkerchief. For I was afraid of you because you are a severe man. You take what you did not deposit, reap what you did not sow.’ 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? Why then did you not put my money in the bank, and at my coming I might have collected it with interest.’

“He said to those who stood by, ‘Take the mina from him and give it to the one who has the ten minas.’ They said to him, ‘Lord, he has ten minas. ‘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. But as for these enemies of mine who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slaughter them before me.’” King has heard enough.

After a, a vile self-justification like we just heard, that’s all that remains, is a just condemnation. We read from Proverbs 20 earlier. Here it says in verse 26, Proverbs chapter 20, “A wise king winnows the wicked, and he drives the wheel over them.” That’s the threshing sledge, the threshing wheel over the top of them. Ground out all the chaff, and all that’s worthless, and all that is a nothingness, like flattery, and fakery, and attempt to counter-accuse.

Drive that all away. “Winnows the wicked. He drives the wheel over them.” Why? To get to the true nugget. What is the true nugget here? Rottenness, vileness, wickedness, evil. This is what the king does in verse 22. He cuts through the flattery; he sees through the fakery. He drives a threshing sledge over the top of this false accusation, and he winnows the servant’s words to expose this rotten kernel beneath, and reveal the bold-faced lie.

Verse 22, “He said to him, ‘I’ll condemn you with your own words, you wicked servant.’” You want my evidence? My evidence is your words. And now here’s my judgment on you: You are wicked. That’s what you are. The word wicked, poneros, is, refers to a moral evil, badness. Describes someone with a bad character, evil intent, wicked designs, wicked motives. He’s false to the core. He’s of his father, the devil. That’s what this is. The servant’s character is exactly the opposite of who this king is in his nobility. They are at polar opposites, polar extremes.

And so the king, notice he refuses to defend his character to the wicked servant. He refuses to explain himself, to make any response to any false charges. He seh, No, no, no. Wait a minute. I, I don’t. I don’t sow. Come on, yuh suh, you’re overstating it. I don’t reap where I didn’t sow. I don’t, I don’t take up where I didn’t deposit. Come on, you’re wrong about me. Let me win you over. Let me defend myself to you. Because you’ve clearly misunderstand all my intentions. Oh, you thought I was giving you a, a mean look? Oh, no, no. I was looking at something else. I didn’t mean to offend you. Oh, my tone was wrong. I’m so sorry. You see, there’s none of that here.

Proverbs 26:2, “Like a fluttering bird or a flying swallow, so a curse without cause does not come to rest.” King takes a very wise approach here to this false accusation, to this slander. He just simply ignores it. We’ve seen some, from some quarters of the Internet, different dark places where they’re all exposing all kinds of bad things in good leaders. We’ve seen some mud slung over at Grace Community Church and my former pastor, John MacArthur, to try to make him look evil and wicked, and as if he’s done all kinds of evil and covered it over, and hurt women, and done unjust things.

And you know what Grace Community Church has chosen to do against all these slanderous false accusations? Say nothing. They refused to go back to old counseling cases at these people’s demands and unpack what should be kept discreet and covered over in love. They have done the righteous thing and the wise thing by refusing to answer the charges of the likes of Julie Roys. It’s wicked, what people out there online are doing to faithful men.

That’s what this king does. He simply ignores the charge. Instead, the king acts kingly here. He acts nobly, he acts according to noble character, he does what justice requires, and he recompenses wickedness wherever he finds it. And notice he’s, especially when he finds it in his own household, that there’s evil in his own household among his closest servants. So let’s start there. Let’s start where it’s closest to me, and work its way out.

Good principle for you. When you see injustice in the world, maybe start with your own heart, start with the members of your own household, work your way out there, outward from there. Let your outrage be over your own sin first before you start charging others, rather than stoop to this man’s false accusations, and go back and forth with a man of evil character. The king is not gonna dignify the man’s slander by trying to answer it.

Instead he, he just backs his own charge against the servant. He goes immediately to the evidence. He says to him, “I’ll condemn you with,” evidence, “your own words, you wicked servant.” Let’s take your words here. You knew that I was a severe man, really? Taking what I did not deposit, reaping what I did not sow? Really? You know that? Don’t hear that as an admission on the king’s part. He’s in, not admitting that as fault, that as true. He’s not saying the guy’s charge has any merit at all. He’s just repeating the servant’s words back to him. He’s saying them out loud so that they reverberate and echo throughout the, the palace courtroom. This is, his words are Exhibit A in making his case. And you know what? He’s not gonna need an Exhibit B.

In fact, the translators of the Greek New Testament, they kind-of insert a question mark after verse 22. Reads something like this: You knew, did you, that I was a severe man? Hmm. You knew that? Question mark. Pluperfect here. So he’s taking note of the fact the wicked, servant’s judgment against his master is a resolved judgment. It’s a fixed opinion. A severe man, eh? After all that I’ve given you, that’s the conclusion, the settled conclusion you’ve come to about me. That’s what you’ve come to know about me. That’s how you’ve come to view my character? Huh. The servant’s words have become the rope for the hangman’s noose, and the king is gonna start drawing it tight around his neck. “Why then, did you not put my money in the bank?” Just open a savings account. Get one of those CD’s. “And at my coming I might have collected it with interest.”

I mean, if the servant is so afraid of such an austere man, such a severe master, why did he do nothing, even the minimal amount of effort? If you can’t produce, put the money in the bank. Let somebody else make money with my, m, my, mina. So his inattention, his lack of effort, his utter disregard for doing the master’s will, and failing to follow his clear instructions before he left, what he has failed to do really betrays the lie in charging the master with wrong.

The master hasn’t taken where he hasn’t deposited. He deposited the money with him. Proves the evil of this man’s character. It reveals an obvious fact, that he has no love at all for this king. Therefore, he has no place in the king’s household. He has no part in doing the king’s will. No stake in the king’s name. No matter what his words are, no matter how he thinks of himself, no matter what pretense he makes, no what, no matter what his arguments are, his excuses, his defenses in his behalf, this man is a false servant. He’s a total hypocrite. He’s a liar, and he’s a fraud.

The enemies of verse 14, at least they’re honest about their animosity toward the nobleman. They declare their hatred publicly. “We do not want this man to reign over us.” I’m not saying it’s good. I’m not saying it’s right. I’m just saying it’s honest. At least they haven’t covered over their hatred with hypocrisy. This man, by pretending loyalty, addressing him as Lord, his hatred is disguised as friendship. And get this, He is poised and ready to betray the Son of Man with a kiss.

It’s rather ironic here, isn’t it, that the wicked servant has done to the master exactly what he accused the master of doing. To me as I’ve been in leadership and seen all of these kinds of people throughout my ministry, they show up all the time. That is a clear and obvious sign of a guilty conscience, when the guilty accuses the innocent of his own crime or his own sin.

This wicked servant’s indolence resulted in the master’s loss. By receiving the mina and being charged to engage in business, this servant has a fiduciary responsibility toward his master. He is bound by law, by common propriety, by good faith, by noble character, just by common sense, he is bound to be loyal to his master, to be diligent, to work diligently, act in good faith, work in the best interest of his master. He’s supposed to act in the best prudence possible, apply the highest degree of care and caution and skill.

But by his own testimony, he intentionally put the mina away, wrapped it up in a handkerchief. He’s been careless. He’s been indifferent. He showed disregard for the master, disrespect, a total lack of love for the master. And folks, that is what false discipleship looks like. No love for the Lord Jesus Christ. Failing to work with the mina that he is given to you.

So, failing to execute on his fiduciary responsibility, instead of falling on his face, confessing his sin, he accuses the master of theft. That’s essentially, though, what he’s done. He robbed the master of any interest that the money might have earned, by tucking it away and just letting it sit there. He’s cost the master money.

Now he doesn’t see it that way, of course. We can safely assume that he wouldn’t care; that if he did see it that way, he didn’t care. He’s playing the victim here, and by playing the victim, he distorts the truth. He condemns the master and he justifies himself. He’s trying to turn his failure into a virtue, turn the master’s benevolence into an accusation of evil. He’s trying to flip the script and subvert reality, and get everybody else to believe a false narrative that he has invented and it is evil. His condemnation is entirely just.

It’s exactly what Judas Iscariot will do within the next week, exactly what he will do. Which, it’s hard for me to see that Jesus is not telling this in some way to provoke Judas Iscariot’s conscience here. But this is what explains the betrayal of Judas, the way he can justify in his own mind, in his own heart, handing over the sinless Son of God to the Sanhedrin for execution. I mean, how can the guy get it in his heart, in his head, to do such a thing?

It’s because Judas thought little of the mina that the Lord gave him. He thought very little of it. He had the honor of being numbered with the Twelve. Oh, but that didn’t mean royal purple robes, walking through the earth and having everybody fall down and praise your name and say, Oh Rabbi, Rabbi Judas. No, they walked dusty roads, and the Son of Man had no place to lay his head. And Judas, he didn’t like that kinda living. His skin was for a maybe a more delicate, uh, form of life, like a palace, cushions, soft clothing. He didn’t count the honor of preaching the Kingdom to be enough.

And this, I mean, if I could have any gift, any of the supernatural apostolic gifts that the Holy Spirit gave out during the transitionary time, you know what I’d love to have is the gift of healing. To just go to people in suffering and completely alleviate it with a touch; eradicate disease, and all that, sorrows, and parents grieving over children. I’d love to do that.

And you know what Judas had? That! To validate the message of the Kingdom, he had miracles of power. You think that’s a little thing? He did. He despised the gift that he’d been given. He despised the Lord who gave it to him. He counted the Lord’s mina to be a small thing, and refused to do his very best with what he had received in a heart of gratitude. Why? Because he counted the mina he received as a little thing, of little significance in the world, of little value.

Beloved, don’t let that be you. Judas was numbered among the Twelve, traveled for three years with them. He was so fastidious about the funds that all the disciples entrusted him with the money bag, not knowing that he kept dipping into it to take for himself. That only came, was revealed later.

Let this parable be a warning to you, my friend. If you name the name of Christ and yet look for some signs of falseness in you. Do you hold yourself aloof from people? Do you stay on the fringes of the church? When’s the last time you invited somebody into your home and treated them to hospitality, expecting nothing in return? Do you refuse to love people? Do you refuse to love worldly people, people who are out there who are lost, need salvation? Do you few, refuse to love Christ’s people?

Do you find reasons to accuse them, and charge them, and cri, gripe and complain about them? Are you easily offended? Do you have thin, paper-thin skin? Watch out, watch out. When’s the last time you shared the gospel? When’s the last time you took that mina out to let it fly? Put that quarter in and said I’m, I’m playing the whole gospel now. When’s the last time you used the mina of your gifts and talents, investing them in other people? Use the mina of your time. Steward your time well, for the sake of the Kingdom.

If you look at all those different examples I’ve given, and say, man, you know, I mean, you know, honestly, before the Lord. If he’s to be standing here, and I’m this guy standing before the Lord, the master. Hard for me to find an example. Be warned, my friend. Be warned. Now, for those of you with sensitive consciences, I know who you are, and I know that you’re probably not seeing all that you have done.

Reminds me of when the Lord comes to those that he just charged, you know, I was in prison. You didn’t visit me. I was sick. You didn’t come and visit me. ‘S hungry, you didn’t feed me. ‘S thirsty, you didn’t give me a drink.” And those who are false say, Lord, when did we see that? But you know, the people with sensitive consciences, they’re like, Lord, I, I don’t know what you’re talking about. He says, No, no, yeah, I was hungry and you gave me food. Thirsty, gave me drink. I was sick and you visited me. I was in prison. You came and visited me. You were there. Lord, when did we see you like that? I don’t know.

True believer, take courage. Be comforted in the fact that your God is omniscient, and he sees all things. He sees your good deeds. He designed them, Ephesians 2:10, planned your good works from before the foundation of the world, and he is guiding you through every wicket, every gate, leading you through every little good work he wants you to do and he’s taking note. It’s great! He gives you the power, he gives you the ability, he gives you the energy, he gives you the mina, he gives you the resource, he gives you the strength, he gives you the motivation. Everything comes from him. And then when you do it, he rewards you. He gives you the credit. So for you with sensitive consciences, know that the Lord marks your service.

There’s a particular warning, I think, here, for a church like ours, where we do strive to be faithful in our doctrine. But it’s really important to us that I, there’s good reason for that. I’m not gonna argue at all right now, but we want to be accurate. We want to be biblical in our theology. We count it to be lifesaving, really. Essential.

But the mina of the gospel that we’ve received, sometimes we can tend to think that we need to protect that mina, keep it really shiny and dust free and keep it indoors; you know, out of the elements, wrapped in a handkerchief, away from the dust that would tarnish its shine. We got to be careful. Striving for doctrinal soundness, we need to be careful that the gospel that we try to protect and guard and articulate very, very well; it’s not for admiring. I mean, we do admire it, but it’s, that’s not its purpose. It’s for saving souls.

It is like the, the life preserver that you throw into the water. You don’t say, no, keep it on the ship where it’s dry, and it sparkles, and it’s all shined up, and…” No, there’s somebody drowning in the water. We throw it in, we’re gonna get that thing wet. We don’t care if it gets seaweed on it. We don’t care if it hits ‘em in the face, and I get a little blood on the life preserver. Hey, what, what’s that? We’re going to keep it polished up. We want to save souls. We want to save lives. That’s what the mina is for.

And don’t worry about the mina. It gets a little scratch on it, tarnish, it’s okay. The gospel is a hearty, powerful thing. So take it out of its hiding place, wherever you’ve tucked it away, unwrap it from its handkerchief, or sweat-rag, or whatever it is you’re putting it in, and preach it. Go preach it. Proclaim it. Teach it. Explain it. Defend it. As Spurgeon says, “Let the lion out of the cage,” and see it do its work.

We preserve the gospel when we use it. We guard the gospel best when we open the vault and give it away. We defend it by proclaiming it. Church, let us never be so interested in doctrinal precision that we fail to see the point of the precision, which is to apply the doctrine with wisdom for the souls of men and women. Fastest route to dead orthodoxy is a failure to proclaim the gospel we claim to know, failing to preach the gospel that we say we believe. Let none of us be anything like this indolent, wicked servant. Let us instead follow the example of the faithful.