Invest

Luke 19 Palm Sunday celebrates Jesus entering the city of Jerusalem with people waving palms and declaring him 'the king who comes in the name of the Lord.' But just before he enters the city, there is a parable he tells that teaches a very difficuult lesson. Its known as 'the parable of the ten pounds.' It begins with the expectation that the Day of the Lord would soon come. The people who are evil would be judged and those who are good would receive blessings from God. Then we hear the parable of pounds. A single pound were equal to about one and a quarter pounds of gold or silver, so it was of significant value, more than most people in a town would have. The ruler gives this much money to ten slaves expecting that it will be invested and earn a return. This was a reasonable expectation, since it was so valuable, and so few people had access to capital for investing.

When the ruler leaves to be given his 'royal power' (meaning the emperor of Rome would affirm his rule over that territory on behalf the emperor), the people decide to try and get rid of the ruler. They raise a big stink trying to convince the emperor that this ruler is not a very good one, and he should choose someone else to rule. This really happened with both King Herod and his son, Archelaus, being opposed by the Jewish people. Neither time did it convince the emperor, and certainly people were killed for their opposition to these rulers. In the end, the ruler is still appointed, and those who invested their money wisely are commended, while those who wasted it were punished. Jesus's story reminds us that, even if the end were very near for us, we need to use the time we have to invest in what matters. Fighting against bad rulers is not likely to go our way (although there are other parts of scripture that do encourage us to resist these evil rulers). The best use of our time is to invest wisely. In the story they invest to make more money, but in God's economy, our best investment is into the hearts and lives of the people who are willing to listen to the good news of God's love for the world.