Parable of the ten pounds

Fri­day. [II Tim. 1:1-2, 8-18; Luke 19:12-28] The par­a­ble of the ten pounds por­trays the en­tire his­to­ry of man­kind un­til the sec­ond com­ing of Christ. In it the Lord speaks of Him­self, of His suf­fer­ings, death, and res­ur­rec­tion to the Heav­en­ly Fa­ther, to reign over man­kind — all of which is His birth­right. Those who re­main on the earth are di­vid­ed in­to two parts: ser­vants, serv­ing the Lord through obe­di­ence to the faith, and those who do not want to have Him as king and serve Him, be­cause of their un­be­lief. To those who ap­proach the Lord through faith, with a read­i­ness to serve Him, are giv­en the gifts of the Ho­ly Spir­it in the ho­ly mys­ter­ies: this is a pound — and ev­ery per­son num­bered a­mongst the be­liev­ers re­ceives it for serv­ing. When ev­ery­one from the hu­man race ca­pa­ble of sub­mit­ting to the Lord sub­mits to Him, then He will come again, as One who has re­ceiv­ed the King­dom. His first job will be to judge a­mong the ser­vants: who ac­quired what with the grace giv­en. Then will fol­low judg­ment al­so over those who did not want to have Him as king; that is who ei­ther did not be­lieve, or who fell from faith. Im­print these truths in your mind and do not lose at­ten­tion to them, for then there will be a de­ci­sion — do not ex­pect any chang­es. Flee un­be­lief, nei­ther be­lieve idly, but bring forth the fruits of faith. Find­ing you faith­ful over a few things, the Lord will make you rul­er over man­y things (cf. Matt. 25:21).