For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. Matthew 25:29
If we try to understand this scripture from a worldly perspective it seems very harsh. It seems to support the idea that you need to have money to make money. If we want to understand the spiritual nature of this wisdom we need to take a spiritual perspective. That perspective is gained by focusing inward…by taking this message into our heart and asking the question…so, what about this makes sense to me today, in my life…what can I use from this scripture that would help me to grow spiritually?
The key to using this message in the most useful way is to decide what ‘have’ is referring to…for those who have what? Again, in the physical world our assumption might be that to those who have money, power, a big house, a new car, a great relationship, an awesome job, a loving family or lots of friends…a lot more will be given. But for those of us without any of these things or very little…well more of not having will come our way. Sheesh!
To make the jump to a spiritual perspective we might decide that the ‘what’ the scripture is referring to is our spiritual understanding…to those who have more understanding, more will be given and to those with none, they will have even less. Ah, an opening…let that sit on your heart. To me, spiritual understanding includes my beliefs about how life works, my openness to the evolution of my consciousness, my dedication to prayer and meditation and what I believe about God. My understanding expresses in the world as kindness, compassion, clarity, peace, joy…or something less according to my understanding.
In the scripture passages before this verse, three slaves were given ‘talents’ by their master who then went away. When he returned, the two slaves who went out and ‘invested’ their talents provided a profit to their master but the one who buried his ‘talent’ was sent ‘out into the darkness’. So…if I am willing to spend some time developing my spiritual understanding and being open to new possibilities then more understanding will come my way! If I am unwilling to be open to a new understanding and continue to live my life from a point of fear…well, I will understand less and less and my life will be less than joyful and peaceful.
This is just one way to make sense of this passage and to apply it in my life today. Feel free to share your idea by replying below.
Peace and joy always
Paula
