Have I Done My Best?

TEXT: Matthew 25:14-30

TITLE: HAVE I DONE MY VERY BEST?

After reading verse 18 make the following comment: The tragedy of the man with the one talent is not that he had only one talent but he didn’t use the one talent he had.

How many of you know what it is like to feel inadequate. I do. I know what it is to feel like I could never do enough.

But, the question before us tonight is: Have I, have you, done the very best you know how to do?

When you stand before God He isn’t going to ask you how you did compared to the person in the pew next to you. He isn’t going to ask you how you did in comparison to the people in the church down the street or in the next town. However, He is going to say: DID YOU DO THE VERY BEST YOU COULD WITH WHAT I GAVE YOU TO DO IT WITH WHERE YOU WERE?

If you can not say you did your very best; if He cannot say to you “Well done my good and faithful servant” it doesn’t really matter what people thought about what you did.

His message to us tonight is one of challenge and comfort.

His challenge is for you and me to make sure we have done our very best and it will be good enough for Him.

There are 2 things I want to bring to your attention:

1. Your best is good enough no matter how poor it is.

2. Less than your best is not good enough no matter how good it is

FIRST, YOUR BEST IS GOOD ENOUGH NO MATTER HOW POOR IT IS.

Jesus is telling us that God has given to every person certain talents – at least one, some more according to his or her ability, not according to equality but to his or her ability.

Some believe that all men are created equal, but that’s not true, that’s what the American bill of Rights says. The Bible says the opposite. There are no two human beings that have ever been created equal in the human race.

Take for example your fingerprints. Yours is different from anyone’s. No two fingerprints are exactly the same. God has never made two people exactly alike, God loves variety.

To prove His point He gives us this illustration of these three men. He gave one man 5 talents, one man 2 and one man 1. No equality there. When the returns came in the same – one brought back 5 more and one brought back 2 – no equality.

Notice: the percentages were the same; the amount was not the same. However, when it came time for rewards the identical thing is said to the man with 5 talents as with the 2 talents.

“Well done good and faithful servant, you have been faithful over a few things and now I am going to make you ruler over many.”

The Lord didn’t get one ounce more pleasure out of the 5-talent man than He did over the 2-talent man.

The lesson is this, while we are not created equal we are created uniquely for a specific purpose of God’s divine choosing.

What He has chosen you to do I can’t do and what He has chosen me to do you can’t do. While there may be no equality in our creation or what God has called us to do, when it comes time for rewards God will reward us equally if we have sincerely done the very best we could with what God gave us to do.

So, God is trying to tell us, do the very best that you can and your best will be good enough to please me no matter how poor it may look to you or how poor it may look to other people. The question is: HAVE I DONE MY VERY BEST?

One day God spoke to Moses on the backside of the dessert and told him to go lead His people out of Egypt. Moses felt his total inadequacy. We all know how he felt. He felt he couldn’t do it; he felt he didn’t have the ability to do what God wanted him to do. You’ve felt that way haven’t you? Moses said, “I can’t talk good.” He said, “my brother Aaron, he’s a good speaker but I don’t think I’m the man for this job.” Let me pause here – What is your excuse for not doing what God wants you to do?

The Lord said to Moses: “I know you can’t talk good but who made man’s mouth, have not I the Lord? But this is something I want you to do – I know your heart. You go down there and you do your best and it will be good enough.”