Dear friends,

Hearing and reading news reports about mismanagement, graft and corruption gave me a thought — it is high time for us to think about putting subjects like “Christian Stewardship,” and “Biblical Principles on Management” in the curriculum of our schools, especially Christian schools.

The Parable of the Talents in Matthew 25:15 to 28 teaches a lot of things about Christian Stewardship. Let me mention a few.

First, Christian stewardship means that we acknowledge God as the owner of everything.

When the master entrusted the talents to his servants, the servants became trustees or stewards. This means that we are not the owners but God.

Second, Christian stewardship means that each one of us is given by God at least one talent to invest and to cultivate.

According to a Bible dictionary, a talent is equivalent to 20 years of wages during the time of Jesus. This means that the one that received 5 talents had 100 years worth of wages, and the one with 2 talents had 40 years worth of wages, and the one that got 1 talent had 20 years worth of wages. This means that the story of Jesus talks about a very big sum of money entrusted to the 3 servants.

Every one has a talent — not just the financial resources, but also abilities and skills. Nobody can claim that he or she has no talent. We need to discover those talents and use it. We should not bury our talents because God will eventually ask us to make an accounting of what we have done with the talents that He gave us. Doing nothing is inexcusable. But it is not just using it in any way that we want. We need to use it according to God’s will — for the purpose of spreading the Gospel.

We need to remember that God rewards the faithful stewards or trustees. Using the principles in parable, God will reward us by giving a commendation — “well done good and faithful servant.” God will also award us with a promotion — “greater responsibilities.” And finally, God will reward us with joy — “Come and share your master’s happiness.”

To sum, Christian stewardship is the faithful management of resources entrusted by God to us with the accountability that as stewards or trustees to put the resources to work in order to gain more, and share more, hereby giving joy to God and receiving commendation from Him.

May God bless us all!

Sincerely,

Rev. Francis Neil G. Jalando-on
Director
Office of Communications
Central Philippine University