How are you increasing your capacity with what you have?

Do you ever get that feeling that there isn’t enough? Not enough hours in the day, not enough resources for our big goals. Maybe we are not good enough to do the work entrusted to us? I have had those days. Psychologists call this the imposter syndrome.

In the parable of the talents, three servants were each granted tablets according to their Matthew 25:14–30. Some scholars use old testament measurements to explain the talents. This would make a talent in biblical time a unit of measurement for gold and silver, and each talent weighed about 75 pounds or around 34.019kilograms.

The first servant got 5 talents, the King then entrusted the second with 3 talents and the last servant received one talent. Now one talent converted from the old testament to modern day was worth $2,129,550 (over two million). In South Africa, where I live, that would be R 4,170,992 (over four million)

But in the New testament when this parable was told, at a time estimated to be about 85 CE, a talent meant something different. The word “talent” comes from the Greek word tálanton. A talent would equal to 6,000 drachmas or denarii, the Greek and Roman silver coins. To put this into the right context, one denarius was worth a single day’s work. To earn one talent, a man would need to work for 6,000 days. If you lived in these times, you would need to work a staggering sixteen years just to gain one talent.

This means that the servant who the King called wicked and lazy was sitting with money equivalent to sixteen years of labour. We should remember that the King initially saw potential in that servant. Had he not, he would not have entrusted him with so much. Isn’t that like us sometimes? Others see so much potential in us, but we don’t use it.

Psychologists now have figured out that procrastination can be linked to a fear of failure. This seems to align with what the last servant said upon the King’s return. His reason for not making use of the talents was that he knew the king was a hard man and so he was afraid and he buried the talent. I found this staggering.

Despite having sixteen years of wages at his disposal, he still did nothing. It means that even people who have a vast amount of potential also have fear.

I know that there are areas in my life where I am sitting on an idea or an introduction where I don’t take action and then I lose out.

The two servants who did something with what they had got entrusted with something more. While there are times where we have to say “no” to some things, there are other times where we have to say YES.

• Yes, I can try.
• Yes, I will take a risk.
• Yes, I will take action.

It leads to the question, what talents are we not utilising?

Each of us has a measure of gifts, talents, and time. Let’s make the most of them and expand our influence and worth.