Have you ever stressed over being a “good and faithful” servant? We have all read or listened to a sermon about the parable of the three servants to whom the Master entrusted five, two, and one talent before leaving on a journey (Matthew 25:14-28, KJV). When the Master finally returned, Matthew 25:21 tells us that he gathered his servants together and told the five-talent servant (who had doubled the Master’s talents to ten), “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” Similarly, he told the same thing to the two-talent servant, who had also doubled the talents given him by the Master. But for the third servant, who only buried the one talent entrusted to him because he was afraid, the Master called him a “wicked and lazy slave” and ordered him thrown into outer darkness, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.
I don’t know about you, but I stressed for decades over this parable. I feared deeply that God would someday say to me what the Master in the parable said to the one-talent servant. But I don’t fear this any longer. By God’s grace, I am now experiencing more and more of the Exchanged Life in me, and I realize that God has made an irrefutable way which guarantees that I will hear “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” How is this possible? Because 2 Corinthians 5:21 says that God sees the Exchanged Life of Christ in you and me as that good and faithful servant. It’s not me, but Christ, whom God sees. My heart cries out in praise and worship to Him each time I read this verse. What peace and freedom this has brought into my life.
From the book, "A Different Place," The peace and freedom that comes from knowing: God has done it all—He is all we need, pages 143-144.