Then he that had received the five talents went and traded with the same, and made them other five talents (Matthew 25:16, KJV)
Jesus told a parable in Matt. 25:16 of a rich man who gave his resources to three of his servants and went somewhere. They used talents in Bible days. Let me use dollars to make the point in this devotional. He gave the first servant 5 dollars, the second 2 and the third one dollar. The difference was due to their different abilities to handle money he already knew about them.
The first servant traded with his 5 dollars and made 5 more. Likewise, the second who had received 2 dollars did the same while the third servant who received one dollar did nothing with it, and it did not increase. Upon returning from his trip, the master was quite pleased with the servants who “traded” and multiplied what was given to them. The “multiplier effect” is that ability in us to make things we have to increase. The servants traded and multiplied the money. That means they engaged in activities that multiplied or grew the money they had, except one servant.
This ability to multiply is crucial to a life of abundance. It is the difference between the rich and the poor. There are people that if you give them one million dollars today, the money will rather shrink and they might end up broke 2-5 years from one. However, there are others that will have one thousand dollars today and know how to engage in activities that will multiply the money and make them a millionaire in the same 2-5 years.
This principle is true both of spiritual or physical riches. God has committed spiritual and natural resources to us. He expects you to “trade” or do something with what you have to increase what you have.
MEDITATE
What are some activities scriptures have shown us can MULTIPLY or increase our resources? ( Prov. 11:24, 10:4, 13:11, 28:11, etc)
APPLY THE WORD
What kind of person are you: the one who only consumes or the one that is able to multiply and make resources to increase? If you give a consumer 1 million dollars today, it will be almost gone in 5-10 years because consumers ONLY use resources to meet their needs. However, in the hands of the diligent, the 1 million dollars today will be more than 10 million dollars or so in 5-10 years. Train your hands to multiply.
PRAY
Ask the Lord to help you learn how to multiply and increase the resources in your hands.