THE apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith." The Lord replied, "If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you would say to (this) mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.

"Who among you would say to your servant who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep in the field, ‘Come here immediately and take your place at table?’ Would he not rather say to him, ‘Prepare something for me to eat. Put on your apron and wait on me while I eat and drink. You may eat and drink when I am finished’? Is he grateful to that servant because he did what was commanded? So should it be with you. When you have done all you have been commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we were obliged to do.’"

There is a fundamental difference between a salary and a gift. A salary is a payment made by an employer to an employee for work done by the latter. It is really a form of exchange: I give my time, energy, and talent for a certain sum of money, which I judge an adequate compensation. In this transaction, both my employer and I surrender something to the other, something deemed of equal value. And so, when the transaction is completed, we stand on a footing of equality. The exchange "work for salary" rests on a basis of commutative justice. Once I have performed the work which my employer hired me to perform, the salary agreed upon is something due to me in strict justice.

On the other hand, a gift is something voluntarily transferred to me by someone, without my having to return any compensation whatever for it. By its very nature, a gift is something not due, it is something graciously surrendered to me as a pure favor. Justice does not enter the picture here, only the generosity and goodwill on the part of the giver. The gift, if it is to be a real gift and not a disguised salary, must not depend on my merits or deserts or worthiness. This transaction is not a reciprocal transaction like the salary; it is entirely one-sided. There is no exchange involved here. Once the gift is bestowed, my benefactor and I are not on an equal footing; I am in his or her debt, not a monetary debt but a debt of gratitude. A salary is based on law, whereas a gift is based on love.

At the time of Jesus, the Pharisees had a great influence over the people, who admired their personal austerity and their strict observance of the Law. Unfortunately, "the Pharisees conceived God not as a Father, but as a Legislator and Judge; religion they regarded as a legal form of living before God. The letter of the Law is all that counted, and righteousness consisted mainly in the external and mechanical observance of it." (Catholic Biblical Encyclopedia-New Testament, p. 507)

In matters of retribution, the Pharisees had a thoroughly legalistic view of things. Eternal life was conceived as a salary for good deeds, as something due in strict justice. In other words, once a person had fulfilled the requirements of the Law during an entire lifetime, at the moment of death that person had a claim on God. God was in that person’s debt and had the strict obligation to grant eternal life as a matter of commutative justice. At bottom, eternal life was conceived as a salary.

Jesus rejected the Pharisees’ understanding of retribution. He taught that God is not a judge, but a Father. As He says very clearly in John’s gospel, "Nor does the Father judge anyone" (Jn 5:22). Moreover, the Father is gracious and showers His gifts on us, even though we do not deserve them. As Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount, "that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for He makes His sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust" (Mt 5:45). True, He does retribute good deeds with eternal life, but not as a salary due. With God, everything is pure gift because the good deeds we perform can be performed only thanks to His sustaining grace. And so, when God crowns the just person with eternal life, He is merely crowning His own gifts.

All this is reflected in the parable we just heard at the end of today’s gospel reading. This parable is not aimed at giving a picture of God, but at presenting the attitude we should have towards God. The service of God is really the work of a servant. God commands, we must obey this command. We are mere servants. If, afterwards, God wants to reward us out of sheer kindness, it depends entirely on him; we have no right to a reward, having merely done what we were bound to do.

SOURCE: "365 Days with the Lord," ST PAULS, 7708 St. Paul Rd., SAV, Makati City (Phils.); Tel.: 895-9701; Fax 895-7328; E-mail: publishing@stpauls.ph; Website: http://www.stpauls.ph.