JESUS now goes on with his exhortation to be watchful for his coming. We can't exclude that his words here are also addressed to the whole of mankind, but the fact is that the whole of mankind is indifferent to this warning, and so we find Jesus speaking to those who confess that they are servants of God. It is a fact that the judgement pronounced upon unfaithful servants will be visited on all ungodly people, but there is a special responsibility laid on those who confess to be religious and serving God.

Jesus first speaks of those who are faithful and wise servants. Jesus speaks of the responsibility laid upon all who profess and call themselves Christians, and specially those who claim to be teachers and ministers. The fact is that the servant of Christ is given responsibility. We are put in charge of the gospel. We are put in charge of the witness to Christ and the salvation he has provided by his death and resurrection. We fulfill this charge when we so live as to bring glory to Christ. We are charged with the responsibility to adorn the doctrine of Christ our Saviour. We claim to be saved from our sin – forgiven, justified in the sight of God, raised to new life, and sanctified by the Spirit. We are charged with the responsibility of living the truth of this in our lives. We are also charged with the responsibility of making Christ and his salvation known in the sphere of life Christ has placed us. At its most basic this means we should be so full of Christ that we are not ashamed to make our love for him known and speak of the blessing he has done for our soul. From this comes the charge to witness as God gives us opportunity. As far as those called to ministry is concerned, this charge to give people their spiritual food is most serious. The minister that fails to preach Christ as the bread of life and the living water, are pronounced by Christ here as wicked servants.

We are taught here also that there are rewards in heaven for faithful service (v.47). We shall find this same teaching in the parable of the Talents in the next chapter. This is a difficult aspect of Christ's teaching to fully understand, but we are meant to receive it and believe it. What we may be sure of is that there will be no discontent or jealousy or any of the other unpleasant expressions in this earthly life when people are discontented because others seem to be more favoured than themselves. Total harmony will be the atmosphere in heaven, and total contentment and humble submission in love to our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus also gives a strong warning to all who do not adorn the doctrine of Christ our Saviour. Jesus speaks of servants who grow careless and indifferent when Christ is so long in returning, and because of this return to the world, and its values and practices. We are meant to see the idea of beating his fellow-servants, and eating and drinking with drunkards, as an illustration of growing careless about spiritual things, and returning to the ways of the world.

The idea here is very wide. Eating and drinking with drunkards includes all embracing worldly values and practices. If a person claiming to be a Christian embraces the wisdom of the world, and in this wisdom changes the values and ways of living which God has commanded in the Bible, this is eating and drinking with the drunkard. The world is drunk with pride in its wisdom; drunk with confidence that there values and ways are quite acceptable. In this intoxication, the world challenges and derides the teaching of God's Word, and rejects the revelation which God has given there. We see this profoundly in the proud way the world challenges the testimony of the Bible that God is the creator and sustainer of the universe. The world in its wisdom, says the apostle Paul, knew not God. The world basically is content to maintain that the universe created itself. This is just one of the ways the world is intoxicated with its own opinions and values, which we see expressed in the departing from the moral values of the Bible, and dependence on God as the ruler over all. The folly of this is seen in the chaos which we find the world's wisdom has brought on us.

What Jesus is condemning is the way the servants of God, the body of the visible church, is ready to take on board the wisdom of the world, and become, with the world, intoxicated with worldly wisdom and behaviour which challenges and rejects the wisdom and way God given in his Word. Such servants are not watchful. They even, in some cases, deny the return of Christ or his king-ship over his body, the church.

The arrogance and pride of such 'servants' will be brought down with terrible judgement at the time of Christ's return. Christ speaks of these servants being cut in pieces and assigned a place with the hypocrites. In other words these so called servants will find themselves lumped together with the ungodly world, and condemned with them to the eternal torment, spoken of here as weeping and gnashing of teeth.

The total lack of watchfulness of these 'wicked' servants is seen in the fact that the idea of eternal punishment, and the reality of God condemning people to such an end, is claimed to be ridiculous, and a false view of God. Yet these words are spoken by Christ himself. To say that a God of wrath against sin is a false idea found only in the Old Testament through ignorance, and the New Testament teaches us better that God is all love and that wrath is a denial of his character, is seen here to be untenable. Jesus is speaking of the wrath of God against unfaithful servants, and by implication on all the godless.