12:41
There are times when Jesus spoke specifically to His disciples, at other times He was speaking to all the crowd. Here Peter was evidently unsure of who Jesus was addressing these words to, or at least who they applied to.
12:42-44
Jesus doesn’t answer the question, at least not directly. Instead He says “who then is the faith and wise manager ...”. Perhaps He is actually answering Peter’s question, or at least telling Peter what he should really be concerned about. Often we want to know the answer to a question, but there is actually something else that we should be concerned about. For instance, people often ask “what about those who haven’t heard the gospel?” when what is crucial is what is our own response to the gospel. Here Jesus is emphasising that Peter’s prime concern should be to ensure that he is fulfilling his duties properly. If he does this, then there will be much greater responsibilities when Jesus returns.
12:45,46
Conversely, suppose the servant slackens off, becoming complacent. Even worse, he starts abusing the other servants, and then getting drunk. Notice that Jesus uses “other servants”, earlier He used the term “wise manager”. We may have an “important” position in a church, pastor, elder or whatever, but we are all servants. If we forget this we will start going off the rails. This complacency can crop up in our wondering about “once saved always saved” or the sovereignty of God. Is our salvation absolutely secure, most definitely yes. Is our salvation entirely dependent upon the sovereignty of God? Yes. Does Jesus blood cover all sins? Again yes. But if we use any of these truths as an excuse for complacency or, worse, for outright disobedience, then we demonstrate that we really know nothing at all.
Such a man will suffer the most severe consequences on the day of judgement. Notice how Jesus does not mince His words. We most certainly cannot mess about with our lives.
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