38. The parable of the “talents” was given as part of what prophecy, and so how should the culmination of its fulfillment in our day be indicated?

³⁸ The parable of the “talents” was given by Jesus Christ as being a part of the many-featured “sign” for indicating the fact of his parousia or presence. So the bringing of the fulfillment of the parable to a head in our time ought to add to the testimony that he has returned in spirit and that his presence is upon us. Certainly if we say that the royal presence of the Lord Jesus Christ began at the close of the Gentile Times in 1914, then there ought to be facts available to verify that the fulfillment of the parable is undergoing its culmination in our day. What are the facts?

39. What did the slave with the one talent do, and when did settling of accounts with the slaves begin?

³⁹ First, we look to see how the parable turned out. So we take up reading further in Jesus’ parable, as follows: “But the one that received just one went off, and dug in the ground and hid the silver money of his master. After a long time the master of those slaves came and settled accounts with them.”​—Matthew 25:18, 19.

40. (a) In the parable, with what did the “master of those slaves” return? (b) The year 1914 C.E. had to do with what “kingdom power” in particular, and how so?

⁴⁰ When the “master of those slaves” came, he came back with what he had traveled abroad to gain. His own words later show that he had gained a “joy” to share with his faithful slaves; he came back with “many things” that he had not had when he committed the eight silver talents to them. An earlier parable given by Jesus, the parable of the “ten minas,” specifies that what he came back with was “kingly power.” (Luke 19:12-15) The Gentile Times, or “the appointed times of the nations,” have to do with “kingly power,” particularly the “kingly power” of the family of King David of Jerusalem, the kingly power of which Davidic family Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon overthrew in the year 607 B.C.E. That disastrous year was the date when the 2,520 years of the Gentile Times began their count down to the year 1914 C.E. So the end of those Gentile Times about October 4/5 of 1914 should logically witness a reversal of the situation of such long standing. It was therefore not without significance that October 4/5, 1914, found the Gentile nations in trouble, already for two months embroiled in the first world war of human history.

45. (a) According to the parable, what was due to be carried on by the “master of those slaves”? (b) As regards their possession of “talents,” what needed to be done in behalf of those Christian slaves?

⁴⁵ The parable of the “talents” pictured that when the traveler returned from abroad he would settle accounts with them. This meant an inspection of them. Quite logically, with that turn of events in the spring of 1919, it would be the due time for the heavenly “master of those slaves” to inspect them. But what account could they render with respect to his “talents” that had been committed to the slave class? Any increase that they may have gained prior to the climax of wartime persecution in 1918 seemed to have been wiped out. They were as if they had no figurative “talents” in their possession at all. If, now, they were to show any increase in their Master’s “talents,” they must produce this increase in the postwar period and render such increase of his belongings to him in the future. They must be given a new and further opportunity to ‘do business’ with his precious “talents.” This is just how it worked out historically, due to the merciful considerateness of their heavenly Master.