WE ARE ONLY STEWARDS. GOD IS THE OWNER | There is one dangerous word that can slowly enter the human heart: “Mine.”
My money. My property. My position. My power. My success.
When “mine” becomes too strong, we begin to forget one important truth: everything we have is ultimately a gift from God.
This is what happened in today’s Gospel. A landowner planted a vineyard. He put a fence around it, dug a winepress, built a tower, and entrusted it to tenants.
Notice: the tenants did not create the vineyard. They only received it. But eventually, they began to behave as if the vineyard belonged to them. When the owner sent his servants to collect the produce, they rejected and killed them. Finally, when the owner sent his son, they said: “This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.”
This is what greed does: it makes the steward forget the Owner. And this remains very relevant today.
God has blessed our world with so much. Yet why are so many still hungry? Why do some families have almost nothing, while others accumulate far more than they could ever need? One reason is greed.
Greed says: “I want more, even if others have less.” It happens when public resources are treated as personal property. It happens when profit becomes more important than people. It happens when we accumulate what we do not need while our neighbor lacks what is necessary to live.
But Jesus reminds us today: We are not owners. We are stewards.
Our money is entrusted to us.
Our talents are entrusted to us.
Our positions are entrusted to us.
Our time is entrusted to us.
Even the earth itself is entrusted to us.
And one day, the Owner will ask us: “What did you do with what I entrusted to you?”
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There is a simple story about a wealthy man who died. After his funeral, someone asked, “How much did he leave behind?”
Someone quietly answered: “Everything.”
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My dear brothers and sisters, one day that will also be true of us.
There will come a day when these hands of ours will finally open, and everything we have been holding will have to be left behind.
We will take nothing of what we received. Not our money. Not our houses. Not our land. Not our titles. Not our possessions.
But what we have given away in love—that is different.
The food we shared with the hungry. The help we gave to someone struggling. The education we provided for a poor child. The time we gave to someone lonely. The forgiveness we offered. The love we poured into another person’s life.
In the end, what matters before God is not how much we managed to keep, but how much we learned to give away in love.
So while the vineyard is still entrusted to us, let us produce good fruit. Let us hold our blessings with open hands. Because everything comes from God, everything belongs to God, and one day everything must return to God. We are only stewards. God is the Owner.