when you have done all those things which you are commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants. We have done what was our duty to do.’  (Luke 17:10)

Jesus, through the unusual device of a parable based on rhetorical questions, seems to be challenging the stubborn thinking of his close disciples, and it is easy to see how the same attitude prevails in all who would follow Christ.

For it is easy to fall into the mistaken notion that in keeping the commandments, say the Great Commission, evangelising the Gospel and discipling those evangelised, a person adds to God’s purpose.  Put another way, the faithful disciples thinks that they are necessary for God to achieve his goals and without them God is at a loss.