It is easy to believe that God owes us something because we have suffered or have performed some work for him. In v 6, Jesus expresses the need for faith, but does not seem to answer the apostles question of v 5. Yet he answers it in a subtle way in vv 7-10.
Faith is based only on a sense of giftedness.
It is an awareness that no matter what we do, we can never match or return what the Lord has already done for us. The work of ministry, being the Lord s servants, is not something we do in order to get something from God or even to please him or to try to win his favor. Rather, it is a response always inadequate to what God has undertaken on his own initiative. Ministry to which all Christians are called is never our own work, it is cooperating in God s work. True humility is a sense that, no matter how dedicated we may be, we are only sharing what God has abundantly blessed us with, and that even our best is not really and finally our own.