QUESTION: Will the Lord be able to say to any of His own: "Well done, good and faithful servant" (Matt. 25:23; see also vs. 21)?
ANSWER: The Lord say to His disciples amid all their failures: "Ye are they which have continued with Me in My temptations" (Luke 22:28), when they could not impute faithfulness to themselves. He, knowing their hearts' earnest desire to please Him, though hindered by weakness and all that belongs to the flesh, could say it of them. We are His servants and His friends also. It is our portion to serve in the devotedness of friends. And in glory "His servants shall serve Him" (Rev. 22:3). There will be no mixture of self in it then.
Notice how Matthew 25:23 reads: "His lord said unto him; Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord." It does not say that anyone was faithful in everything. What encouragement this is to seek to please Him in all that we can. "Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God" (1 Cor. 4:5).