Luke 16:1-13 (NRSV)
Then Jesus said to the disciples, “There was a rich man who
had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering
his property. So he summoned him and said to him, ‘What is this that I hear
about you? Give me an accounting of your management, because you cannot be my
manager any longer.’ Then the manager said to himself, ‘What will I do, now
that my master is taking the position away from me? I am not strong enough to
dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I have decided what to do so that, when I am
dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.’ So, summoning
his master’s debtors one by one, he asked the first, ‘How much do you owe my
master?’ He answered, ‘A hundred jugs of olive oil.’ He said to him, ‘Take your
bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.’ Then he asked another, ‘And how
much do you owe?’ He replied, ‘A hundred containers of wheat.’ He said to him,
‘Take your bill and make it eighty.’ And his master commended the dishonest
manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of this age are more
shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. And
I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that
when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes.
This has to be one of the most challenging parables in all
the Gospels.
As it was read to you --- did you ask yourself --- what does
it mean?
It was late in August when I began working on the idea for
this sermon, and I have to admit that some of the news of the time influenced
my title for this sermon.
George Van Til, convicted of miss using county resources for
his own gain was once again in the news.
I have known George for a number of years. He used to regularly come to our fish fries ---
but our lives really intersected during the flood.
Also, around this same time, Jeff Langbehn was fired from
his job at the Solid Waste Management District over buying a purse for an
employee with our money.
As I read this parable --- over and over again --- I had to
think
Just what point is Jesus trying to
make?
·
That we should be dishonest if it gets us ahead?
Like
I said --- this is a tough parable to figure out.
Even
the scholars have a hard time finding consensus with it.
Most
of them seem to skip quickly over verses 1-9 and focus on a part of the passage
that I chose not to look at. Verses
10-13
“Whoever is faithful in a very little is
faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest
also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who
will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with
what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? No slave can serve
two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be
devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.”
But
even tagging those four verses to the end of our parable doesn't really help
--- in my mind
In
my studying on this parable let me share with you what I have figured out.
First,
we need to recognize right off the bat who Jesus is addressing this parable to.
He
has been engaging with "the Pharisees" but now our focus shifts in
this parable to the disciples.
It
starts quite simply:
"Jesus said to the disciples"
In
this story we have two major characters
1. A Rich
Man --- a person who was most likely an absentee land owner
2. A Manager
--- who was the person who managed the landowner's property
You
have to love the "honesty" of the manager. When he realizes he is about to be fired he
begins to run through his head all kinds of options.
‘What will I do, now that my master is
taking the position away from me? I am not strong enough to dig (in other words
to do manual labor), and I am ashamed (too proud) to beg.
In
the very first verse, Luke takes us back to the story of the prodigal son
because he levels the same charge against this manager as was leveled against
the younger son.
Both were charged with squandering property
Even that interior debate that was doing on
in his head harkens us back to the prodigal son story.
This
parable also seems to have had a second ending added to it --- one that tried
to explain the parable because even to the early Christian community --- this
parable was a paradox
The
amount of debt that the manager was seeking to collect was huge!
The
debt was from tenant farmers --- who "rented" the land from the
landowner and would pay the rent in either olive oil or wheat.
The first debtor owes a hundred jugs of
olive oil.
The Greek word, for jugs, that was used, and
from what we know from other sources suggests that this is about 9 gallons of
oil in each jug.
In
other words he owes 900 gallons of olive oil
The second debtor owes 100 containers of
wheat. Again the Greek word used
suggests anywhere between 7 - 12 bushels of wheat.
BOTH OF THESE ARE VERY LARGE AMOUNTS
The landowner in this story would be very
wealthy man
But
there seems to be some sense of arbitrariness in how much of the debt the
shrewd or dishonest manager was seeking to eliminate.
The wheat was reduced by 20 containers
The oil by half
By
reducing the amount that these tenant farmers owed to the landowner, while
these tenants still believed the manager was working for the landowner, the manager
was trying to ingratiate himself with these people
And
once the debt was reduced the landowner would not be able to go back and raise
it back up without losing face
Thus
the manager would have acquired a debt of honor from each of these families
that would ensure that they would show him goodwill in the future.
BUT
THE PROBLEM with this parable is WHAT EXACTLY WAS THE MANAGER DOING?
Was
the manager dishonestly falsifying the records in order to gain the favor of
the debtors --- or was he shrewdly sacrificing his own prospect of short-term
gains for long-term benefits?
There
seems to be three ways to look at this story
1) The manager was cheating the landowner by
simply reducing the size of the debts.
2) The manager was acting in a righteous
fashion by excluding or reducing the interest that had been figured into the
debt
3) The manager reduced his own commission
that he included in the debt that he was charging the tenant farmers.
I
don't think we can --- with any certainty --- say which one of these ways Jesus
intends for us to understand the story
The
first two scenarios have financial implications for the Landowner.
In
the third --- only the manager would be harmed financially --- there is no cost
to the landowner
Let's
look at what the Landowner had to say to the dishonest manager
"his master commended the dishonest
manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of this age are more
shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light"
The
third option doesn't make really make sense because he wasn't acting
dishonest. The actions the manager would
have taken would have been completely legal
The
second has problems as well --- but it is rather complicated.
Most
commentators find the amount of interest being charged to be highly
unlikely.
Especially
since charging interest of another Jew would have been considered a breach of
the Torah.
Deuteronomy 23:19-20 (NRSV)
You shall not charge interest on loans to
another Israelite, interest on money, interest on provisions, interest on
anything that is lent. On loans to a foreigner you may charge interest, but on
loans to another Israelite you may not charge interest, so that the Lord your
God may bless you in all your undertakings in the land that you are about to
enter and possess.
Many
of the commentators on this passage lean toward the third solution because it
seems to take the issue of dishonesty out of the equation and then we can focus
on how one uses the resources that are at one's disposal. And since the manager reduced his fee (even
if it was exorbitant in the first place) he was being shrewd to create a sense
of goodwill toward himself.
For
whatever reason --- most Christian commentators of this passage --- especially
if they come from a more conservative bend want to do everything possible to
take the story way from the idea that Jesus might be condoning --- or even
encouraging one to be dishonest.
But
the simplest solution, and the one that gives this parable a real punch is the
first alternative.
Quite
simply: The manager is dishonest, and he continues to squander the master's
resources by arbitrarily slashing the amounts owed by his tenant farmers
With
this understanding the force of the parable is found in the first half of the
8th verse.
"his master commended the dishonest
manager because he had acted shrewdly"
The
master praises the manager for his foresighted --- shrewd action
The
manager casts an aura of honesty and goodness on his master and shrewdly
provides for his own future.
The
tenants (the debtors) are now bound by honor to reciprocate the manager's
benevolence
But
it still leaves us in a quandary!
What does Jesus want us to get out of this
parable?
What is the point of the story?
This
parable seems to be challenging us to be as clever and prudent as the manager
in ensuring our future.
Jewish
tradition is filled with stories of tricksters.
Maybe the most famous is Jacob who deceived his father, cheated his
brother, and then made off with most of his father-in-law Laben's flock. Even Jacob's name in Hebrew means trickster.
There
is a great story told by the rabbi's
A man once caught stealing was ordered by
the king to be hanged. On the way to the
gallows he said to the governor, who was in charge of carrying out the
execution, that he knew a wonderful secret, and that it would be a pity to
allow the secret die with him. He also said that he would like to disclose the
secret to the king. The poor man told the governor, further, that the secret
would allow someone to bury the seed of a pomegranate in the ground and then
make it grow and bear fruit overnight. Well the governor thought this sounded
wonderful so the thief was brought before the king and all of the king’s high
officers of state. Standing before these powerful men, the poor man dug a hole
in the ground and said, “Here’s the secret: this seed must only be put in
the ground by a person who has never stolen or taken anything which did not
belong to him. I being a thief cannot do it.”
So the thief turned to the prime minister
who, frightened, said that in his younger days he had retained something that
did not belong to him. Next the thief turned to the treasurer who said that
while dealing with such large sums of money, he might have at one point or
another entered too much or too little. Finally the thief turned to the king, who
embarrassingly admitted to keeping a necklace of his father’s without his
permission. Then the thief said, “You are all mighty and powerful men who
lack no material comfort, and yet you cannot plant this seed, while I who have
stolen a little because I was starving am to be hanged.” The king,
pleased with the shrewdness of the thief, pardoned the man.
Like
in our parable this morning --- the man is accused of stealing and by shrewd
actions wins not only a pardon but also a commendation from the king.
Our
parable seems to invite us to understand that we too are in the midst of a
crisis that demands an urgent decision if disaster is to be avoided.
We
who have been called to stake everything on the coming of God's kingdom know
that we too must act decisively.
And
if we were to add those additional verses to the story as it seems the early
church did, it gives us another lesson.
“Whoever is faithful in a very little is
faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest
also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who
will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with
what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? No slave can serve
two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be
devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.”
It
seems to be telling us that we must be faithful with whatever we have in our
relationship to God.
The
early church developed a significant understanding about what a manager or the
more correct understanding of the word --- steward --- is to be doing. And this has significant influence still to
this day
Throughout
the new testament a steward is expected to be faithful with whatever they have
--- large or small.
Faithfulness
is the steward's highest duty.
Fred
Craddock vividly illustrates this when he wrote:
Life consists of a series of seemingly
small opportunities. Most of us will not this week christen a ship, write a
book, end a war, appoint a cabinet, dine with the queen, convert a nation, or
be burned at the stake. More likely the week will present no more than a chance
to give a cup of water, write a note, visit a nursing home, vote for a county
commissioner, teach a Sunday School class, share a meal, tell a child a story,
go to choir practice and feed the neighbor’s cat. "Whosoever is faithful in a very little
is faithful also in much."
Mother
Teresa is quoted as saying:
What I do you cannot do; but what you do, I
cannot do. The needs are great, and none
of us, including me, ever do great things. But we can all do small things, with
great love, and together we can do something wonderful.
Or
as it is often remembered:
We are called not to do great things,
but small things with great love.
Jesus
is calling us to be shrewd --- Like Jesus we are fighting against culture.
And
everything we do should be about how we share --- how we live out --- the
absolute, unconditional love of God that we found in Jesus.
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