16:1 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. 16:2 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.' 16:3 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. 16:4 I have decided what to do so that, when I am dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.' 16:5 So, summoning his master's debtors one by one, he asked the first, 'How much do you owe my master?' 16:6 He answered, 'A hundred jugs of olive oil.' He said to him, 'Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.' 16:7 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.' 16:8 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. 16:9 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. 16:10 "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. 16:11 If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? 16:12 And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? 16:13 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."
What a wild text! What in the world is Jesus' point? Does he seriously want us to start ripping people off?
What's interesting is Jesus' use of this worldly situation. Jesus' tells a story about a crooked conniver in order to open our imaginations to creative living as disciples.
Eugene Peterson's paraphrase (from The Massage) of verses 8 and 9 help me:
8 "Now here's a surprise: The master praised the crooked manager! And why? Because he knew how to look after himself. Streetwise people are smarter in this regard than law-abiding citizens. They are on constant alert, looking for angles, surviving by their wits. 9 I want you to be smart in the same way - but for what is right - using every adversity to stimulate you to creative survival, to concentrate your attention on the bare essentials, so you'll live, really live, and not complacently just get by on good behavior."
What does this "creative survival" and "bare essentials" look like? How is this fleshed out? Illustrations, people!
Furthermore, I think verses 10-13 are Luke's interpretation of Jesus parable in verses 1-9. So, I'm more interested in verses 1-9. Word.
6 comments:
One might suggest, not just 10-13, but perhaps verses 8b and following are interpretation of the parable, and the parable ends "and his master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly."
BTW: I like the suggestion by Dr. Pay No Toll, (I think that's who I quoted in a sermon 6 years ago) that one might render the conclusion to this parable to read. . . "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.
You should be so smart!"
I'm not sure what the heck he means by that, but it'll preach.
Sarah Dylan Breuer blogs on the Gospel text, and she has some good things to say.
Let me quote her at some length here...
"So here's the big question that I haven't seen commentators in print ask:
Q: What, precisely, is it that the steward does, albeit without authorization and with deception?
A: The steward forgives debts.
The steward forgives. He forgives things that he had no right to forgive. He forgives for all the wrong reasons, for personal gain and to compensate for past misconduct. But that's the decisive action that he undertakes to redeem himself from a position from which it seem he couldn't be reconciled, to the landowner any more than to the farmers.
So what's the moral of this story, one of the stories unique to Luke?
It's a moral of great emphasis for Luke: FORGIVE. Forgive it all. Forgive it now. Forgive it for any reason you want, or for no reason at all.
Remember, this (Luke) is the guy whose version of the "Lord's Prayer" includes the helpful category confusion, "forgive us our sins as we forgive (the monetary debts of -- it's clear in the Greek) our debtors" (Luke 11:4). I could point to at least a dozen moments off the cuff at which Luke raises this point: the arrival of the kingdom of God is no occasion for score-keeping of any kind, whether monetary or moral."
As I once heard Martin Mull say on Fernwood Tonight, "stick that in your pipe and see how it sucks!"
Back to Dr. Pay Not Toll's suggestion: at our text study yesterday the wise Dr. from Eidsvold made some similar comments on verse 8b. He thinks it is pure sarcasm, like See what good will come from making friends by means of dishonest wealth. Just try it and see how screwed you'll be.
I don't know if that is what PNT has in mind. Hard to tell what the guy thinks. Good thing he's not a Dean.
I think that PNT has a quite different take than Dr. Eidsvold.
That the shrewdness of this steward screws the landowner, and you SHOULD be so smart.
Ha!
That sort of read might quite enjoyable for a mining community - a lumber camp - but it can be a bit hard for shopowners to swallow.
I should be so smart! I actually think the paraphrase from the Message gets at the point I was going for. But it separates the parable from the lines of interpretation about it, in particular the business about money. The idea being its not about money as such, its about being so smart, recogizing a situation etc. etc. On the other hand, it is hard to resist a clear text that encourages mastery over ones money, instead of the other way around. My money works for me. I don't work for my money. (Actually I do work for my money, but not... oh well, you know what I mean, perhaps.) I'm glad the new Bishop will be at our church this Sunday. I will get to listen to a sermon for a change.
I concluded - by the time I preached on this text - that one interesting thing is that Jesus - if he is speaking a parable of forgiveness - Jesus uses a scandalous, almost dangerous example of forgiveness. The forgiveness, finally won for you is given through the scandal of the cross.
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