Wealth
Luke 16: 1-13
Click here to view the full sermon video, titled "Wealth"
Mark Twain once said that a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes. Never has that pithy observation proved more true than with the rise and dominance of the internet as a source of information, or as is too often the case- misinformation. There’s a funny meme showing a picture of President Abraham Lincoln with a quote, “Don’t believe everything you read on the internet just because there’s a picture and a quote next to it.” And yet, of course, people do that all the time. Which means there are stories that we come to believe are true because lies and misinformation are so much easier to spread than the truth. I just never expected that kind of misinformation to come from my own bible.
Case in point, this morning’s parable and subsequent saying of Jesus shared with us by Luke. The heading for this reading calls it the parable of the dishonest manager. That is how I’ve always known it. Although, to be honest, I don’t think I’d ever heard of this parable before attending seminary. Let’s face it, this isn’t one of Jesus’ greatest hits. It doesn’t make it into the musical Godspell. Rembrandt was never inspired to depict its characters with oil paint on canvas. My guess is that the reason I didn’t know about it before seminary is that it doesn’t get preached in churches all that often. Even in bible study, people aren’t sure what to make of it. We figure if Luke is the only gospel writer to include it in his version of the good news, then maybe we can just skip it. Because it leaves us with far more questions than it does answers. I mean, given the kinds of financial scandals that we’re familiar with over the last couple of decades from Enron to Bernie Madoff to fraudulent border wall fundraisers, it’s hard to imagine a dishonest manager as the kind of anti-hero we want to root for anyway. Just what is it that Jesus is trying to say here? Just what is it that we are supposed to see in the light of this parable? By the time we hear Jesus tell us to, “make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth,” we are thoroughly confused. That can’t be right, can it?
But consider again the chain of events that Jesus describes, and the players involved. There is a rich man who has a manager. In our world the rich are often exalted. We are endlessly fascinated with the lives they lead from the old TV show Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous to MTV’s Cribs, to the more recent Real Housewives franchise. But whereas we tend to cater to and think more highly of people we consider to be rich, Luke and the Jesus he depicts have a decidedly different take on them. When Jesus’ mother Mary learns of God’s plan to bring a savior into the world through a poor and inconsequential Jewish girl, she sings a magnificent song about God’s great reversal in which the powerful are brought down from their thrones and the rich are sent away empty. Later, when the Rabbi Jesus teaches his disciples on the plain in a series of blessings and woes, he is unequivocal, “woe to you who are rich,” he warns, “for you have received your consolation.” Just a few weeks ago, we heard Jesus tell another story about a rich man who had to build a bigger barn to hold all his stuff only to be faced with the inevitable reality of death. A story that is introduced with the words, “there was a rich man,” should tip us off about what to expect from this person. This rich man has a manager, someone who works for him. But charges are brought that the manager is squandering the rich man’s property. Let’s pause for a second and consider a few things. First, this parable comes fresh on the heels of the parable of the lost sons, the youngest of whom is said to have squandered his father’s property. I don’t think the repetition of that word is a mistake. But notice also what Jesus doesn’t say. He doesn’t say if the charges are true. He doesn’t confirm with his own story that the manager has actually done anything of the sort. That may sound like a small detail but remember where this story is told; on the road to Jerusalem, where Jesus himself will face charges made against him. And it turns out that, like Jesus, it doesn’t matter if the charges are true or trumped up. Sure enough, all it takes is the allegation with no substantial proof for the rich man to turn on his manager and tell him that he’s out of a job. But it's what happens next that calls the characterization of this manager as ‘dishonest’ into question. Knowing that he’s getting fired and that he’s not cut out for hard labor or willing to beg, he looks for an exit strategy. If he were truly dishonest, he could have gone to collect the debts owed to his master, taken payment, lowered the bill due himself, and made off with the difference. He could have convinced himself that it was what he was owed for all those years of loyal service if he really were dishonest. That isn’t what he does. Instead of stealing from his master, thus confirming the accusations against him and justifying his dismissal, he does what he can to effectively forgive a portion of the debt that’s owed. He does this, according to Jesus, because he knows he’ll need the good will of his neighbors to survive unemployment. And here’s the kicker. Instead of getting mad at the manager, the rich man commends him for his savvy. He admires his chutzpah. Maybe we should be calling this the parable of the shrewd manager instead, because in the end Jesus too is lifting this man up as an example of how to be. Why?
It might have something to do with the forgiveness of debt, and how such forgiveness is not only life changing for the person who receives it, but also for the person who practices it. Surely having a debt reduced by anywhere from 20 to 50 percent lifts a significant burden from the person who would otherwise have to pay. When you’ve been unburdened in that way, it also makes you far more likely to pay it forward and help someone else down the line, maybe even the person who helped reduce that debt. Notice too that there is no discussion about whether these debtors deserve such a generous gift. Deserve has nothing to do with it. Jesus had just finished telling a series of parables about the finding of lost sheep, coins, and sons in response to the criticism that he himself appears to be squandering his time, attention, and welcome on disreputable people. Those stories were for his critics. But this story is for his disciples. In effect he is trying to show them the rejection that awaits anyone who squanders such valuable commodities and the value of forgiveness in creating and generating good will in the face of such rejection. Something Jesus will dramatically demonstrate on the cross.
Tucked into this story is a rather subversive suggestion for those who follow Jesus that dishonest wealth can and should be put to good use. Is he talking about some kind of Robin Hood scheme? Stealing from the rich to give to the poor? I don’t think so. When Jesus talks about dishonest wealth, a phrase he uses twice to make his point, he isn’t talking about ill-gotten gain. He’s making a point about wealth itself. Not that having it is inherently dishonest. One of the most commonly misquoted verses in the bible is the suggestion that money itself is the root of all evil. That isn’t was the apostle Paul wrote. He wrote that it is the LOVE of money that is the root of all kinds of evil. Likewise having wealth does not make one dishonest. No, the dishonesty of wealth comes from the story it would, and often does tell in the world around us. Wealth would have us believe that it is the most important thing in determining value. When a person of great wealth is discussed in the news, you often hear it said that they are worth whatever their financial holdings amount to. That is inherently dishonest. That isn’t how humans are valued. In fact the parable Jesus tells underlines this point. Instead of stealing wealth from the rich man, he engenders good will. He recognizes that the nature of his relationships with others are of far greater value than any amount of wealth he can shelter for himself off-shore in the Caymans or in a numbered account in Switzerland. The lies that wealth would tell about who is and isn’t worthy of time, attention and welcome are no less prevalent today than when Jesus told this story. If anything, they’re more widely accepted than they’ve ever been. But that doesn’t make them any more true.
To be faithful with dishonest wealth, to make friends for ourselves with dishonest wealth means robbing the concept of wealth of its power by giving it away, by freeing ourselves from its debt. One of the ways we rightly order our relationship with the wealth that we find ourselves with, whether such wealth is vast or meager, is through the practice of stewardship. More than anything this parable is about just that, it’s about recognizing the power of putting wealth to work in the right places; not at the center of our being, but as a tool for creating good will, faithfully using it for the good of others. We don’t just talk about stewardship in church because we rely on the gifts of this gathered community to pay the bills and staff salaries. We talk about stewardship as a tangible spiritual practice that reminds us that we don’t serve at the altar of wealth. Rather, wealth is given to us that we might use it to better serve those around us, knowing that the true riches of this world aren’t found in numbered accounts, or cash money, but in the love and forgiveness we have known and that we have been called to pay forward in obedience to the only God we serve.