Scripture
Readings for Ordinary Time, RCL Year C: Luke 16:1-13
Sermon
They say you shouldn’t try to explain a parable, and part of me wonders if this parable might be why they say that. It’s a gnarly one. The main character of the first portion is a man known to tradition as “the dishonest manager.” He works, in turn, for a “rich man” about whom we otherwise know nothing. Upon learning that The Rich Man is going to fire him, our manager does some dishonest stuff in order to secure for himself some kind of safety or landing place among those who owe The Rich Man a debt.
And then he’s lauded for this dishonesty by Jesus.
Hm.
“It is true,” Jesus says, “that the children of this world are more shrewd in dealing with the world around them than are the children of the light.” The passage concludes with the famous statement that no one can serve two masters: we cannot serve both God and wealth.
This story makes me think “hm that’s wild” every time I read it. But here are some things I notice this week: We’re told, at the beginning, that there is a manager whose wealthy boss comes to him apparently out of nowhere and accuses of him of mismanagement, and fires him.
A thing to remember about the world in which Jesus and the evangelists lived is that there wasn’t a robust middle class, owning modest homes and Honda Civics. There were the very rich, and the very poor. The poor were often subject to the depredations of greedy (rich) landlords who would take a big cut of their crops, and the Roman imperial tax system with its infamously corrupt tax collectors. The religious elite were politically in league with the Romans, for complicated reasons. Then, as now, a ruling class enslaved to wealth drove incredible injustice. This is a primary concern of Luke’s: “Blessed are the poor,” Jesus says in Luke’s beatitudes. Matthew softens it to “Poor in spirit,” but we’re not reading Matthew right now.
So this manager, upon being fired and not wanting to have his only two options to avoid total destitution being digging ditches for the Romans or begging on the street corner, engages in the very dishonesty of which he was accused: he functionally steals from the rich man by slashing others’ debts.
Was he actually a dishonest manager? We don’t see that, prior to his being fired. Within the unjust system in which he lived, he used that system (shrewdly!) to soften the blow to both himself, and others. It’s easy to judge this behavior when we’re not subject to those same injustices… say, as a white American in the 21st century. Jesus calls this out: The children of this world are clear-eyed about the world around them, he warns us. The children of the light tend not to be so clear-eyed.
Dr. King said, “no one is free until we are all free.” The steward used the system to help both himself out of a bad situation, and others who were in debt as well. And Dr. King’s words (and the rest of Luke!) remind us that the Rich Man isn’t free either. This is a system that enslaves everyone to wealth, forcing the sort of decision-making we see in this parable. Choices are curtailed in systems like this.
I invite you, in the coming week, to consider the systems of our world. Our gap between rich and poor continues to widen. Systemic racism is a real and present reality, in Minnesota and the Twin Cities. Money, and the desire to maintain power, can drive much of our political system. As you read the news, bring this parable as a lens. See what you notice. And with clear eyes hold in generous prayer the dishonest managers of our day, who may sometimes be among us.
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