Ninth
Sunday after Trinity
August
5, 2012
Shrewd
Means Getting Your Priorities Straight
Luke
16:8
The
master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly.
For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their
own kind than are the people of the light.
Dear
baptized souls,
To
understand this parable, you need to know about farming in the Middle
East.
To
understand the point of this parable, you need to see how it connects
to the verses before and after.
First,
the parable.
1
Jesus told his disciples: “There was a rich man whose manager was
accused of wasting his possessions. 2 So he called him in and asked
him, ‘What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your
management, because you cannot be manager any longer.’
The
master was a wealthy landholder. He had hired a man to manage his
holdings. But word got back to the master that this manager was doing
a bad job.
So
the master calls in the manager and asks him, “What is this I hear
about you?” An expert on Middle Eastern culture, Dr. Ken Bailey,
calls this a classic Middle Eastern tactic. You ask a open-ended
question, hoping that the manager—whom he knows is
guilty—starts talking and accidentally confesses. This
hanging-yourself-on-your-own-rope tactic often works.
But
not this time. The manager keeps his cool. He doesn't say anything.
He does what the master tells him and is walking down the hallway to
his office to get his ledger, the account book. While he's walking,
he's trying to figure out what to do.
3
“The manager said to himself, ‘What shall I do now? My master is
taking away my job. I’m not strong enough to dig, and I’m ashamed
to beg— 4 I know what I’ll do so that, when I lose my job here,
people will welcome me into their houses.’
This
manager had wasted his master's possessions. Since we live in 2012
America and not 32 AD Israel, we immediately think of politicians and
bankers cooking the books, skimming off public funds, or fixing
interest rates. But this is not necessarily how this manager wasted
his master's possessions. He may have been cooking the books.
But
he also might have simply been an unshrewd manager:
people were taking advantage of him, he was not diligent in his
accounting, he was making bad decisions on how to use his master's
resources. In a word, incompetent.
But
now his mind is focused. He's been fired. He's need to think fast and
accomplish his number one priority—make some friends. And the
manager's finally gotten wise. He shrewdly calls in each debtor one
at a time, because he doesn't want what he's saying to one farmer,
getting around to the other farmer right now.
5
“So he called in his master’s debtors, one by one. He asked the
first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’
6
“‘Eight hundred gallons of olive oil,’ he replied.
“The
manager told him, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it
four hundred.’
7
“Then he asked the second, ‘And how much do you owe?’
“‘A
thousand bushels of wheat,’ he replied.
“He
told him, ‘Take your bill and make it 800.’
The
manager has them slash their bills and he makes them alter the
numbers in their own handwriting, not his. He's trying to keep his
fingerprints off the book-cooking.
Now
here's something else to keep in mind. The minute the master fired
his manager, the manager had no authority. But he put his shrewd plan
into action so quickly that the farmers and the other servants in the
house hadn't gotten the word that the manager's been sacked. And it
worked.
As
the manager was slowly walking back to his office, he tells his
former master's servants to go and bring those farmers to him—and
they obeyed. They didn't know he'd been fired. Very shrewd.
And
he also is smart about how he cooks the books. He doesn't forgive all
the debt. He seems to be acting on behalf of his master and making
his master look good. Maybe something like the manager said something
like this, “Hey, I know how it's been a tough harvest and you're
hurting. So I talked my master and I and he, we, we decided that
since you've been such a reliable tenant in the past, you really
should get a discount this year.”
If
we jump to the conclusion that the manager's crime was charging high
interest rates and now was correcting himself, we miss the point of
the parable. It's likely that the 800 gallons of olive oil and the
1,000 bushels of wheat were fair debts.
But
here's where it gets interesting. The master is stuck. The manager
has returned the books, as requested, and it's quite possible that a
celebration has broken out in town. It's a celebration in honor of
their kind and generous landowner and his wise manager. If the master
fires the manager and then reverses the discounted bills (which the
master had ever legal right to do, since the manager had been fired
when he made the changes), the master is going to look like a jerk.
So
what does he do?
8
“The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted
shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing
with their own kind than are the people of the light.
So
here's the point. Unbelievers know which way to jump. They have their
priorities straight. They want to make money. So they get busy making
money. They shrewdly make their careers the most important thing in
their lives. Everything else comes last.
This
parable is about priorities, not how to use your money. See how the
parable connects to the Parable before and the Parable after.
The
parable before is the Parable of the Prodigal Father. Prodigal means
recklessly extravagant. But it also means spending everything you
have for someone else. The father in the Parable of the Prodigal was
prodigal—he spent his land and his reputation, everything he had,
for his sons. He had his priorities straight—he wanted living sons.
This
parable of the unjust steward follows right after and its point is
the same—get your priorities straight. Unbelievers have got their
priorities straight because their god is themselves and they do what
their god says. Their priorities are going to destroy them, but they
are consistent.
Believers,
get your priorities straight. Use your baptized life in faithful
service to your Savior. Be shrewd about yourself and about those
around you and act accordingly. Get focused on the one thing you
need: the cross of Christ. Be consistent—believe in His Cross that
saves you and carry your cross. Make this your life's priority.
What
comes after the parable of the manager is a mini-parable about money,
and it really is a new idea. It shows us how getting your priorities
straight is seen in how you use your money.
But
the parable before today is much more than a lesson in
money-management. It says, “What do you need in life?”
The
world says, “Money. Sex. Reputation. Family. Friendship.” And the
worldings go out and they get those things.
Christ
says, “I am the way. I am what you need.” Dearly beloved, if
anything is getting in the way of the cross, be shrewd and remove it.
Focus on the cross of Christ, your Savior who loves you so much that
He got rid of everything and became nothing for you.
In
the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
