Homily for 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Today’s section of St. Luke – the story of the dishonest steward – is one of the most difficult of Jesus’ parables to interpret.  It certainly brings up a lot of questions: How can a servant this dishonest be praised?  Is he praised by the master, the rich man,  or is Jesus the Master, praising him? How can dishonesty be held up to praise? Why does Jesus tell us to make friends with dishonest wealth?  How do the proverbs that come right after the story fit in with the story at all? So many problems! So many questions!

First of all, the parable itself ends in verse 8 with “the children of the light”.  The proverbs that follow after seem to be attempting to comment on the parable, but they have no connection to each other and are just four little homilies which try to explain the parable. None of them really succeeds in doing so, according to most Biblical theologians.

In Jesus’ time the distinction was not really between those who were poor and those who were rich, but was about who was most in control.  In fact, they did not use money very much but would barter with agricultural produce. We note that the debts described in the parable were debts of olive oil and of wheat. The reason that they owed the rich master this produce was probably for rent of property which they used to grow things.

Now the steward who was working for the rich man would likely be getting a commission on all of the dealings he was handling for the master.  Perhaps he was taking too much commission and so was reported to the rich master for doing so and taking advantage of his position.

The reaction of the rich master was to fire the man immediately. He was apparently honest and would not have a dishonest man working for him. But before the news got around that he was fired, the steward needed to do something to prepare for his future.  He knew that he was not strong enough to be a laborer and he was not about to beg for a living, so he had to find a way to make people in debt to him.  By going to the renters and halving their rent (which might only be his commission), they would be quite happy and would be indebted to him for doing so. When the steward was out of  job, he could then depend on them to help him out.

When the rich master learns what he has done hid reaction is actually on of admiration, not anger as we would usually suspect. Why is that?  Well, again it has to do with that topic we have so often talked about in Luke – honor!  You see, the rich man is now thought to be an honorable man because he has halved the rent of the people on his land. They would be very grateful to both the steward – and the person the steward was acting for.  There was no way he was going to go back and demand the rest of the rent, because then he would be looked down on, and the renters would have to take back all the nice things they said.

So, you see, the steward has actually made it better for both himself and the rich man, albeit the rich man was losing a hefty sum of produce in the deal. The rich man admired the genius of the plan and saw the wisdom of the steward, despite the fact that it was not quite kosher!

So the parable has a happily ever after ending. The poor people are happy that their rent was halved; the steward is happy because he can ask favors of the renters; the rich master is happy because he is seen in the community as a man of honor.

“For the children of this world, Jesus moralizes, are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light.” What this saying may mean then, is that Christians – the children of light – need to have the kind of prudence, that is, having care and thought for the future – as the steward did. If the world is going to end, or if you are going to die, you need to build up your reputation and honor rather than worry about money, so that you may get your final reward. The dishonest wealth might better be translated wealth the way the world makes it.  This then would be: Make friends and create honor for yourself. Honor is the only thing that can accompany you into the new kingdom.

Up to this point it makes a lot of sense if Jesus is just trying to show that Christians need to think about the future and build up a case for themselves for the afterlife, but then we have the four sayings that seem to have been added to the parable to try to create meaning.

Each of the sayings is about money or faithfulness, but don’t really come near to interpreting the parable itself. But each does stand alone in making a comment or truth.

I would like to certain my final remarks on the last of these four interpretations: “No servant can serve two masters.” The truth of that statement is important to us today.  All the way through the readings for the last 5 or 6 weeks from Luke, we have been seeing how we need not to trust in worldly things, whether it be wealth or sex or power or control. None of these things will be important.  Serving these things and trying to serve God as well are incompatible.  We have to decide. The world places great emphasis on attaining all these things and it so easy to fall into the traps that are out there for us today.  The internet, for example, for all its wonder and allure has opened up a whole new area of concern today. Students are doing less well in school because they are up all night surfing and texting; marriages are being destroyed by the easy accessibility of pornography; lives are being destroyed by internet gambling and easy buying.  The internet has many positive virtues as well, but these are problems which also come as a result of it. Who are you going to serve? We need to evaluate our actions during the next week and see where the time and emphasis is being put. That is the one we are serving. Then ask ourselves, what can we do to put God more central in our lives.

A minister stands before a hall full of graduating theology students and decides to demonstrate the theme of his address. “Please stand up,” he says. “I will read out the names of some high government officials for whom we have a responsibility to pray. If you know that official’s name, keep standing. If not, you sit down.” He begins with the president. No one sits down. Then the state governor, and a few people sit down. When he mentions the senator from the state more people sit down. By the time he gets to the congressperson representing the district only about 25 percent of the audience remain standing. To conclude the demonstration, he says to those still standing: “If you have not prayed for each of these at least once since the beginning of this year, please be seated.” One person, and only one person, is left standing. If we carry out the same demonstration in our church today, how shall we fare?

In today’s second reading, Paul gives instructions to Timothy on Christian worship. The first injunction he gives him is on praying for everyone, especially for civil authorities: “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone, for kings and all who are in high positions” (1 Timothy 2:1-2a). Today we take it for granted that we should pray for our leaders, but when you realize that Paul wrote this letter at a time when Christians were going through a most brutal state-approved persecution under the wicked emperor Nero, then the injunction to pray for the emperor raises eyebrows. Why would Christians pray for this emperor and his deputies who are out to eliminate the church?

Paul anticipates the question and gives Timothy two reasons why the church should pray for the king and all who are in high positions. The first reason is “so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity” (verse 2b). The church needed to pray so that the king would reverse his bad and discriminatory laws against Christians, which would enable them to live their lives in quiet and peace, fulfilling their religious obligations without fear of arrest, molestation or death. In other words, they were not praying for the emperor so that he would continue in power with his bad policies and decrees, they were praying so that he would change his heart and his policies against Christians.

The second reason to pray for the emperor is more altruistic. As Christians we know that “God desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (verse 4). But the emperor and his nobles are living in the darkness of error and sin. So the church needed to pray for them to come to the light of truth and salvation. The religion of the emperors was emperor worship. In death emperors were deified and proclaimed to be gods, in life there were called sons of god (filii divi). Paul says that they are in error because there is only one God and one Son of God, who mediates between God and humankind, Jesus the Christ. “For there is one God; there is also one mediator between God and humankind, Christ Jesus, himself human” (verse 5). Since the emperor and his officials are in error, Paul enjoins Christians to pray for them so that they may realize that truth and salvation are found in Christ “who gave himself a ransom for all” (verse 6).

When Paul asks us to pray for the king, he is not asking us to automatically support the policies of whoever happens to be the head of government. He is asking us to pray so that (1) our rulers may govern us with laws that allow us freedom of worship so that we can freely carry out our religious duties without hindrance; and (2) that they themselves may come to know the truth that we all share, that there is only one God, and this God has revealed Himself fully in His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, and so come to be saved themselves.

Today there are many countries in the world where the Christian faith is persecuted and believers cannot practise their faith openly. We need to pray for a change of heart in the rulers of such countries. In some traditional Christian countries the signs of the faith can no longer be displayed in public: prayer has been banned in schools, crucifixes have been removed from public buildings, and “Merry Christmas” has been changed to “Happy Holiday.” Let us pray today for our government officials so that they may recognize the universal kingship of Christ and make it possible for us to practise our faith both in private and in public.

An angel appears at a faculty meeting and tells the dean that he has come to reward him for his years of devoted service. He was asked to choose one of three blessings: either infinite wealth, or infinite fame or infinite wisdom. Without hesitation, the dean asks for infinite wisdom. “You got it!” says the angel, and disappears. All heads turn toward the dean, who sits glowing in the aura of wisdom. Finally one of his colleagues whispers, “Say something.” The dean looks at them and says, “I should have taken the money.”

Wisdom, in the sense of being smart or shrewd as we see in today’s parable of the dishonest servant, is not an end in itself. One can be smart and use one’s smartness to do mean things. Many con artists and terrorists are smart people who use their smartness to create unhappiness in the world. Today’s parable challenges us to be smart in the pursuit of the kingdom of God just as godless people are smart in their pursuit of selfish goals and ambitions. Jesus uses the example of a smart manager in his master’s business to teach us the need to be smart in the Lord’s service. We are challenged to imitate the manager’s shrewdness, not his dishonesty. “The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly” (Luke 16:8).

Why did the master who had made up his mind to fire the manager now commend him? Probably the manager had been running his master’s business in a drab, routine and lifeless manner devoid of creativity and imagination. As a result the business was failing, so the master decides it is time to fire him: “Give me an accounting of your management, because you cannot be my manager any longer” (verse 2). The manager is facing a real danger of being dismissed from service. He knows the seriousness of the situation. He is not kidding himself. He knows exactly how helpless he is out there. He says 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” (verse 3). He knows he is in a very difficult and precarious situation. He scratches his head and comes up with this ingenious plan to safeguard his future. The master praises him because if the manager had been using such smart thinking in the daily running of the business he would have made a much more successful manager rather than a failure.

The parable challenges us all to be smart managers. Me a manager, you say? Yes, we are all called to be managers. God has entrusted the whole of His creation into our hands as His managers. Jesus Christ, in addition, entrusts the kingdom of God – the kingdom of love, justice and peace – into our hands as his managers. World peace and harmony, and the renewal of all things in Christ, are the business of us all, collectively and individually. Jesus calls it the kingdom of God. Our business as followers of Christ, non-ordained as well as ordained believers, is to help bring about the kingdom of God starting from our own selves. We have all been given the necessary resources to do this. We have been equipped with the truth of faith, we have been empowered by the Holy Spirit who dwells in our hearts, and we have been given time. Sooner or later we shall all be called upon to render an account of how we have invested and managed these resources.

Events in our world show that we live in difficult and precarious times, like the manager in the parable. The manager faced squarely the truth of his helplessness and vulnerability and did something about it. Why do we keep on telling ourselves the lie that we are safe and secure and that nothing can ever happen to us? We do not have to wait, like the dishonest servant, for a last minute display of smartness to fix our eternal concerns. The time to be smart is now. The smart manager used what he could not keep to get what he needed so badly, friendship with his business associates. We should likewise invest all our temporal and spiritual resources to gain the only thing that matters in the end: the kingdom of God.

By Bishop Kasomo Daniel

The Bishop of The Society of St.Peter and Paul (SSPP)