The master commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness. For the sons of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal dwellings.
One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much. If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful in that which is another's, who will give you that which is your own? No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.
Luke 16:8-13
We have one more issue to consider from the parable of the dishonest manager. When Jesus said that we should use ‘unrighteous wealth’ to make friends who could welcome us into eternal dwellings, did he intend his followers to imitate the dishonest manager’s shrewdness?
In his parables Jesus always pointed out when a character behaved badly and he called the manager dishonest for a reason. So the answer must be, No!
On another occasion, Christ told a parable about an unjust judge to encourage his disciples to persevere in prayer (see Luke 18). The judge did not fear God or respect people but he gave justice to an aggrieved widow when her persistent badgering began to annoy him. Was Jesus saying that God is like that judge? Or did Christ expect us to realise how just and loving God is in comparison to the unjust judge?
Similarly, in commenting on the behaviour of the dishonest manager, Jesus was not suggesting that his followers are to be like him. He does not, for example, want people to be good to their business rivals and work colleagues only because they expect something better later. What Jesus really wants is for people to do the right thing, and to do it cheerfully, because it is the right thing to do. Even where money is involved.
In another passage from the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells his followers to do their good works, their ‘righteousness’ discretely because if they do it publically to ‘be praised by others’ that that praise will be all they can expect. St Paul brings further clarity to the issue in what is probably the most famous passage in the Bible, I Corinthians 13. He explains that if we do good works without love (literally, ‘charity’), they do not work for our good: ‘If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing’. The word ‘charity’ is from a Greek word that means love in action.
If that is the case, then how can we make sense of what Jesus then says about being faithful in little and in much, and in being faithful when we use another’s wealth? How does it tie in with Jesus’ advice to the rich, young ruler to give away all his wealth so that he might have ‘treasure in heaven’? More pertinently, how could Jesus of Nazareth, a religious teacher from an occupied country in the Roman Empire, speak with authority about treasure in heaven?
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Copyright © All Souls Clubhouse Community Centre & Church and Philip Evans 2012.
Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
These Advent Reflections do not teach personal finance skills and where these skills are mentioned the issues have been simplified. Handling money and dealing with money problems and debt can be complicated and neither the author nor anyone else involved in the production of these Reflections is responsible for any action you take, or fail to take, based on what is written here.
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