Sermon for SMHP, Year C, Pentecost + 15, Proper 20, Sept.
22, 2019
Luke 16:1-13
Then Jesus
said to the disciples, “There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges
were brought to him that this man was squandering his property. 2So he summoned him and said to him, ‘What
is this that I hear about you? Give me an accounting of your management,
because you cannot be my manager any longer.’
3Then the manager said 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. 4I
have decided what to do so that, when I am dismissed as manager, people may
welcome me into their homes.’ 5So,
summoning his master’s debtors one by one, he asked the first, ‘How much do you
owe my master?’
6He answered, ‘A hundred jugs of olive oil.’
The manager
said to him, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.’
7Then he asked another, ‘And how much do you
owe?’
He replied,
‘A hundred containers of wheat.’
He said to
him, ‘Take your bill and make it eighty.’
8And his master commended the dishonest
manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of this age are more
shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. 9And I tell you, make friends for yourselves
by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into
the eternal homes. 10“Whoever is
faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in
a very little is dishonest also in much. 11If
then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to
you the true riches? 12And if you
have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is
your own?
13No slave can serve two masters; for a
slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and
despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.”
School
is important. In the developed world,
one of the great advancements of the past couple of centuries is to make school
universal to all children, at least in theory.
It has gone a long way in changing centuries of economic stratification
which saw education only as a privilege for the rich, and thus limited the
opportunities of the majority of people.
Most
of us now live in a system which offers better opportunities, because all kids
can, and should, go to school.
But
last Friday, a whole bunch of kids in a whole bunch of countries didn’t go to
school. Or they went to school and walked
out. There was a worldwide climate
strike. It was hard to miss. Students led, joined by indigenous persons,
tech workers, and a bunch of other people who realize that the systems in place
to protect us have failed. Money has
taken precedence over the planet.
Money
tends to do that, doesn’t it? The
systems in place for the buying and selling of goods and services are not
morally neutral—they are morally deficient.
And they pretty much always have been.
The prophet Amos was complaining about this in the Eight Century BCE!
“4Hear this, you that trample on the needy,
and bring to ruin the poor of the land, 5saying,
“When will the new moon be over so that we may sell grain; and the sabbath, so
that we may offer wheat for sale? We will make the ephah small and the shekel
great, and practice deceit with false balances.”
Nearly
three millennia ago, people valued their money over their faith—rushing to
get through the sabbath, so that they could get back to buying and selling in a
system that was literally rigged toward the wealthy. They weighted the balances and sold the
gleaning portions of the wheat, which Torah declared were for the feeding of
the poor.
Our
culture has done away with the Sabbath. Now you can buy and sell any time you
want. The system itself has not changed,
except to widen the gap between those who sell and those who must buy.
Our
human systems of buying and selling are and always have been sinful
systems. They can only be kept in check
by other systems which privilege the welfare of living things. Those systems do exist. Three of them office in this building. One helps people live well despite
addiction. One teaches drumming and
dance to kids with lots of potential but more than a few stumbling blocks in
their lives. And one is working to
challenge the idea that there should be a class of people known as the “working
poor.”
When
communities get together and think about people first and corporations second
(or fourth), change happens. Before we
were even semi-serious about environmental protection in this country, the
Cuyagoga River used to catch fire.
A
river. Caught fire. [Slide]
Here’s
the 1952 fire. [Slide] Here’s the
aftermath of the 1969 fire.
In
1952, people shook their heads and said “What a shame.”
In
1969, people took to the streets and demanded change. And the Environmental Protection Agency was
born.
The
leaders of systems which privilege people above wealth sometimes have to be
persistent. Noisy. And creative.
Like
having millions of people walk out of school and work.
Or
making a dishonest manager the hero of a story about value systems. [slide]
This
is a confounding lesson, isn’t it? Nobody
really knows what to do with it. Including
the commentary writers, who are all over the place.
When
the text itself is puzzling, we look at…?
The context.
The
parables we had last week were about a lost sheep and a lost coin. What did we say about them? Subversive.
Then
the lectionary inexplicably decides to leave out what might be the most well
known of the parables…the one which begins, “There was a man who had two sons…”
Also
known as…the Parable of the Prodigal Son.
The
story of a younger son who asks for his inheritance, squanders it on “loose
living,” returns home…and gets a party.
And his brother, who stayed home to take care of the family holdings…and
got nothing.
Subversive. Take my word for it if it is not apparent to
you.
This
whole section of Luke is designed to get people’s attention, mainly by the use
of irony and subversion of expectations.
To
point a finger at a God who subverts our expectations.
What
do we make of a shepherd who leaves ninety-nine sheep unattended to find
one? Or a father who celebrates
the son who turned his back on him and squandered his money? What about a manager who forgives debts willy
nilly and is then praised for it?
A manager who is described as “dishonest,” as he is being lifted up.
It
doesn’t make sense.
It’s
like a body of water…on fire.
Or
a God who creates human beings and then makes a really generous deal with
them. “You worship me, and I will give
you everything I have.”
And
when they take everything and destroy it, says, “Okay, let’s try this
again. I’ll give you my child, a part of
me.”
And
when they destroy him too, that God, that unbelievably loving parent of us all,
says, “It’s okay. I still love you. I will still forgive you.”
Do
you believe that? It can’t be true,
right? Nobody is that
forgiving.
I
think this God must be lying to us.
Tell
the truth…haven’t you wondered? Is God really
going to forgive me all that I’ve done?
Am
I really “saved”? Don’t I have to do
something? I must have to do something,
right? That preacher on tv said I have
to make a declaration that Jesus is my Lord and Savior. And send money.
You
don’t have to do anything. God has done
it all, and will continue to do it all.
When you fall again, and you will, God will scoop you up and remind you
that you are saved. You were already
saved.
You
have always been saved.
God
does it all. Just like in the
parable. We don’t like this parable,
because we can’t figure out who God is in the parable. And God is usually a character in the parable. Or Jesus.
The answer is Jesus.
God
is the sower.
Jesus
is the good shepherd.
But
God can’t be the “dishonest manager,” right?
God
is the one who makes debts manageable, without a care. Who turns a system on its head that is
already turned on its head.
All
that matters in this parable is what happens.
Not the language used to describe the parties. Is the manager “dishonest”? Is the wealth “dishonest”?
What’s
the opposite of “dishonest wealth”?
Honest wealth? Is that a thing?
See,
while we were all caught up in that, Jesus just laid down a beautiful picture
of grace. One more story about how God
does it all.
It
doesn’t make sense. At all.
God
has loved you and forgiven everything you have ever done. You came into this world “saved.”
Doesn’t
make sense at all.
We
can still live as if we believe it. Or…stay
with me here…we can actually believe it.
And then we can think about how we might reflect all of that love and
forgiveness back to God. And out into
the world.
We
could even try living as if we believe that it is possible to love like God
does—without counting the cost or holding the debts.
You
know what will happen then? We will see
our forgiven debts. We will see what it
is to be the sheep returned to the fold, the son received by his father, the
debtor whose debt is reduced for no reason at all.
We
will see grace. We will be grace.
Amen
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