1Now He was also saying to the disciples, "There was a rich man who had a manager, and this manager was reported to him as squandering his possessions. 2"And he called him and said to him, 'What is this I hear about you? Give an accounting of your management, for you can no longer be manager.' 3"The manager said to himself, 'What shall I do, since my master is taking the management away from me? I am not strong enough to dig; I am ashamed to beg. 4'I know what I shall do, so that when I am removed from the management people will welcome me into their homes.' 5"And he summoned each one of his master's debtors, and he began saying to the first, 'How much do you owe my master?' 6"And he said, 'A hundred measures of oil.' And he said to him, 'Take your bill, and sit down quickly and write fifty.' 7"Then he said to another, 'And how much do you owe?' And he said, 'A hundred measures of wheat.' He said to him, 'Take your bill, and write eighty.' 8"And his master praised the unrighteous manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the sons of this age are more shrewd in relation to their own kind than the sons of light. 9"And I say to you, make friends for yourselves by means of the wealth of unrighteousness, so that when it fails, they will receive you into the eternal dwellings. 10"He who is faithful in a very little thing is faithful also in much; and he who is unrighteous in a very little thing is unrighteous also in much. 11"Therefore if you have not been faithful in the use of unrighteous wealth, who will entrust the true riches to you? 12"And if you have not been faithful in the use of that which is another's, who will give you that which is your own? 13"No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be devoted to one and despise the other You cannot serve God and wealth." Luke 16:1-13
I've been chewing on this passage for awhile. Today, two things have jumped out at me about it. First, Jesus was so good at doing the unexpected. When reading this parable you do not expect Jesus to look favorably on the "unrighteous" servant. Jesus had a habit of zigging when everyone knew, just absolutely knew He was going to zag. I want to be like that. That might be my new definition of cool. Second, I believe the point of the parable is that people are more valuable then anything else. That is good for me to remember. I'm very task centric and can throw on blinders to others around me. This is not one of my better qualities. Jesus is actually saying that the dude figured out a way to mend some fences with folks and in the end those folks will have his back. Of course, the guy didn't go about it the right way, but Jesus doesn't focus on that. Instead, He only recognizes my boy's creative ways to make friends. I love Jesus for many reasons, but this week I've added another reason to my list. No matter what I learn and how much I grow, He always teaches me lessons about Him, life, and does it in amazing ways.
