The Ninth Sunday after Trinity – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: St. Luke 16:1-9

In Christ Jesus, our heart’s true Treasure, dear fellow redeemed:

Jesus shows by today’s parable that He is not naïve about how the sinful world operates. He tells a story about a manager’s wastefulness, selfishness, and deceit. This manager worked for a rich man who clearly trusted him and gave him full access to his wealth. We don’t know just how the manager wasted his master’s possessions, but we know the evidence was strong enough that the master did not hesitate to fire him. “Turn in the account of your management,” he said, “for you can no longer be manager.”

Here we might expect Jesus to teach about remorse and repentance, the manager recognizing what he did wrong and owning up to it. Then we might expect to hear about the master’s mercy, like the father who welcomed home his prodigal son (Luk. 15:20-24). But instead, we learn more about the selfish scheming of the manager. His fraudulent gains were coming to an end. What would he do now?

Physical labor and begging were out of the question. He wasn’t interested in an honest day’s work with his hands or taking a hit to his pride. Then he remembered: he still had access to his master’s accounts. He called in his master’s debtors and reduced what they owed. Now they would be indebted not only to his master but to him as well. Now they would owe him a big favor. Jesus concluded the story with the master’s surprising response: “The master commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness.” But we can assume he still fired him.

Jesus did not tell His disciples this parable to give them ideas for how to “make money without really trying,” to “get what they truly deserve,” or even to “make the rich pay their share.” The manager’s actions are clearly sinful. They would not be justified no matter how poorly his master might have treated him.

We should be clear about that as well. An employer’s mistreatment of his employees does not give them the right to steal from him, either by neglecting their work or by taking what belongs to him. Employees do not have the right to sin against their employer, and an employer does not have the authority to sin against his employees.

This is true for every sphere of life. Parents do not have the right or authority to sin against their children, or children against their parents. Teachers do not have the right to sin against their students, or students against their teachers. A person’s station in life does not give him or her justification to commit sin. “Sin is lawlessness,” writes the apostle John (1Jo. 3:4).

What we owe to one another is love. Romans 13:10 says, “Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.” Love for one another is what Jesus is teaching in today’s account, but He does it in an unexpected way. He first of all says that “the sons of this world,” the unbelievers, are “more shrewd” in their dealings than “the sons of light,” the believers. They use what they have better than we use what we have.

The unbelievers are motivated by the things we mentioned like selfishness, greed, and pride. They will work day in and day out, never stopping, expending every ounce of energy to get what they want. Think of how committed people are to their vices, and what lengths they will go in pursuing what is wrong and in covering up what they are doing. They work very hard, probably harder than most others who pursue what is good.

We understand this mentality well, because we have often gone to much greater lengths in hiding our sins from others than we have in doing good to them. But this sort of darkness is no place for “the sons of light” to be. We are called by the Lord of Light to nobler and more productive things. Jesus said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (Joh. 8:12).

Because of what Jesus has done for us, we are both “living ones” and “light bearers.” We were dead in our trespasses and sins. We were no better than the dishonest manager, making every decision that suited our sinful passions and desires. But God saw in our hopelessly indebted souls something worth saving. It isn’t that there was anything worthy in us. We had nothing to offer Him to “sweeten the pot” if He redeemed us. And He didn’t look at us like a greedy taskmaster who might be personally benefitted and enriched by our productivity.

Our heavenly Father looked upon us with a perfect, other-worldly love, a love that compelled Him to send His Son to pay the price for our souls. I call this an “other-worldly love” because our love often has strings attached. If I show love and kindness to you, I expect to receive the same in return. And if I don’t, then I won’t be so generous with my love and kindness in the future. God loved you and me and the whole world even when we, like the dishonest manager, had only wasted the good gifts He had given us.

Jesus, perfect God and perfect Man, willingly went to the cross to pay for our selfishness, greed, and pride. He suffered as though He were the dishonest manager, as though He thought only of Himself. But He was thinking only of you and me. He poured out His holy blood while suffering the anguish and agony of hell in order to completely and forever cancel the debt of your sin. He wanted to win for you and share with you the riches of heaven. He wanted you to lack nothing good for all eternity and to feast with Him in His perfect kingdom of light.

But you don’t have to wait until heaven for the inheritance of His grace. It is already deposited into your account right now through His Word and Sacraments. Through these means, Jesus gives you His righteousness and life. In the waters of Holy Baptism, He made you a co-heir of His eternal treasures. In His word of absolution, He declares your sins forgiven and heaven open to you. In His Holy Supper, He provides a foretaste of the marriage feast of the Lamb as you partake of His true body and blood.

These rich gifts are received by faith, which was also a gift brought to you by the Holy Spirit. And these gifts are not intended only for you. He wants all people to know of His love, all “the sons of this world,” so that they might become “the sons of light.” In the main point of His parable, Jesus said, “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.”

“Unrighteous wealth” does not mean wealth obtained in sinful ways. It is the wealth of this world which also comes to us as a gift from God. The word translated “wealth” is “mammon” in the original language. Mammon includes all our money and possessions, everything we use for life in this world.

Jesus calls us to “make friends” with this wealth. These aren’t the kind of friends who mooch off us or only hang around us because of our riches. These are people who become our friends when they are brought to faith through the Gospel. How else could they “receive [us] into the eternal dwellings” when our life on this earth comes to an end? They will receive us into the kingdom of light because they became “the sons of light” with us by hearing and learning the Word of God.

In calling us to make these friends, Jesus wants us to be diligent in our use of His gifts—both the earthly and spiritual ones—to promote the work of His kingdom. We think of our faithful forefathers who made a deposit of faith by establishing this congregation and continuing in the Word of truth. That is the best inheritance we could receive and have received. We might all dream of having riches handed down to us someday, but those types of riches ultimately fail and fade.

Our greatest treasure is the grace we have received from God through the work of Jesus Christ. We might lose our home someday and our possessions and everything in our investment accounts. But even if we are left penniless and homeless, that will not change what we have in Christ, the riches that are ours by faith in Him. That is a “higher good,” than all the unrighteous wealth of the world.

This is the treasure we seek to pass on to our children and grandchildren, to our neighbors and friends, and even to our enemies and persecutors. We pray for God’s kingdom to come among us and around the world through the preaching of the Gospel. We apply our time to the study of His Word, so we are “prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks [us] for a reason for the hope that is in [us]” (1Pe. 3:15). We give offerings, so that His Word will continue to be taught in this community and in communities around the world like beacon lights in the darkness.

We don’t do this to gain something for ourselves or because like the dishonest manager we are desperate to selfishly guard what we have. We gladly work in love, for the benefit of our neighbor, and to the glory of God. We Have a Higher Good. We are the sons of light. St. Peter in his First Epistle describes us as “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (2:9).

Everything we need for this life and for the life to come is supplied by our gracious God. He is not stingy with His gifts. He gives all things in abundance—His grace, His forgiveness, and every good thing we have—such abundance that there is plenty for all. The hymnwriter says it well:

The world seeks after wealth
And all that Mammon offers,
Yet never is content
Though gold should fill its coffers.
I have a higher good,
Content with it I’ll be:
My Jesus is my Wealth.
What is the world to me! (Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary #446, v. 4)

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.

+  +  +

(picture from “Parable of the Unjust Steward” by Jan Luyken, 1649-1712)