Perspective: Lessons from a Questionable Bookkeeper

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Comments are always welcomed.

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Lessons from a Questionable Bookkeeper

People who belong to this world are more clever in dealing with their peers than are people who belong to the light.  I tell you, use worldly wealth to make friends for yourselves so that when it's gone, you will be welcomed into the eternal homes.

Luke 16:8b-9 (CEB)

Money, so they say

Is the root of all evil today

But if you ask for a raise it's no surprise

That they're giving none away

From "Money" by Pink Floyd

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus tells a rather strange story about a man whose job is to manage the property of a rich man.¹  One day, the rich man catches wind that his manager is mismanaging his assets, so he summons him and demands a report of his business dealings.  The manager, knowing that he will soon be out of a job, has to figure out how he will provide for himself since he is, by his own admission, "not strong enough to dig and too proud to beg."  He contacts all of his employer's debtors and tells them to alter their bills so that they appear to owe less.  He is hoping that, if he can endear himself to them, then maybe one of them will help him out after he is fired from his job.

When the manager meets with his employer, he is commended for his shrewdness.

What makes this parable perplexing and even troubling is that, in the end, a seemingly dishonest person is commended.  It is not the type of parable we would expect Jesus to tell His followers.

I decided to write about this strange parable in order to force myself to figure out what it means.  It has been suggested that one of the best ways to learn about something is to teach it to other people.  I consulted the various commentaries at my disposal, and, if I've learned anything about this parable, it is that there are numerous different interpretations out there and that there are many different lessons we can glean from it.

There is a lesson about our priorities, particularly what drives us to think and act.  Speaking of the rich man's manager, Jesus says, "People who belong to this world are more clever in dealing with their peers than are people who belong to the light."  On this note, scholar William Barclay writes,
If only Christians were as eager and ingenious in their attempt to gain goodness as those with more worldly concerns are in their attempts to attain money and comfort, they would be much better people.  If only people would give as much attention to the things which concern their souls as they do to the things which concern their business, they would be much better human beings.²

There are also lessons about how we use the resources available to us.  Jesus says, "I tell you, use worldly wealth to make friends for yourselves so that when it's gone, you will be welcomed into the eternal homes."  In the parable, the manager leverages the position he fully expects to lose in order to gain help for himself when it is gone.  Perhaps Jesus is suggesting that we should similarly leverage our temporal resources, which we will not have forever, for eternal gain, which we cannot lose.  When it comes to our worldly resources, we need to use them before we lose them.

The great preacher Fred Craddock notes that "how one handles property has eternal consequences" and that, "for all the dangers in possessions, it is possible to manage goods in ways appropriate to life in the kingdom of God."³

There are additional lessons to be gleaned if we are willing to consider alternative interpretations of the parable.  Perhaps the manager wasn't quite as dishonest as he seems.  It is worth noting that the Jewish people were forbidden by their Law from charging interest on loans to fellow Jews.  In the Book of Deuteronomy, we read, "You shall not charge interest on loans to another Israelite, interest on money, interest on provisions, interest on anything that is lent."⁴  The Jewish people were especially forbidden from exploiting the poor through interest.  In the Book of Exodus, we read, "If you lend money to my people, to the poor among you, you shall not deal with them as a creditor; you shall not exact interest from them."⁵

A number of commentators, including scholar N.T. Wright, speculate that, if the manager in the story is to be commended, then maybe, when he told his employer's debtors to alter their bills, he was knocking off interest they were wrongly being charged.  According to Wright,
If [the steward] reduced the bill in each case to the principal, the simple amount that had been lent, the debtors would be delighted, but the master couldn't lay a charge against the steward without owning up to his own shady business practices.  Thus when the master heard about it... he could only admire the man's clever approach.⁶

Maybe the manager used his position to endear himself to others by righting wrongs that had been committed.  According to  Darren Whitehead and Jon Tyson, "By cutting the deals that he did, the manager makes his boss look extremely generous while simultaneously bringing him into alignment with God's law."⁷

There are lessons in the parable about making friends.  Jesus tells us to "use worldly wealth to make friends for [our]selves."  N.T. Wright suggests that maybe the unlawful interest that the rich man was charging represented the rules and regulations the religious leaders of the day added to the Jewish Law.  He writes, "Jesus in this parable, indicates that if Israel is facing a major crisis the answer is rather to throw caution to the winds, to forget the extra bits and pieces of law which the Pharisees have heaped up, and to make friends as and where they can."⁸

I suspect that Jesus would want us to use our resources to make friends with the very people with whom He identifies: the widow, the orphan, the poor, the immigrant, and other vulnerable populations.  In the end, we will be judged by how we have treated such people.  In another Gospel, Jesus says
I was hungry and you gave me food to eat.  I was thirsty and you gave me a drink.  I was a stranger and you welcomed me.  I was naked and you gave me clothes to wear.  I was sick and you took care of me.  I was in prison and you visited me...  I assure you that when you have done it for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you have done it for me.⁹

Having studied this perplexing parable, I haven't come to any conclusions regarding a definitive meaning.  That said, I think I'll take some advice from The Beatles and "get by with a little help from my friends."  My friend Wendell called the Bible "a tough book" in our church small group discussions.  My friend Marti, a fellow teacher in my denomination, would say that only Jesus really knew what He had in mind when He told His parables.  My friend David would say that it makes God smile to see us trying to figure such things out.

So let's keep trying to figure it all out, shall we?

If you have any thoughts about this strange parable, please share them in the comments.


Notes:

1. A majority of this perspective is based on Luke 16:1-9.  Quotations from this passage are taken from the Common English Bible.
2. William Barclay.  The New Daily Study Bible: The Gospel of Luke.  2001, Westminster John Knox Press.  p. 247
3. Fred B. Craddock.  Luke (Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching).  1990, John Knox Press.  pp. 190-191
4. Deuteronomy 23:19 (NRSV)
5. Exodus 22:25 (NRSV)
6. N.T. Wright.  Luke for Everyone.  2004, Westminster John Knox Press.  pp. 193-194
7. Darren Whitehead and Jon Tyson.  Rumors of God: Experience the Kind of Faith You've Only Heard About (Participant's Guide).  2012, Thomas Nelson.  p. 42
8. Wright, p. 194
9. Matthew 25:35-36, 40 (CEB)

The photograph of the old ledger has been released to the public domain.

Introspection: Showing Myself Grace

I share these thoughts hoping they are of help to someone else.

Comments are always welcomed.

If you find these thoughts helpful, please share.

Showing Myself Grace

May grace and peace be yours in abundance.

1 Peter 1:2 (NRSV)

Come sit at the table

Come taste the grace

From "Come as You Are" by Crowder

When I arrived at church one Sunday morning last month, I was reminded that there was a potluck luncheon in the gym immediately after the service.  Though I had signed up one week earlier to indicate that I would be attending, I had forgotten to prepare a dish to contribute.  Because I had not brought anything, I figured I should probably skip the luncheon.  It was a potluck after all, meaning that, if I forget to bring a pot, I'm straight out of luck.

Normally, I'm happy while I'm at church, but that morning I was in a funk for most of the service because, thanks to my thoughtlessness, I was going to miss out on the church luncheon.  After the service I would head home and most likely spend the rest of the day feeling sorry for myself.

As I listened to the sermon that morning, I kept hearing about people sitting down at the table together to eat as a family.¹  I began to consider that, when it came to the church luncheon I was planning to skip, perhaps what mattered the most is not that I paid my entry fee by bringing a dish but that I was at the table with my church family.  I knew that nobody from my church would bar me from attending the luncheon because I had forgotten to bring something, and I knew that I would never bar someone else from attending a church luncheon if he had forgotten to bring something or was unable to bring something.  Why should I not extend the same grace to myself?

I decided to attend the church luncheon, even though I had not brought a dish.  I think I made the right choice, because I enjoyed spending some time with my church family.  I still wanted to contribute in some way, so I made it a point to stay behind and help clean up the gym after the luncheon.

Please note that I don't intend to make it a habit to attend church potlucks without bringing anything.  If nobody brought anything to a potluck, there would be nothing for anybody to eat, so, if one is able to bring something, then one should do so.  What I am suggesting is that being present is more important than getting it right.  A church potluck is an economy of abundance.  People tend to bring more food then they could eat on their own, so there is typically more than enough food to feed everyone.

I think that luncheon was, for me, a lesson in grace.  I had to show myself grace in order to eat lunch with my church family.

Grace is a free gift.  It is something we can never earn, something we'll never deserve, and something we can never repay.  We can only receive it for ourselves and then gratefully extend it to others.  I think that many of us, myself included, tend not to extend to ourselves the same grace we would extend to other people.  If God is gracious to us, then why should we not be gracious to ourselves?  If we believe that grace is meant for everyone except us, then I'm not sure we really believe in grace at all.

If we cannot extend grace to ourselves, then how can we accept grace from anyone else?  How can we accept grace from God?  May we learn to receive the grace given to us; may we learn to pass along that grace to others; and may we learn to give ourselves grace as well.


Notes:

1. Jonathan Tompkins.  "A Traveler's Rest, Part 2."  Travelers Rest United Methodist Church, 08/12/2019.

The photograph featured in this introspection was taken by Pixabay user congerdesign.  The photographer is in no way affiliated with this blog.

Perspective: Weeds and Fig Leaves

I share these thoughts hoping they are of help to someone else.

Comments are always welcomed.

If you find these thoughts helpful, please share.

Weeds and Fig Leaves

The Lord God called to the man and said to him, "Where are you?"

The man replied, "I heard your sound in the garden; I was afraid because I was naked, and I hid myself."

Genesis 3:9-10 (CEB)

I am not a stranger to the dark

"Hide away," they say

"'Cause we don't want your broken parts"

I've learned to be ashamed of all my scars

"Run away," they say

"No one'll love you as you are"

From "This Is Me" by Pasek and Paul

In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus tells a story about a landowner who plants wheat in his field.  One night, someone hostile toward the landowner plants weeds in the field.  One day, the household servants report that weeds are growing alongside the stalks of wheat.  They ask the landowner if he wants them to pull up the weeds, and he replies that, if they pull up the weeds, they will inadvertently uproot perfectly good stalks of wheat as well.  He decides that the best course of action is to wait until the harvest and to have the harvesters separate the wheat from the weeds and dispose of the latter.¹

Jesus tells the Disciples that the field represents the world, that the stalks of wheat represent children of the Kingdom of God, and that the weeds represent the children of the devil.²  A lesson we can glean from this parable is that we need to leave the judging to God.  If we take it upon ourselves to decide who is a child of God and who is a child of the devil, we will end up hurting children of God.

I've found that this parable, when applied in a different way, can also serve as a good analogy for perfectionism.  Suppose that the field represents not the world but rather your life.  The wheat would represent the good things in your life, while the weeds would represent the things in your life you don't particularly want other people to see.  When you try to make your field more presentable by pulling up the weeds, you risk uprooting the wheat as well.  In other words, when you try to hide the parts yourself you don't want other people to see, you run the risk of preventing others from appreciating the best parts of you.

Perfectionism, I think, is one of those problems in life that are best viewed not as problems but rather as attempts to solve deeper problems.  Perfectionism is actually a strategy some people use for dealing with shame.  Shame is essentially the fear that, if we allow other people to see us as we are - "weeds" and all - we will be ridiculed, rejected, or abandoned.  Perfectionism then is the idea that, if we can at least appear to do everything right, nobody will ever have any reason not to accept us.³

Researcher Brené Brown, who has written at length about things like perfectionism, shame, and vulnerability, writes,
Perfectionism is not the same thing as striving to be your best.  Perfectionism is not about healthy achievement and growth.  Perfectionism is the belief that if we live perfect, look perfect, and act perfect, we can minimize or avoid the pain of blame, judgment, and shame.  It's a shield.  Perfectionism is a twenty-ton shield that we lug around thinking it will protect us when, in fact, it's the thing that's really preventing us from taking flight.⁴
Brown goes on to say that striving for excellence is concerned primarily with how one can improve and that perfectionism is concerned primarily with what other people think.⁵

I suspect that for many of us, myself included, perfectionism is less about correcting our imperfections and more about hiding them from others.  In my own experience, my fear of being deemed unacceptable has kept me from being seen at all.

Perfectionism doesn't work, because - aside from the fact that perfection is unattainable - no attainable degree of perfection, be it real or faked, can entitle a person to be accepted.  If someone doesn't want to accept another person, he doesn't need to find some imperfection in the other person.  If he cannot find one, he will make one up, turning any part of the other person into an imperfection.  If we're going to be rejected by others, we may as well be rejected for who we are and not for who we pretend to be.

When it comes to the "weeds" in our life, maybe it's not our job to fix ourselves but rather God's job to transform us into who we were created to be.  Maybe we're not always the best judges of what needs to be changed in our lives in how it needs to be changed.

In the Book of Genesis we read that, when God creates the first humans, God makes them the caretakers of a garden.  God tells them that they are allowed to eat the fruit of any tree in the garden, with the exception of one particular tree.  Naturally, the humans do the one thing they are forbidden to do.  When they eat the fruit, they suddenly realize that they are naked.  In other words, they feel vulnerable or exposed.  In their shame, they try to cover themselves with fig leaves, and, when they hear God walking in the garden, they hide.  God calls out, "Where are you?"⁶

In the Gospel of John, we read about a woman who meets Jesus at a well.  This woman, who has a string of failed marriages in her past, has walked to the well at the hottest part of the day because she is trying to avoid the other women in town.  Jesus offers her "living water" that will never leave her thirsty again, and, when she expresses an interest in this water, Jesus tells her to go back home and bring her husband to the well with her.  She says that she has no husband, and Jesus says, "You are right to say, 'I don't have a husband.'  You've had five husbands, and the man you are with now isn't your husband.  You've spoken the truth."⁷

When the first humans hide from God in the garden, God calls out to them.  When the woman at the well tries to keep a certain part of her life a secret, Jesus drags it out into the open.  God's response to our shame is to call us out of hiding.

The walls we build to protect ourselves, including perfectionism, inevitably become the walls that imprison us.  There is no proverbial silver bullet that can kill the monster of shame.  To quote the refrain from a certain children's book, "We can't go over it.  We can't go under it.  Oh no!  We've got to go through it!"⁸  Our only hope to overcome shame is "exposure therapy."  In other words, we must become vulnerable.  We must allow ourselves to be seen for who we are and risk being rejected in the hope that we are accepted.


Notes:

1. Matthew 13:24-30
2. Matthew 13:36-43
3. I think it is only right to note that I owe my understanding of shame and it's relationship to perfectionism to Brené Brown.
4. Brené Brown.  The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are.  2010, Hazelden Publishing.  p. 56
5. ibid.
6. Genesis 2:15-17; 3:6-10
7. John 4:7-18 (CEB)
8. Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury.  We're Going on a Bear Hunt.  1989, Walker Books.

The photograph of the wheat was taken by Magnus Rosendahl and has been released to the public domain.  The photographer is in no way affiliated with this blog.

Perspective: Do Not Engage

I share these thoughts hoping they are of help to someone else.

Comments are always welcomed.

If you find these thoughts helpful, please share.

Do Not Engage

Then Jesus told his disciples, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.  For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life?  Or what will they give in return for their life?"

Matthew 16:24-26 (NRSV)

Father, father

We don't need to escalate

You see, war is not the answer

For only love can conquer hate

You know we've got to find a way

To bring some lovin' here today

From "What's Going On" by Marvin Gaye

A few days before Jesus is crucified, the Disciples make a comment about the impressive buildings in Jerusalem.  Jesus tells them that, in the near future, "not one stone will be left here upon another."  The Disciples, who are naturally alarmed by His words, ask Him when the disaster He has predicted will happen.¹  Jesus warns them that, when they see what He calls the "desolating sacrilege" in the temple, they need to literally run for the hills, because a time of great suffering is immanent.  He warns them to not listen to the "false messiahs and false prophets" who will emerge and deceive many people.²

Jesus' prophecy is often used in conjunction with other parts of Scripture - most prominently Revelation - to formulate an elaborate timeline of events that will supposedly happen at some indeterminate point in the future.  Many believe that there will be a seven-year period of hell on earth they call the Great Tribulation.  During this time, the world will fall under the control of an evil ruler called the Antichrist, who will be empowered by Satan to persecute and martyr followers of Christ.  This time of suffering will end with the Battle of Armageddon, after which Christ will return to reign on earth and judge all people.

It is important that we have some knowledge of ancient history when engaging certain parts of the Bible, like Jesus' troubling prophecy.  Otherwise, we might waste our time obsessing over future events that probably won't happen.  Jesus' prophecy actually addresses a particular chain of events that came to pass nearly two thousand years ago.

The "desolating sacrilege" of which Jesus speaks is basically something that does not belong in the temple of the Lord.  Jesus is predicting that the Roman Empire, which is occupying the region in His day, will at some point defile the temple, perhaps with pagan images.  The Jewish people, who will be rightfully enraged by this act of desecration, will respond by rebelling against Rome.  Rome will, in turn, respond to the rebellion by destroying Jerusalem.  Jesus warns the Disciples to flee for the hills when they see the "desolating sacrilige" the temple because He does not want them to get caught up in the conflict that follows and lose their lives in a battle He doesn't want them to fight.³

It is important to remember that the Jewish people of Jesus' day expect a militant messiah who will drive out the Romans and return Israel to its glory days.  Some of them even aspire to be that militant messiah.  The "false messiahs and false prophets" of whom Jesus speaks are not the so-called Antichrist and his acolytes.  They are the people who will incite the people to rebel against Rome.  He warns the Disciples not to follow them because they will not bring salvation to the land as they intend but will instead invite destruction.⁴

Some time before Jesus makes His prediction about the destruction of Jerusalem, He asks the Disciples, "Who do you say that I am?"  Simon, one of the most vocal, brash, and hotheaded of the Disciples, replies, "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God."⁵  Jesus instructs the Disciples not to tell anyone that He is the Messiah.  At this point, because at least one of the Disciples believes He is the Messiah, He has to start warning them that, once He reaches Jerusalem, He will have to suffer, die, and be resurrected from the dead.⁶  Jesus wants them to understand that He is not the kind of messiah they have been expecting.

The people are expecting a conquering king, but Jesus has come as a suffering servant.  The people are expecting a savior who will bear arms, but Jesus is a Savior who will bear a cross.  What people believe about their Savior will naturally have implications for how they choose to follow their Savior.  When Simon objects to the revelation that Jesus will have to suffer and die, Jesus tells the Disciples that to follow Him is to deny oneself and to take up a cross as opposed to a sword.  To conquer through violence is to lose one's very soul.  Following Jesus means self-denial and self-sacrifice and not self-aggrandizement.

After Jesus warns the Disciples about the destruction of Jerusalem, He goes on to tell them about His return.  He tells them that they will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds to gather His people.⁷  After Jesus ascends to Heaven, his earliest followers will believe that His return to Earth will be very soon.  Maybe Jesus is merely saying that, when He returns, He will not be among the people who are plotting against Rome and that His return will leave no doubt about His identity.⁸

In AD 66, a few decades after Jesus' Ascension, the Roman governor Gessius Florus plunders the temple treasury in response to protests against taxation and unpaid taxes.  The people riot, killing a number of Roman soldiers, and Florus arrests and crucifies a number of city leaders.⁹  Jewish militants then revolt against the Roman Empire, driving non-Jewish people from the region of Judea and setting up a provisional government.  A seven-year war between the Jews and the Romans ensues.  In AD 70, after a siege lasting several months, the Romans penetrate the city walls and destroy the temple.¹⁰

During the war between the Jews and the Romans, many people chose not to follow Jesus' advice to flee but instead stood their ground in Jerusalem.  Many died of starvation during the siege, and some reportedly resorted to cannibalism.¹¹  This is the great suffering Jesus did not want His people to endure.  War is hell.

I think that one lesson we can glean from Jesus' grim prophecy and the warning He gives the Disciples is that Christ does not want us to throw away our lives engaging in conflicts that have nothing to do with what He has called us to do.  I think about the costly culture wars waged by certain segments of Christianity in conjunction with certain political interest groups.  Any gains they made in supposedly taking back the culture for Christ came at the cost of alienating people who might have been drawn to Christ were they not repelled by people's politics.  Christ never called us to take back the culture; Christ calls us to be a refuge for all who have been oppressed by the culture.

May you, dear reader, learn to recognize an unholy war when you see it, and may you choose not to engage.  Remember that to follow Jesus is not to take up a sword, whatever form that takes, but to take up a cross.  Remember that, as Revelation shows us, the Lion who emerged from battle victorious is the Lamb who was slain.¹²


Notes:

1. Matthew 24:1-3 (NRSV)
2. Matthew 24:15-28 (NRSV)
3. N.T Wright.  Matthew for Everyone, Part 2.  2004, Westminster John Knox Press.  pp. 118-119
4. ibid.
5. Matthew 16:15-16 (NRSV)
6. Matthew 16:20-21
7. Matthew 24:29-31
8. Wright, p. 117
9. Wikipedia: "Jerusalem riots of 66"
10. Wikipedia: "First Jewish-Roman War"
11. William Barclay.  The New Daily Study Bible: The Gospel of Matthew, Volume Two.  2001, Saint Andrew Press.  Barclay pp. 358-359
12. Revelation 5:5-6

Flevit super illam was painted by Enrique Simonet in 1892.