Sermon Tone Analysis
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March 27, 2022 - Luke 16:1-1
Luke through Lent - Hard Heart
Rev’d Lynda Johnso
Have you ever had a Taxation of ce audit
How did you feel?
Were there some nerves - what did I do?
What didn’t I do
Or maybe, you have had a tax audit and knowing you did some dodgy stuff on your last tax
return.
The nerves would de nitely be there and you'd wonder what the outcome might be
Similarly, have you ever been a victim of fraud?
I’ve known at least two people who have been
defrauded by a business partner, and the end result was terrible, coupled with relational
breakdown and horror.
I really hope it hasn’t happened to you
Some shrewd managers do well.
Some shrewd managers fall away
Today we’re looking at a really strange parable.
On initial reading it seems that Jesus is af rming dishonesty.
What on earth can this parable
mean?
How do we interpret whether shrewdness is positive or negative?
How do we nd out what
Jesus really meant
And probably the biggest question is - why on earth would Jesus tell a story like this anyway.
It
seems so odd
Well, can I say that one of the rst things we do in ALL bible reading is consider the context.
And that means you have to ask ….. what’s happened before, and what happens after.
The rst thing to note is that this immediately follows the parables of the the lost sheep, lost coin
and lost sons, which was our reading last week.
And we noted then that these were parables for
the Pharisees to hear.
It’s the Pharisees who were there muttering about Jesus saying "He
welcomes sinners and eats with them."
And he told the parables of the lost sheep, coin and son
Then at the beginning of chapter 16, in v.1 it says that Jesus is now speaking to the disciples.
And he tells them this really interesting parable
But before we get into it, I want to direct you to v.14.
I believe this is a key to understanding why
Jesus told this parable
v.14 says - "The Pharisees, who loved money, heard all this and were sneering at Jesus.
So we’re told that Jesus is telling this story to his disciples, but the Pharisees haven’t gone
anywhere.
They hear it all!
And Jesus would obviously know that the Pharisees are still there, and
could hear.
My question is - was Jesus continuing to tell parables against the Pharisees.
Was Jesus wanting
them to hear??
I believe - yes, he was
Let’s get back to the parable with all that in mind
Basically what it is, is that a rich man does an audit on his manager, his steward, because he’d
been accused of wasting his possessions.
Not the sort of thing you’d be wanting a supposedly trustworthy manager to do
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So the manager goes into panic mode.
I’m getting red!
I’ve been doing a desk job for so long, I’m
not t anymore so I couldn’t do a labouring job, and I’m certainly not going to demean myself by
begging!!
I have to work out a plan.
What about - if I negotiate with all the debtors, and get in good
with them, then they’ll like me and invite me for meals.
Then at least I won’t starve
So he sets about to put his plan into action.
He calls in the debtors one by one and changes their
invoices in their favour
Surprisingly the rich man commends this, and we’re left wondering ….. why
Now of course, this is a parable.
It’s a story Jesus made up, so we can’t have every question
answered as if we needed to do an investigation of it all.
This isn’t a real audit.
It’s a story
designed to teach a principle
We don’t know whether the manager was lining his own pockets by over-charging, and through
these invoice changes he was righting his own wrongs.
You could say that that change of method
could be commended.
We don’t know whether he was skimming other things off the top and diddling the rich man that
way
And we don’t need to know.
All that we know is - we’ve got a dodgy manager; he got found out, and the end result was that he
was commended for how he handled it.
And we are told the reason for the commendation - he
acted shrewdly.
And in these circumstances he was in, that was wise
Jesus says that the point of the story is that we are to use worldly resources wisely, to plan well for
the future.
And the big point about that, is that it’s not just about a physical worldly future, but we need to plan
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