Domes - Our Monthly Newsletter
Dunbar UCC
September 23, 2007
Luke 16:1-9, 13
Salvation Calculation
- This is one of the hardest of Jesus’ parables to make any sense of. It’s about an office manager who lies, cheats and steals from his boss, and who is then rewarded -- by his boss! -- for being such a successful con artist. Is Jesus telling us to be like the dishonest manager?
- Some people use this parable to justify a life of crime -- but they’re missing the point. The dishonest manager was fired from a job he liked. He was making a good living. Imagine a job where you can give yourself a bonus whenever you want one!!!! He’d go to Circuit City and see an incredible 50 inch plasma High Definition TV and then he’d write himself a bonus check so he could buy it -- today!!!! But his boss was finally checking the books and he saw what this guy was doing. He fired him -- but gave him a week to leave. And this is where the story gets interesting. The office manager is a calculating person. He says to himself: “What am I going to do? I have a winter house in Florida -- I don’t want to lose that. And in the summers I have a beautiful home on the water in Mystic, CT. Close to the Halseys and Bonadies -- I’d miss them terribly if I had to sell that. But I can’t steal from my boss anymore -- what am I going to do?”
- So he came up with this ingenious plan. He’d contact all the people who owed his boss money -- and he’d tell them: “Don’t worry about it -- I convinced the boss to cancel your debt.” And now all these people owed the office manager a favor -- they’d give him a job, or take care of him for the rest of his life. Maybe he was a liar, a cheat, and a thief -- but he was smart too.
- When the boss saw all the money that the office manager stole from him in his last week -- he called him into his office and closed the door, and you know what he did? He offered him a cigar, and patted him on the back and said: “You are so shrewd and cunning and resourceful -- I don’t think I’ll fire you now. In fact, I’d like you to be the president of the company.” So the corrupt office manager and his boss made millions of dollars, and lived happily after after.
- Why’s Jesus telling us a story like this. The key is in this line, when Jesus said: “...for the children of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light.” The "children of this age” are the politicians -- they’re the Karl Roves, the Hilary Clintons -- they’re the CEO’s of Exxon/Mobile and General Motors. The children of this age are the army generals, like Petraeus, who has the impossible job of convincing people that we need to stay in Iraq -- and he’s doing it brilliantly. Do you think any church would have budget problems if Hillary Clinton or Barak Obama were on the stewardship committee? No way -- our budget would be in the millions of dollars -- and we’d be struggling to find how to spend all of it! Or do you think the Hamden Food Bank would be having shortages if Bill Gates was running it? Hamden would have enough food to feed Africa! Or what if Paris Hilton was running the New Haven shelter? We’d have no people living on the streets -- our shelter would look like the OMNI and the homeless would be pushing their shopping carts wearing the latest fashions!
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Jesus was saying: “My God -- I wish “the Children of Light” -- my followers -- were as clever and creative as the corrupt manager, the politicians, the CEO’s -- ‘cause if they were, this world wouldn’t be such a bad place. So come on --- my friends -- come on children of the light -- my followers -- take some risks -- be creative in practicing your love and goodness.”
Be kind like Warren Buffet invests his money --
Love your enemies like Oprah Winfrey interviews her guests --
And cheer up! -- the Kingdom of Heaven is closer than you think!