Don Friesen
A firm was interviewing candidates for a senior accounting position. The first candidate was asked, "What's two plus two?" "Four," he replied, whereupon he was ushered out of the room and told, "Don't call us; we'll call you." A second candidate was asked the same question, and when he gave the same answer he was also summarily dismissed. A third candidate, upon being asked the same question, "What's two plus two?" stood up, locked the door, went over to the windows and lowered the blinds, then leaned over the desk and in a hushed voice asked, "How much do you want it to be?"
Stories like that are a little less funny since the financial scandals of Enron and WorldCom. Fortune magazine named Enron "America's Most Innovative Company" for six consecutive years! It was innovative, alright, especially its accounting department. One might have thought that the lessons of these scandals had been learned, but several years later CEO Dennis Kozlowski was sentenced to 25 years in prison for looting Tyco International of hundreds of millions of dollars. Heads have rolled, ofttimes straight into a prison cell, as formerly celebrated CEOs have been charged with fraud and with betraying the trust of their stockholders. Their stories are shocking tales of greed and criminal mismanagement. Former Canadian Conrad Black is just one of the latest in this parade of greed.
The dollars involved in these tales of greed and criminal mismanagement are almost too large to comprehend, but the sense of betrayal is the same as in cases of minor fraud. I remember my parents purchasing a business, and discovering, after the papers had been signed, that taxes were owed on the property! The previous owner, however, had skipped the country, and responsibility for the tax-bill fell to my parents. The lawyer involved was negligent, and probably in a conflict of interest – being the only lawyer in town and used by both parties – but my parents paid the back taxes, and in our household the previous owner's name was forever associated with fraud.
Another Account of Fraud
We find similar fraudulent activity in today's Gospel reading. It's the story of a quick-witted scoundrel, but a scoundrel nonetheless, who tries to cover his fraudulent tracks with additional fraud! The story goes something like this: A wealthy landowner assigned the management of his properties to a fellow named Willy Steward. It was Willy's job to oversee the contracts with the tenant farmers who used his master's land. Willy wasn't the sharpest knife in the management drawer, so the wealthy landowner said, "Willy! Show me the books!" Willy knew he was in big trouble, and sure enough, the books showed mismanagement of criminal proportions, and Willy was released from the firm.
Well, Willy Steward changed his name to Wily Steward, and he changed his "squandering" (Luke 16:1) ways to scheming ways. He was in a bind! His ruined reputation could well prevent him from finding a similar job with another firm, he was too flabby – perhaps too lazy – to do manual labour and he was too proud to beg, so he struck upon a unique idea. Wily's clients assumed he was still with the firm, and so when he visited each of them, offering them generous discounts on their debt load, they were pleased to oblige. In so doing, Wily ingratiated himself to the clients – for substantial sums were involved – and Wily figured: I'm already fired. How much worse can it get? At least the clients will now be my friends.
One might expect Wily to get hoisted by his own twisted petards, but in a surprising twist of the story, the landowner admired Wily's shrewdness! He's a disaster at management, thought the wealthy landowner, but my cash flow has improved immensely. Wily expected his boss to be furious, but his shrewd manoeuvres resulted in a win-win-win situation! Unbelievable! And this is a story Jesus told to teach us about life in the kingdom of God! Go figure!
One Tough Parable!
Jesus' parables are usually enigmatic, but this one is particularly hard to crack. It's a notoriously difficult passage to interpret. In fact, I was hoping this reading would be the reading for next Sunday – when we're at the retreat – but here it is, and here I am, and we're going to have to make the best of it. Some passages of Scripture leave room for doubt because there are so many variations of the text in the various ancient manuscripts we rely on. Not this one. It has only a few variants – minor ones – so we're left with the story pretty much as we read it.
The story has bothered people for centuries. Saint Augustine (354-430) said, "I can't believe that this story came from the lips of our Lord." The Emperor Julian (361-363), a contemporary of Augustine, used this parable to denounce the Church, saying, "Of course Jesus told it, and of course it proved Jesus a mere man and hardly a worthy man." Centuries later biblical scholar Rudolph Bultmann (1884-1976) threw up his hands trying to understand why Jesus would tell the story of a crooked manager who gets out of his difficulties by swindling! And to top things off, Jesus seems to commend this rogue manager! Is Jesus recommending deceitful business practices? The difficulty of this parable is confirmed by the hundreds of interpretations in its wake.
Sometimes I wonder if Luke himself was puzzled by this parable because it looks like he tacked on about three different endings. Ending #1, or Moral #1: Christians should be as shrewd as creative accountants (Luke 16:8); Moral #2: Use filthy lucre for good (16:9); and Moral #3: Be faithful with the small stuff, if you want to earn God's trust with the big stuff (16:10-12). So which is it?!?
Possible Parabolic Lessons
A variety of lessons have emerged from this parable. Some suggest the parable has a simple lesson, like: Make friends. Jesus says as much: "I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes." (Luke 16:9) Yes, the rogue manager was dishonest, but he gained a lot of good will and friends who might help him later. In other words, relationships trump riches. Human beings trump profit margins. A noble idea, but I wonder about the health of relationships based on fraud.
Another simple lesson: Develop the gift of shrewdness. Practise cunning. Be as cunning in kingdom matters as "the children of this age" (Luke 16:8) are about material matters. Well, we all want to be smart, but Wily's ingenious scheme was risky. If it worked, his future would be secured; if it did not, he would have yet another prison sentence tacked on to his criminal record. We don't know why it worked; we can only speculate. Perhaps the landowner was astute enough, when he saw the community already celebrating his generosity, to realize that his reputation would be compromised if he asked the original debts to be reinstated. It would reveal his lack of control over his own affairs, and saving face was very important in that society.
Now, in some commentary on this parable, Jesus' "Be shrewd" comment somehow morphs into Stephen Covey's "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People," and Jesus' parables are reduced to strategies for success. Just as people who are successful in their careers set goals, so Christians ought to do the same. My goal is to forgive ten people today, whether or not they've wronged me. Christians, like successful career people, should be disciplined, focussed on results, and intent on advancement – really! – even if Jesus said that the first will be last? I would like to think that there's more to Jesus' parable than the vacuous maxim: Don't be sloppy at what you do!
A corollary lesson to the "Be shrewd" lesson might be: Be proactive. Don't resign yourself to a bad situation. Think outside the box. When the boss calls us in and tells us to clean out our desk, some of us hang our head and go stand quietly in the unemployment line. When bad things happen to us we sigh, resign ourselves to a bleak future, contort our voice into a whine, and wallow in self-pity. Perhaps Jesus is suggesting that Christian discipleship demands more than Stoic resignation. Be creative! Be hopeful! Stride into the future with confidence! If a wealthy landowner can forgive an unscrupulous scoundrel, how much more will God forgive us!
A related lesson gleaned from this parable is: Prepare for the future. The story is told of a Christian who arrived at the Pearly Gates, where Saint Peter offered to show her around. She was looking forward to seeing her own mansion in glory, and when Peter took her through a lavish neighbourhood, she wondered which one of these palatial homes was hers. Saint Peter took her through another neighbourhood, not as fancy – mostly little bungalows with white picket fences and campers in the back yard – and she was glad that none of the mailboxes there had her name on them. She was doubly glad when Saint Peter took her past a slightly run-down apartment complex, and drove on. Saint Peter eventually stopped at the very outskirts of heaven near an old tarpaper shack. To her horror, her name was stencilled on its dilapidated mailbox. She asked Saint Peter for an explanation. "Well," said Peter, "we used all of the material that you sent on ahead! This is all we received from you while you were living down on earth."
We spend all kinds of energy and ingenuity planning for our retirement, but perhaps we don't devote enough energy to our long-term future. Jesus, one of our first financial advisors, said, "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven...." (Matthew 6:19-20) Jesus also told the story of a farmer who prepared for his future by building bigger and bigger barns to store his largesse (Luke 12:16-21), and then informs us that God considered the man a fool! (12:20)
It's about Grace ...
The various interpretations of Jesus' parable are all flawed and speculative, so I feel free to speculate about another possibility. I wonder if the parable doesn't have something to do with the system of indentured servanthood common at the time. Over the years the rich in Jesus' day had become richer, and the poor poorer. The debt load of the poor was so crushing that they had no hope of ever getting out from under it. The poor were aware of the Old Testament vision of jubilee – a vision of wealth redistribution – but the rich had always resisted its implementation.
When Jesus told the story of Wily Steward, the poor must have nodded in agreement. They too were at the mercy of the wealthy's whims. When Jesus outlined Wily's scheme, however, they may have slapped their thighs in delight, not believing that the underdog would get the upper hand, but cheering him on nonetheless.
It's akin to a World War II story of a wine steward in charge of the finest collection of wine in all of Europe. The wine cellar at the Chateau of Monaco was well known for its rare, vintage wines, and when the Nazis overran the city they expected to indulge themselves. The wine steward resented their presence and carefully hid the rarest wines deep in the cellar. He served the invaders only the cheapest wines, pretending that they were the best.
We like stories in which the little guy gets the upper hand. Those of my vintage will remember the movie, The Sting (1973), in which some bad guys pulled one over on some guys who were even worse! Or consider a more recent movie, Catch Me If You Can (2002), based on the true story of a successful con artist (Frank Abagnale Jr.) who passed himself off as a doctor, a lawyer, and a pilot, always just a few steps ahead of the FBI. We know we're not supposed to cheer for him, and we know that he's tempting fate, but there's some pleasure to be derived from seeing someone thumb his nose at the system.
I can imagine that those listening to Jesus' parable found the story delightful, while knowing full well it was an outrageous scenario, especially when the landowner commended the manipulative little manager. He was an indentured peasant, just like them, but he was a teflon peasant, and it was nice to entertain the notion that they too might someday escape their bleak existence.
The lesson of the parable then becomes: Trust God's grace. The situation Jesus sketched was so fanciful that it could not possibly be about any landowner they knew! Wily, the rogue manager, was counting on his boss's compassion, so Jesus must really be talking about God. The boss could have had Wily put in jail for his initial acts of mismanagement, but he didn't, and so Wily conceived of a plan in which he would benefit from his boss's mercy. He had confidence that his approach would work.
The lesson for us then is that God invites us to trust His love and mercy. God invites us to go about our Christian duties and witness, trusting in God's compassion, even and perhaps especially in times of crisis. Even unscrupulous characters trust compassion on occasion; should not Christians be even more trusting of God?
This parable then, like the stories of the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the lost brothers, informs us of the outrageousness of God's extravagant grace. Jesus uses the figure of a rogue to emphasize the roguery of grace. Thank God this parable is not about money! It's yet another spiritual lesson about God, who treats us as more than a business transaction. That's a relief, not only because some of us have done little to deserve God's grace, but also because we don't really want the change the economic system that benefits us.
...or Is it?
Thank God this parable is not about money! ... Or is it? There are several reasons why it may be. For one thing, Luke follows this parable with the observation that the Pharisees listening in were "lovers of money, ...and they ridiculed him." (Luke 16:14)
Secondly, there is throughout the Gospel of Luke a special concern for the poor. Many of the characters in Luke's parables have trouble with money. The prodigal wastes it, the rich man refuses to share, a woman loses one of her precious coins, a widow presses a case involving money, and so on. The theme of wealth is as prominent in the Gospel of Luke as the theme of grace, and there may very well be some connection between the two.
Thirdly, while studying this parable I couldn't help thinking of two other parables. One of them is a mirror image of this one – the parable of the unforgiving servant who is forgiven a truckload of debt but who then cuts his own debtors no slack whatsoever! (Matthew 18:21-35) And the other is the parable that follow's today's parable – the story of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31), a companion-piece to our parable.
In the story of Lazarus and the rich man, we witness a reversal of fortunes. On earth Lazarus must content himself with scraps from the rich man's table, while the rich man enjoys his sumptuous dining and other luxuries, blithely ignoring Lazarus' poverty. Both men die, the rich man incredulous as he peeks over the edge of hell and sees Lazarus dining at the great heavenly feast, at a place of honour, no less. Jesus was offended by the great chasm between the two men, by the gap between rich and poor, and when the rich man begged Jesus to warn his unsuspecting brothers about this reveral of fortunes, Jesus as much as said: Don't plead ignorance with me. All you had to do was read the prophets! And there it is, in today's reading from Amos, a profound castigation of those who exploit the poor, who "trample on the needy, and bring to ruin the poor...." (Amos 8:4)
It Ain't Right!
Our neighbours to the south are preparing for an election. Fifteen years ago there was a presidential candidate, small of stature and with ears not made for television, but who captured nineteen percent of the popular vote. His name was Ross Perot. He was a very wealthy man, and in one of his campaign advertisements he used several charts describing economic life in his country. One of his charts showed the level of poverty among children in his country compared to the levels of poverty of children living in European democracies. The chart showed that five to seven percent of the children living in European democracies were poor while twenty percent of the children in the United States were poor. No industrialized democracy was even close to twenty percent, and Ross Perot declared, "It ain't right, folks." I don't know if Perot used any of his own immense wealth to narrow the gap between rich and poor, but his diagnosis was dead on: "It ain't right, folks."
The Scriptures – including the prophets and Jesus – say the same thing: "It ain't right, folks." The prophet Amos said that "they who trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth" profane God's holy name (Amos 2:7). The prophet Isaiah warned those who "write oppressive statutes ...turn aside the needy from justice and ...rob the poor...." (Isaiah 10:1-2) Isaiah called for us to "loose the bonds of injustice...(and) to let the oppressed go free, ...to share (our) bread with the hungry, and (to) bring the homeless poor into (our homes)...." (Isaiah 58:6-7) The prophet Jeremiah said, "On your skirts is found the lifeblood of the innocent poor...." (Jeremiah 2:34) The prophet Zechariah urged: "Render true judgments, show kindness and mercy to one another; do not oppress the widow, the orphan, the alien, or the poor...." (Zechariah 7:9-10) Jesus' mission, drawn from the prophets, was "to bring good news to the poor," "to proclaim release to the captives..., to let the oppressed go free...." (Luke 4:18)
Systems that lock people in patterns of injustice have no place in the kingdom of God. The grace of God, as lived out in the life of Jesus, addressed economic injustice, and when the poor heard his words, they began to realize that forgiveness of debt is more than a petition in the Lord's Prayer!
Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969) was a Baptist minister in the early twentieth century. In fact, he was the most prominent liberal Baptist minister of that time. Fosdick has been called an "evangelical liberal" – he himself said, "I may be a liberal, but I'm evangelical, too!" – but he became a central figure in the conflict between fundamentalist and liberal forces in the 1920s and 30s. He was also an outspoken opponent of racism and injustice. Fosdick's sermons won him wide recognition, as did his nationally-broadcast radio addresses. He was the author of numerous books, one of which has the intriguing title, "On Being Fit to Live With" (1946). Fosdick wrote for Harper's, Atlantic Monthly, and Ladies' Home Journal, and he appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1925 and in 1930. Fosdick also wrote one of the hymns we love to sing, "God of Grace and God of Glory". (Hymnal: A Worship Book, #366)
A 1924 newspaper headline read:"Crowds Smash Door: Near Riot to Hear Fosdick". It was not uncommon for Fosdick's own seat in church to be filled by someone standing as soon as Fosdick entered the pulpit. A memo from the head usher of the church reported, "We had a hectic time yesterday in the ushering business. One lady fainted. Two ladies crawled under the ropes on the (pretext) of wanting to (exit) and then beat down the centre aisle. ...the crowd in the south gallery was dense and passing the plate was difficult and lengthy, as every one wanted to chip in – bless their hearts." (Leonard I. Sweet, "Liberalism and Lost Days: A Re-evaluation of Fosdick," The Christian Century, December 18-25, 1985)
When Fosdick was invited to be the minister of the new Riverside Church in Manhattan, he was reluctant, for one of the church's members was John D. Rockefeller (1874-1960), then the richest man in the world. Fosdick said to Rockefeller, "Do you realize how much I have to explain you to my friends?" To which Rockefeller replied, "Not nearly as much as I have to explain you (and your theology) to mine!"
There is something deep within the Christian tradition and vision of life that does not sit well with wealth. I don't know if the tension between Rockefeller and Fosdick produced anything of worth – perhaps Rockefeller's celebrated philanthropy – but we should not dismiss this tension, or try to appease it when we feel it within ourselves. We can thank God for the blessings that have come our way, but the biblical injunction to share it will always be with us. May this tension spark some of the creativity apparent in today's parable. AMEN
Quotations of Scripture are from the New Revised Standard Version, unless otherwise noted.