Sermon for September 18

Pentecost 15-C
9/18/22 St. John’s
Luke 16:1-13

Stop me if you’ve heard this one: St. Peter is sitting at the pearly gates and sees a man walking across the clouds toward him. The man stops and looks around in wonder. He says “This must be heaven.” St. Peter says, “Yes it is.” The says “Can I come in?” St. Peter says, “Sure, but first let me ask you – can you tell me something that you did in your lifetime that you feel was a really good thing?” The man thinks for a second and says, “Yes – once I was coming out of a restaurant and I saw gang of hoodlums hanging around drinking in the parking lot and being rowdy. Just then a lady walked out and the started bothering her and harassing her. I said, “Hey, you guys had better leave her alone,” and the biggest guy turned to me and said, “Oh yeah, who’s going to make us?” So I hauled off and hit him as hard as I could, and meanwhile the young lady ran to her car and got away safely.
St. Peter said, “Well done, my son! And when was it that this happened?” The man paused for a second and said, “Just now, actually.”

Well, what we know about the kingdom of heaven from the bible is lot more nuanced than that joke, in fact what Jesus says about it can be pretty mysterious.

Take today’s gospel reading, for example: The Parable of the Dishonest manager,

A man gets fired for squandering his boss’s property. So what does he do? He goes out and squanders more of his boss’s property or so it would seem. He cancels the debts of the people who owe him money. And then he goes back to his boss and what happens? His boss commends him for it. This is the example Jesus holds up of faithfulness.

So what does that tell us about the kingdom of heaven. Where is the good news of the kingdom in this story? Here’s the best answer I can come up with.

Let’s say we’re the olive merchant character in this parable. You’ve got a got business but, prices are going up, inflation is bad, there’s supply chain problems, you’ve had to take on some debt. In fact you owe a very big client, the rich man of this parable, a 100 jugs of olive oil – it’s a lot of money.

And you hear that this man’s manager is going around town calling in his master’s debts. This manager is known to be real tough customer and maybe even a little crooked. You’re worried.

But what does he do when he gets to your shop, he says “what do you
owe,” “100 jugs,” “here, give me the bill, scratch it out and write down fifty. OK, we’re done here.” And boom, just like that, your debt is cut in half. And he’s gone. Well that feels like good news! Maybe that’s something about the kingdom.

I still remember the first I ever set foot in a Lutheran church for worship, and right at the beginning, just like we did today, we all stood up and said the Brief Order of Confession and Forgiveness.” Back then it was out of the old green hymnal: “We confess that we are in bondage to sin and cannot free ourselves.” And the pastor stood up and said “I hereby declare to you the entire forgiveness of all your sins in the name of the Father Son and Holy Spirit.” Wow! I mean if you grew up in the church maybe it’s not such a big deal, you get used to it. But wow, the entire forgiveness of all my sins, not just half. I’m sure you don’t have to be Lutheran to know what that feels like. To have your debt forgiven –that’s good news.

Well then the parable goes on and it’s the same with the grain merchant. And who knows? Maybe then the fig grower and the goatherd all these people that were indebted to the master. And all of them, for no apparent reason, everybody receives this strange, underserved, unexpected, miraculous, unearned, grace and mercy. They are blessed.

But, what about this manager? Let’s put ourselves in his shoes for a minute. Kind of a mess, really got himself in trouble, has not served the master well. Serving his own ego, his own greed. Well, it happens to the best of us sometimes. And there are consequences, there is judgment, there is accountability by the master – well you expect that, that’s a good thing, it’s only right.

But if you’re this manager, you don’t give up, you don’t say “I’m done, I’m no good, I can’t be of any use to my master.” No you plug along and you end up being a blessing to others anyway, maybe in spite of yourself. And when you return to the master and the time comes for judgment, the master is merciful and gracious, and is happy about the good his servant did. That’s some good news for him.

And finally, what about master in this parable? You know, the parent, the king, the master almost always, if they represent anybody, it’s God. So, this ends up being pretty good picture of God, too. Not always happy with his servants, especially when they blatantly sin, but has a sense of humor and admires spunk, encourages creativity. Is happy to see all people blessed.

I don’t know what Jesus means when he talks about making friends by dishonest wealth and them welcoming him into eternal homes. I have no idea and I don’t know anybody who does. Maybe it ties in with what he tells his disciples about being wise as serpents and innocent as doves. Maybe it means sometimes we have to work change from inside the system to bring about good. Know who you serve.

Scripture is not always easy to understand, and this parable is a good example of that. Jokes about the heaven are usually pretty straightforward, but truth is there are lots of questions we don’t know the answers to in our faith – that’s why it’s called faith. But the one thing we do know is that God, our master, loves us, wants us to serve him, we sometimes do wrong things, but we can trust that God will welcome us back, forgive us and maybe even commend us when we return to him.
That’s some very good news.