The Dishonest Manager

The Dishonest Manager (Luke 16:1-13)

Yesterday my wife asked me to read about the Dishonest Manager in Luke 16 and explain it to her and the older girls. I read it slowly and carefully and was challenged by it. I thought I would share my thoughts. 

You have this Rich Man who is seemingly powerful. He has a Manager that is managing his estate. The Manager is found out to be wasting his Masters possessions. The Rich man is going to call the Manager before him so that the Manager will have to give an account for his actions. 

The Manager says to himself, "I really have no skills to find a job, and I am NOT going to go and beg; I need to make some friends so that I will have places to stay and people who will care for me when I loose my job." So he calls the people who owe his Master stuff. He says to one, "how much olive oil do you owe my Master?" The person says "800 gallons." The Manager says, "take your bill, scribble it out and write down that you own him only 400 gallons." 

He does this to a couple of people, and they surely would have been thankful and grateful for what the Manager was doing for them. He was making friends with them. 

The Master actually commends the dishonest Manager for acting shrewdly. And he says that we need to be more like that. 

Luke 16:9
I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.

What does this mean? Well if you look at the cross references, one points out that we are to sell our possessions and give to the poor, then we will have treasures in heaven. (Matt 19:21) And the other, to sell our possessions and give to the needy, which will provide moneybags for ourselves in heaven. (Luke 12:33)

Here are some connections. 
1. The Rich Man is like God
2. The dishonest Manager is like me and you. 
3. All the possessions the Manager cares for are all the things God gives us to steward. All the money we have, all the possessions we have are actually Gods. We are to be good stewards of them. 
4. The Manager makes himself friends with money. We are to use our money to make eternal friends. If I go without, so that I can use that money to give to someone who needs it, and I do this in Jesus name; I am storing up for myself treasures in heaven. I am going without now, so that I can have later. 

This is challenging to me. I remember giving my lunch away to a begger on the street because he told me he was hungry. But did I go without my lunch that day? No, I drove strait to McDonalds and ordered a value meal. 

God made everything in 6 literal days. All the things you see around you are nothing more than re-arranged earth. Even my iPhone that I am typing on is made from earths resources that have been arranged by man into this product. 

God made everything, and God owns everything. He is the Rich Master whom we will be called before one day to give an account. How well do you use the resources He has given you? Do you use them to gather for yourself earthly possessions, or heavenly ones? That my friends, is challenging!