It Was Never Yours
At the beginning of Luke 16 we experience a strange story shared by Jesus where he seems to high five a dishonest manager? Rather than skipping over these difficult moments let's actually step back and experience the story in Luke's context. [Note blog with video plus full message video and printable PDF article.]
I had another message planned. But six weeks earlier, while reading through the Bible with our Cadre and church family, I ran into a passage that made me say, “Wait. Jesus said what?” You know those moments when you hope the next verses are easier? This time I could not just move on.
It started with a title. We call Luke 15 “The Prodigal Son,” but that can be like setting your GPS for the wrong destination. The lost sheep and the lost coin are not ultimately stories about a sheep and a coin. They draw our attention to the one who seeks. And the next story is not simply about one wayward boy. There are two lost sons—and one relentlessly loving father.
The younger son wants his share and leaves. The older son stays, works, and resents it. One wants the father’s stuff without the father. The other is in his father’s presence but does not want his father’s presence. Both miss his heart.
Then the father says something remarkable: “Everything I have is yours” (Luke 15:31, NLT). Wait. Whose is it? Everything I have. His generosity is not running out, like the last slice of pecan pie. But it still belongs to him.
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Now keep reading into Luke 16. Do not let a chapter number convince you Jesus changed the subject. He tells a bizarre story about a dishonest manager who reduces other people’s debts to make friends before he loses his job. The rich man admires him for being shrewd. What? Is Jesus high-fiving a crook?
No. Jesus is not praising fraud. He is pointing to foresight. The man understood that decisions made today affect tomorrow. Then Jesus turns the whole conversation toward eternity. Use your worldly resources to benefit others, he says, with an eternal home in view (Luke 16:9).
Imagine using what God has entrusted to you so another person experiences his generosity. Imagine meeting people in eternity whose lives were touched by that kindness. That does not mean generosity earns salvation; salvation is God's gift. It means how we use what is temporary matters forever.
And then Jesus gives us the familiar words we sometimes pull out of context: be faithful with little things; you cannot serve both God and money. The Pharisees who loved money scoffed. The disciples listened. Which response sounds more like us?
I think of walking into Menards without a cart. “I only need one thing.” Halfway through the store my hands are full, my fingers hurt, and I am still clutching everything. Sometimes that is what we do with God’s provision. We grab. We clutch. Or we resent being responsible for what belongs to him.
Money is a tool, not the treasure. The Father is relentlessly loving. And what is in our hands is entrusted to us for more than today.
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