Your Role in God's Will

Pentecost 15 Proper 20 

September 18, 2022

Fr. Tim Nunez

Today’s Gospel includes a parable that is a real head scratcher. The manager or steward gets caught squandering his master’s property. He cheats his master and then gets praised for it.

In order to better understand it, we must remember its context. Jesus has been answering the Pharisees who criticized him for eating with sinners. He told the parable of the lost sheep and the lost coin, both of which were found with great rejoicing. Then he shared the parable of the Prodigal Son, who was also lost and found.

So that is one context. He’s still working on that same theme, turning now to his disciples, with this parable of the Dishonest Manager or Dishonest Steward.

Another context to remember is the story of Israel, the Israel they all call home and the Israel they all want to see restored by God. In that larger narrative, when we see parables with owners or masters or hosts or lords or kings, the honored authority figure is always a metaphor for God the Father.

When we look across the greater story of Israel, we often reflect on how Israel failed by running after false idols or getting slack in their worship, which we take on face value as being bad or wrong.

But there are effects and consequences for what we believe. And I don’t mean what we say we believe. What we say we believe doesn’t really count for much if we don’t conform our hearts and minds, and our very lives to that. What we think matters. Believing the wrong thing leads to wrong actions. If we follow after false idols, or set our hearts on false beliefs, or set our goals on temporal things, then our actions will follow those false trails to ungodly mindsets and ungodly behaviors.

When Israel neglected the Law of Moses, when they neglected the spirit of the Law of Moses, among the laws they neglected were those we see referenced in our reading from the Prophet Amos. There’s a little history to know here.

After King Solomon, his son Jeroboam led a rebellion against his brother Rehoboam that Israel split into two kingdoms, Jeroboam leading Israel in the north and Rehoboam leading Judah in the south, which included Jerusalem and the Temple. Jeroboam set up rival temples in Bethel and Dan, temples that featured golden calves, the worship of Baal. The golden calf is bad, right?

Amos, who was from the southern kingdom of Judah, was called by God to prophesy against the false idols and other ungodly practices of the northern kingdom of Israel under Jeroboam II, who reigned about 150 years after his namesake. In today’s reading we hear some results of following the false idols.

Israel is greedy, treating festivals of the new moon and the Sabbath as inconveniences. They are obsessed with dirty dealing. They make the ephah –a standard measure equal to a bushel, small. Making the shekel great is like putting your thumb on the scale. They are practicing deceit by cheating people and forcing the poor into slavery. They are robbing the poor by selling every last scrap of the grain.

All of that is wrong, right? But why is it wrong? To start with, God is the ultimate source of all good, of all goodness. All through Genesis, before Moses, before the Exodus, before Leviticus God had been the standard. Then, after God brought them out of bondage in Egypt and before he led them into the Promised Land, he gave them the Law through Moses. He told them. Written by God’s own finger in stone, he told them.

Each of those attitudes and actions are specifically forbidden in the Law, in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. But the problem here isn’t just failing to follow God’s Law, it is that their devotion to the false gods, the Baals, has precisely these results.

We saw the ruins of the temple at Dan. We saw the main altar, along with several other altars. We saw standing stones which were in place for idol worship. What had been a busy city built around gushing springs and a center of trade is now just ruins.

That helps us understand how the disciples and the Pharisees would have understood Jesus’ teaching. Jesus is holding the Pharisees accountable to the fullness and the spirit of the Law, because for all their piety they have neglected the poor and those lost people who are following Jesus.

The Kingdom of God is different.

How does that speak to us today? There is only one place to put ourselves in the parable. God is the master and we are, potentially, more or less, the managers or stewards of all that he has given us. What does God expect from his managers? While we remain in this world, we are to be industrious. We are to prosper as best we can. We are to be faithful in the little things so that we learn to be faithful in big things, and can be relied upon.

And that takes time. It takes focus. You don’t get much out of a restaurant if all you do is occasionally drop by and look at the menu. Or, worse, you only ever stop by the gas station up the block. Or all you do is listen to its commercials. Get faithful in a little. Devote some time every day to reading the Bible. Pick a book. Pick a devotional that covers a book or a topic and stick with it. Say your prayers. When you tell someone, “I’m praying for you” do it. Right then and make a note to remember it later. Disciples have disciplines. And if you’ll be faithful in a little you’ll find God calling you to be faithful in a lot.

All of that is so that we can bless those around us. Some of that comes through outreach, but the largest part comes through you, through your goodness and fairness in all your dealings, through your influence in your family, your work, your friendships. But we’ve got to keep him first.

AMEN