“THE LIGHT MAKES YOU CHILDREN””
Saint Luke 16: 1-9
9th Sunday After Trinity: 24 July Anno Domini 2016
Father Jay Watson SSP
This Gospel text in Saint Luke’s 16th chapter is every pastor’s least favorite periscope to preach upon. Parishioners don’t particularly like it either.
Patristic research shows that the Church Fathers have correctly, and creatively, allegorized parts of The Lord’s words so as not to do disservice, and heterodoxy, to the Rule of Faith—Justification by Grace through Faith, in Christ. Year after year as you have heard this text “unpacked” in homilies you have chaffed a bit and argued internally with its seeming strangeness. Get over it. This lection means the same today as it did last year when you heard it…it means exactly the same as when The Lord uttered these words to His Disciples.
You already know what the 7th commandment says, what it DEMANDS of you, and you can easily use any study Bible’s concordance to do further research on God’s Laws against stealing in all of its manifestations.
Adam was the first steward. His house and garner were paradise itself. He squandered His birthright as a child of light by listening to the Father of Lies and King of darkness. All of God’s specially chosen people are stewards of the gifts He gives to them by His free choice and gracious love. All of God’s specially chosen people despoil and waste these gifts on a daily basis. Your life is nothing but a day-to-day embezzlement of Jesus’ love. You “cook the books” in every way imaginable.
The point of Christ’s unsettling parable is not to be a clever shyster or nimble “heist” protagonist in one of those classic caper movies where the audience is actually rooting for the thief to pull off the big sting, or whatnot. The steward was a bad steward. You are bad humans. The steward should have been fired. You should be fried. The steward compounded his fallen nature by further defrauding his master. You, even after being Redeemed in the Blood of The Lamb, backslide into thievery every day. Your own actions only make things worse. Had the steward tried to save himself by his own efforts he too would have failed. The steward in reality trusted in His master’s wisdom, yes, but ultimately in his lord’s forgiveness and mercy.
Jesus, The Word of God, states truthfully that the children of this world are in their generations wiser than the children of light. What does this mean? Is Christ saying that the pagans are wiser than His own Blood-bought Saints? Well, maybe they are in a serpentine, Satanic, “eyes-opened” to all evil and nakedness kind of way. But is that truly the Wisdom of God. The fear of God is beginning of wisdom writes the Spirit by the Psalmist. What is Jesus saying? Jesus is saying that the unjust steward simply, in the end, relied not so much on the “friends” he had made by his own generosity in receipt of payment, but in the forgiveness of His master…and only his master…sola fide.
Jesus, The Wisdom of God, states truthfully that you are to make friends of the mammon of unrighteousness so that when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations. What does this mean? No, He is not saying indulge in sinful things to save your lives. Better to die a thousand horrible and painful deaths than to sin even once!
When a text is puzzling or confusing or even too hard to fully understand. Repent of your sinfully damaged “hard-drive” which remains corrupted with the virus of sin and daily sins. You should repent in not being able to fully grasp all of the Lords Words. When in doubt, look to the Cross and even better look to The Sacrament.
Jesus the only Righteous One was made your unrighteousness when He suffered and died as the font of all your sins, the collection drain and trap of all your sewage. He performed perfectly all your obligations, those things God demands of you but which you turn into unrighteousness by law-breaking, and then, even worse, turn into filthy rags by insufficient works. Jesus gives you His peace and restoration into your true family and home by giving you His “I forgive you, for you are my very Bride, my very Body, my own.” Jesus gives you everlasting habitations filled with Angels and Patriarchs, Seraphs and Prophets, Cherubs, Kings, Apostles, Evangelists, Martyrs, and translated family members. Jesus the Right One, the Honest and Good and True Steward of the Trinitarian Mysteries of The Godhead paid your bill as “debtor substitute”
In Him you are wise. In Him you are received.
In the Name of The Father and of + The Son and of The Holy Ghost
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