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The Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost September 18, 2016

This Weekend's Readings (click each reading to view the passage)

Amos 8:4-7; Psalm 113; 1 Timothy 2:1-7; Luke 16:1-13

Pr. Steve's Sermon: Being Shrewd

Children's Sermon: Leaves

Sermon Notes from Pastor Steve...

This past week, Council was reviewing our procedures for doing background checks. As many of you know, we background check all of our staff, and any of our volunteers who work directly with children. And I say, "many of you know this" because many of you have gone through that process and been background checked!

And we do this, not because we don't trust you, but because we know that there are people out there like this guy that Jesus talks about in the parable in today's Gospel reading! It's too bad there weren't background checks back then, because maybe then the guy who hired this "manager" would know that he was a crook. In fact, even after he's caught, he continues to "cook the books."

He's a totally unlikely character for Jesus to lift up. He's accused of being a crook, and he actually is! You might expect Jesus to use a more likeable character, or at least someone who has a tragic flaw that you can sympathize with.

But Jesus doesn't do that. This guy is just like every other stereotypical bad guy people hear about in their daily lives. But then, Jesus creates a twist in the story. The boss "commends" the crook for being "shrewd". Really?!

In spite of that fact that the guy's a crook, the boss is impressed that at least he knows how to act "shrewdly". What's "commendable" about this guy is not that he's a bad manager. And it's also not his dishonesty. Instead, Jesus points out that even this crook who has no ethics, knows how to act "shrewdly" when the situation requires it.

And being ready and willing to act "shrewdly" is really what this parable is all about. But then again, the word "shrewdly" can also have some negative connotations, and the Greek word it's translated from can also be hard to translate into English. Often, it's translated as "wise" or "prudent" ... (as when Jesus says, "be 'wise' as serpents"...)

But even those English words also don't quite get the sense of this word. In this case, "shrewd" has the connotation of being:

Emotionally ready and willing to accept a new reality, even a difficult reality ... (this guy immediately jumps over all the stages of grief and goes right to acceptance ...)

Intellectually ready and willing to think creatively about alternatives he had never even considered before ... (this guy is willing to think outside the box, and even redraw what the box looks like to come up with a way forward in light of the new reality ...)

Physically ready and willing to take action right now to live into that new reality ... (this guy acts and uses the physical resources he has at his disposal right now to live into the situation he finds himself in ...)

Sometimes, Jesus uses a bizarre and unexpected character in his parables precisely to catch our attention. And that's what's happening here. Jesus isn't calling us to be dishonest or to cook the books for our bosses. Instead, he's saying, "look, you know how even dishonest people are often really capable of acting shrewdly when they're confronted with a new reality. And you know what? God is bringing about a new reality in your life each day as well. Are you ready to respond with that same kind of "shrewdness"...?

And while the kind of "shrewdness" Jesus calls us to shouldn't involve dishonesty or cooking the books, it is the kind of shrewdness that calls us to:

Emotionally accept and embrace a new day that God is giving us ... (often, this is hard when things are changing rapidly around us, and maybe not for the best - bad situations in the world which seem to be getting worse, or personally, the loss of a job or a loved one; but it's also sometimes difficult even when good things happen, because we're not always sure what those new things will bring for us - this happened even when the first disciples we're called to embrace the Resurrection of Jesus as the basis of a new reality for their lives ...)

Think in new and creative ways about how we move forward from here ... the guy in the parable first considered the two rational alternatives, but he didn't stop there; sometimes, our biggest challenge to living into the new day God gives each of us is to consider that God might be calling us to try something that at first seems wild and outrageous (including that we STOP doing things that we've always done); but then, that's what Jesus called people to do in the first century as well ...!

Act boldly, using our time, our actions and our material resources to live into the new reality that God gives us; another difficult to understand and translate phrase in today's Gospel reading is "dishonest wealth"; really, though, it has the meaning of "transitory wealth"; the guy in the parable can act shrewdly because he doesn't see his money and material possessions as separate from his spiritual and emotional self; Acting "shrewdly" often means not doing what so many Christians often do, and separating our "real lives" from our "spiritual lives"; Jesus calls us to live into the new "spiritual reality" God gives us each day through our real, everyday "physical" lives and with our ordinary physical "stuff" ...

Jesus told his first disciples, and he tells us, that God is always giving us a new day and bringing about a new reality full of hope and new life. That's never in question, even and especially when things seem difficult and hard, because it's often the case that God's reality of new life happens even in the midst of death, as it did on Easter Sunday when standing at the tomb of death, the first disciples were discovering a day of new life.

So what new day is God bringing about in your life? Who are the new people God is placing in your life? What are the new opportunities God is giving you? What's the different reality God is calling you to experience?

Jesus' call to you and to me, as it was to his first disciples, is to be ready to live and act "shrewdly" so that we can really experience and live into the new day God gives us.

And that means that Jesus calls us to be people who each day confidently embrace hope and new life; to be people who are ready to consider and envision new possibilities; and to be people who act boldly, being willing to invest ourselves and our material possessions in the new reality that God is bringing about in our lives.

Amen.