The Blessed Squanderers

Part 2 – the Unrighteous Steward - Failing into the Stewardship of Grace

…By lessening the burden of the debtors, the steward touched his master's heart. Through his experience of failure, the steward's perspective on everything spontaneously changed.

Now that we have reviewed the first parable, we can go on to the parable of the unrighteous steward in chapter 16. This parable is perhaps less familiar to Christians. 

Losing the Stewardship

According to the story, there was a rich man who had a steward. This steward had been accused by others of squandering his master's resources. The master confronted the steward, telling him that his stewardship was going to be taken from him. The steward knew that he was going to lose his position. He thought to himself, "what shall I do? My lord has taken away the stewardship. I cannot dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I know what I shall do, so that when I am removed from the stewardship, they may receive me into their houses." He then devised a plan to take care of himself. He called all of his masters debtors to himself, and asked them how much they owed. One said that he owed 100 measures of oil. He instructed the debtor to quickly write down 50. Another said he owed 100 measures of wheat. He instructed this debtor to quickly write down 80.

The Master’s Praise

The master then praised the steward, saying that he had done prudently. The Lord commented, saying "the sons of this age are more prudent with their own generation than the sons of light. And I say to you, make friends for yourselves by means of the unrighteous mammon, so that when it fails, they may receive you into eternal tabernacles." The Lord continues his speaking about mammon, and concludes by saying that no man can serve God and mammon – for he will love the one and hate the other.

This parable is troubling. If we had told it, the story might have been different. We might have said that the steward was about to lose his stewardship, but came to his senses and realized he had been squandering everything. He resolved from that point to only care for his master's interests and to administer his resources with justice. We would then perhaps have him calling all the master's debtors together and saying "I will personally pay the debts you cannot pay." We would end the story with him sacrificing everything for the glory of the master! But this is not how the story played out.

Instead of repenting, it looks as if he thought only of himself and where he would go when the stewardship was taken away. Is this service to the Lord? It seems like service to self interest! Not only did he not "repent" but it looks as if what he did next was perhaps even worse. He abused what remained of his authority to diminish the amount that the master’s debtors owed. Isn’t he squandering even more of his master's resources? At first glance this looks like he was bribing the debtors so that they would take care of him when he lost his job.

Yet, the master did not punish the steward. In fact, he praised him, and then the Lord commended his behavior as a pattern! He is unrighteous, but the master praised him for his prudence, and the Lord said that we should imitate this kind of prudence. What's going on here?

Touching the Master’s Heart

It is troubling until we see that this parable is linked to the parable that preceded it. In both parables, the focus is on a squanderer. The first squanderer was the son, and he squandered his inheritance. The second is a steward, and he squandered the master's possessions.

In this parable, the master represents the Lord. Who do the debtors represent? Actually, the debtors represent everyone in the master's house. According to the story, they owed wheat and oil. In the Bible, wheat and oil come together to make the meal offering. This signifies a living full of Christ for God and man's satisfaction. All of us as believers who have been purchased by the blood of Jesus Christ have become debtors to our new master. What do we owe him? We owe him our whole life. Yet the kind of life we owe is not a natural human life, but a life full of Christ. We owe him our whole being so that He can make our life part of a “meal offering” for the Father, a life that is Christ lived through us. 

So what did this steward do with the debtors? He lessened the demand in order to gain favor for himself. He knew that he was going to lose his stewardship, and he also realized that this stewardship was his very life. Once the stewardship was gone, he would have no place for himself. If he was going to have any place, he was going to have to depend on the debtors. He needed them to receive him into their houses. So to the one who owed 100 measures, he said to write down 50. To the one who owed 100 measures of wheat, he said to write down 80. He worked with them to lessen the demand, to diminish the burden. Why was he praised for this? Because through this experience, he unwittingly touched the master's heart.

The Father of the Prodigal is the Master of the Steward

We also need to see something about the master's nature. The parable of the steward and the parable of the prodigal son are linked in the squandering of what had been given to both of them. Also, the master of the house in Luke 16 is the father of the house in Luke 15! If we realize this, we can look at the father in Luke 15 to see what kind of master we have in Luke 16.

The father was not a hard master, with desire to gain something a back from his son's labor. He was a loving father, who was just so glad that his son was alive, and so glad that his son was in his house. The son had squandered everything, but the father was overjoyed to receive him back and give even more to him, because of his great love. Also, this was a rich father. He gave his son the inheritance, but he had much more to give out of the abundance of his wealth. This father is the master in chapter 16. The master is a master, but he has a nature of this father.

These pictures represent our relationship as believers with God in His household. Although we owe our Master so much, He is not interested in making us miserable or burdening us with debt. He is not interested in putting a heavy load on us. He is happy to have us in his household. We are His debtors, but we are His children. We could never repay Him. He would like to see His Son lived out in us. Yet He is very compassionate. He realizes that we are just dust. He realizes that our spiritual capacity is not that great, and that we are all great squanderers. He wants to extend grace to us. He is rich, the richest in the universe, and wants to be a continual source of supply for us.

The Most Basic Realization Needed

The prodigal son squandered everything that he had received and had nothing left. Yet the Father gave him more when he came to his senses. From that point on the son knew that everything he had depended on the father. He knew that everything he enjoyed was from the Father, and he knew that his father would always have more for him. He never had to fear being rejected – he could always come back for more. The Lord wants to maintain this kind of relationship to us. He wants to have us always running back to him for fresh supply. He would give to us more of what we actually owe him! This is the most basic realization that we need.

In the second Parable, by lessening the burden of the debtors, the steward touched his master's heart. Through his experience of failure, the steward's perspective changed. He realized that he himself was a failure. He realized that he had no way to go on without these other debtors. He needed them to receive him. To make friends for himself and gain their favor he worked with them to diminish their burdens. In that he touched the master's heart and was praised. He was praised for his prudence, his wisdom to see what he really was and what he really needed. He was praised for the way he handled the whole situation. He is called the unrighteous steward, but aren’t we all unrighteous? The bible says we are! What the unrighteous people who have been brought into God’s household need in order to serve him is the wisdom to understand His nature.

The Stewardship of Grace

Through this experience, the steward actually entered into the reality of the stewardship in God's house – the stewardship of God's grace. His actions were compatible with the master's nature. Prior to the experience, he might have been like the older brother in the parable of the prodigal son, serving mammon. He might have been "slaving" for the master, and thinking that he should be rewarded with something extra for his work. But now he realized that he could not have any expectation of a reward. The most important thing was to be in the house. Without the master's house, he would have nothing. Just like the prodigal son, he realized that everything he had was something he had received in the household. Without his master and the household, he had nothing. He is no longer thinking in terms of reward. He is realizing that his very life is sustained by the master.

In reality, only someone who has experience as a squanderer can be a genuine steward of grace. This kind of person might not feel like they are really serving the lord. But because of their realization of what they are, they become a person who reduces the burden of others. They don't hold the other debtors to such a high standard.

This is a transition from being a servant of mammon to being a servant of the master. We come to realize that our very life depends on God. We know that without Him we have nothing and we realize that He is the source. We know that what we have is not a reward for our hard work. Rather we realize that what we have is from God Himself. We also realize that we need to make friends with the others. We will not religiously make demands on them. We would not do anything that would make us the kind of person that they could not approach. We need the other believers to receive us, because we need a place in God’s household, which is also their household. In this kind of stewardship we do not think of ourselves as the "ones in charge of the master's possessions." We ourselves are in need, just like the others. We need the others to receive us or we have nothing – no place to go. The stewardship in God's house is not a special calling or a position for us. It does not make a place for us. The stewardship has no reason to exist except to dispense the grace of God (reduce the demands) for the others. By being faithful to God's grace in our dealing with others, we enjoy a secure place in God's home with them.

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