Whenever a pastor preaches on stewardship, people tend to get nervous. But Jesus frequently taught about using our resources for the Kingdom of Heaven, and like with Jesus’s teachings on other topics, his instructions are not meant to be chains that induce nerves but invitations that bring joy.
As Jesus taught, he was surrounded by mostly poor people, people who probably thought that getting more money would solve their problems. Nothing has changed in the twenty-first century; we still tend to think more money is the answer to many of life’s problems.
But Jesus taught about sacrificial generosity and when we read Acts 2, we see that the early church got it.
A Confusing Story
In Luke 16, Jesus taught the confusing parable of the Shrewd Manager. It is a hard parable to understand, but it has eternal lessons for us.
In this parable, Jesus seems to be encouraging theft and deceptive business practices. But looking at the context can clarify our understanding of the parable.
In Luke 15, Jesus had been addressing tax collectors, the financiers of the day. Jesus tells them three parables: the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the prodigal son. All three are about possessions, losing them or squandering them.
Then in chapter 16, Jesus takes his disciples aside and begins to teach them about money. But the parable is strange; the central character is a crook, a thief.
In this parable, a rich man has a manager over his estate who has been stealing from him. The rich man understandably decides to fire him.
However, the manager decides to get ahead of his fate by making crooked deals with his master’s debtors so that he will have a roof over his head when he is fired. He doesn’t even use his own money; he uses the money of his master to buy favors and temporary security. The debtors quickly agree to this dishonest scheme to benefit themselves.
But there is a twist in the tale; the rich man is so impressed with the shrewdness of his manager that he re-hires him.
Is Jesus teaching that it is commendable to be devious? The words of Jesus in verse 9 add to the confusion, “And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal dwellings” (Luke 16:9).
A Kingdom Wealth Management Strategy
So, what are we to make of this parable?
Jesus is not commending criminal behavior; that would be contrary to the teaching of the rest of the Scriptures. Rather Jesus is pointing to the shrewdness and characteristics of a criminal and saying that as children of the light, we should be as driven to do the will of God our Father as the manager was to secure his future. Only instead of leveraging shrewdness for self-preservation, we should look for opportunities to gain eternal wealth.
Jesus encourages us to use the resources of this world to invest in eternity. We can take the unrighteous riches of this world and use them for eternal purposes.
We will leave 100% of our possessions behind when we die. But I don’t think we fully grasp the truth that how we steward our earthly resources affects our eternal rewards.
Jesus continues to teach his disciples with cutting clarity in Luke 16:10-13, shedding light on this parable. Jesus makes it clear that true riches will be entrusted to those who faithfully serve the eternal kingdom of heaven and not the temporal kingdom of this world.
A Holistic View of Riches
God has entrusted each of us with a number of resources to steward. True riches are more than our bank account; there are other resources we are called to steward.
Finances
We tend to view stewardship as an optional extra in Christian disciplines.Some people assume it; others aren’t aware of it. Traditionally it has been taught that we are to give 10% of our income to the Lord’s work, beginning with the local church and then giving above and beyond that to local and international missional causes.
But I believe that these percentages are the training wheels of greater spiritual discipline. Jesus always raised the bar when it comes to the moral teachings of the Mosaic law.
I believe that the foundation for our stewardship is found in Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
Dead people have no possessions. When we commit our lives to Jesus, he becomes Lord over all our resources. When it comes to the question of tithing, 10% is a good starting point, but that doesn’t mean the other 90% remains for us to use selfishly. I believe God is looking at how we are stewarding that 90% for His glory.
Time
Time is a constant; you cannot make time, but you can waste time. We are called to make the most of every minute that we have been given. We can be challenged in this respect when we have an unexpected interruption in our day, when someone comes to us in need. Are we willing to shuffle our priorities to be used by the Lord?
There are a multitude of ways we can steward our time for God’s glory. It is an eternal investment.
Spiritual Gifts
Spiritual gifts are given to us by the Holy Spirit for the glory of God. Gifts are not given for our benefit or enrichment; they are given for the work of the ministry and building up of the Body of Christ.
The Gospel
Believers who have believed in the Gospel are entrusted to steward that message and share it with others (see 1 Thessalonians 2:4).
An Invitation to Stewardship
Everything that we have been blessed with should be stewarded to further the Kingdom of God. We are God’s stewards, managing His resources. Just like the wicked and shrewd manager, we need to be discerning in how we use the Master’s resources, only Jesus invites us to use them for eternal purposes.
How are you doing as an investment manager for the King of Kings?