quoted by Kimberly as the basis for the church's missions program: 'you shall be my witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the remotest parts of the earth'
8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. You will be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth.”
the main passage for the sermon, covering the parable of the shrewd manager, Jesus' teaching on wealth, and the rich man and Lazarus
1 He also said to his disciples, “There was a certain rich man who had a manager. An accusation was made to him that this man was wasting his possessions.
2 He called him, and said to him, ‘What is this that I hear about you? Give an accounting of your management, for you can no longer be manager.’
3 “The manager said within himself, ‘What will I do, seeing that my lord is taking away the management position from me? I don’t have strength to dig. I am ashamed to beg.
4 I know what I will do, so that when I am removed from management, they may receive me into their houses.’
5 Calling each one of his lord’s debtors to him, he said to the first, ‘How much do you owe to my lord?’
6 He said, ‘A hundred batos of oil.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and sit down quickly and write fifty.’
7 Then he said to another, ‘How much do you owe?’ He said, ‘A hundred cors of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and write eighty.’
8 “His lord commended the dishonest manager because he had done wisely, for the children of this world are, in their own generation, wiser than the children of the light.
9 I tell you, make for yourselves friends by means of unrighteous mammon, so that when you fail, they may receive you into the eternal tents.
10 He who is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much. He who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much.
11 If therefore you have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the true riches?
12 If you have not been faithful in that which is another’s, who will give you that which is your own?
13 No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to one, and despise the other. You aren’t able to serve God and Mammon.”
14 The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, also heard all these things, and they scoffed at him.
15 He said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of men, but God knows your hearts. For that which is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God.
16 The law and the prophets were until John. From that time the Good News of God’s Kingdom is preached, and everyone is forcing his way into it.
17 But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away, than for one tiny stroke of a pen in the law to fall.
18 Everyone who divorces his wife, and marries another, commits adultery. He who marries one who is divorced from a husband commits adultery.
19 “Now there was a certain rich man, and he was clothed in purple and fine linen, living in luxury every day.
20 A certain beggar, named Lazarus, was taken to his gate, full of sores,
21 and desiring to be fed with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’s table. Yes, even the dogs came and licked his sores.
22 The beggar died, and he was carried away by the angels to Abraham’s bosom. The rich man also died, and was buried.
23 In Hades, he lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and saw Abraham far off, and Lazarus at his bosom.
24 He cried and said, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue! For I am in anguish in this flame.’
25 “But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that you, in your lifetime, received your good things, and Lazarus, in the same way, bad things. But here he is now comforted, and you are in anguish.
26 Besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, that those who want to pass from here to you are not able, and that no one may cross over from there to us.’
27 “He said, ‘I ask you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house;
28 for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, so they won’t also come into this place of torment.’
29 “But Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets. Let them listen to them.’
30 “He said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’
31 “He said to him, ‘If they don’t listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if one rises from the dead.’”
cited alongside Exodus in the discussion of Torah's prohibition on charging interest to the poor
1 Yahweh said to Moses in Mount Sinai,
2 “Speak to the children of Israel, and tell them, ‘When you come into the land which I give you, then the land shall keep a Sabbath to Yahweh.
3 You shall sow your field six years, and you shall prune your vineyard six years, and gather in its fruits;
4 but in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a Sabbath to Yahweh. You shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard.
5 What grows of itself in your harvest you shall not reap, and you shall not gather the grapes of your undressed vine. It shall be a year of solemn rest for the land.
6 The Sabbath of the land shall be for food for you; for yourself, for your servant, for your maid, for your hired servant, and for your stranger, who lives as a foreigner with you.
7 For your livestock also, and for the animals that are in your land, shall all its increase be for food.
8 “‘You shall count off seven Sabbaths of years, seven times seven years; and there shall be to you the days of seven Sabbaths of years, even forty-nine years.
9 Then you shall sound the loud trumpet on the tenth day of the seventh month. On the Day of Atonement you shall sound the trumpet throughout all your land.
10 You shall make the fiftieth year holy, and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee to you; and each of you shall return to his own property, and each of you shall return to his family.
11 That fiftieth year shall be a jubilee to you. In it you shall not sow, neither reap that which grows of itself, nor gather from the undressed vines.
12 For it is a jubilee; it shall be holy to you. You shall eat of its increase out of the field.
13 “‘In this Year of Jubilee each of you shall return to his property.
14 “‘If you sell anything to your neighbor, or buy from your neighbor, you shall not wrong one another.
15 According to the number of years after the Jubilee you shall buy from your neighbor. According to the number of years of the crops he shall sell to you.
16 According to the length of the years you shall increase its price, and according to the shortness of the years you shall diminish its price; for he is selling the number of the crops to you.
17 You shall not wrong one another; but you shall fear your God: for I am Yahweh your God.
18 “‘Therefore you shall do my statutes, and keep my ordinances and do them; and you shall dwell in the land in safety.
19 The land shall yield its fruit, and you shall eat your fill, and dwell therein in safety.
20 If you said, “What shall we eat the seventh year? Behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase”;
21 then I will command my blessing on you in the sixth year, and it shall bear fruit for the three years.
22 You shall sow the eighth year, and eat of the fruits, the old store; until the ninth year, until its fruits come in, you shall eat the old store.
23 “‘The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; for you are strangers and live as foreigners with me.
24 In all the land of your possession you shall grant a redemption for the land.
25 “‘If your brother becomes poor, and sells some of his possessions, then his kinsman who is next to him shall come, and redeem that which his brother has sold.
26 If a man has no one to redeem it, and he becomes prosperous and finds sufficient means to redeem it;
27 then let him reckon the years since its sale, and restore the surplus to the man to whom he sold it; and he shall return to his property.
28 But if he isn’t able to get it back for himself, then what he has sold shall remain in the hand of him who has bought it until the Year of Jubilee: and in the Jubilee it shall be released, and he shall return to his property.
29 “‘If a man sells a dwelling house in a walled city, then he may redeem it within a whole year after it has been sold. For a full year he shall have the right of redemption.
30 If it isn’t redeemed within the space of a full year, then the house that is in the walled city shall be made sure in perpetuity to him who bought it, throughout his generations. It shall not be released in the Jubilee.
31 But the houses of the villages which have no wall around them shall be accounted for with the fields of the country: they may be redeemed, and they shall be released in the Jubilee.
32 “‘Nevertheless the cities of the Levites, the houses in the cities of their possession, the Levites may redeem at any time.
33 The Levites may redeem the house that was sold, and the city of his possession, and it shall be released in the Jubilee; for the houses of the cities of the Levites are their possession among the children of Israel.
34 But the field of the suburbs of their cities may not be sold; for it is their perpetual possession.
35 “‘If your brother has become poor, and his hand can’t support himself among you; then you shall uphold him. He shall live with you like an alien and a temporary resident.
36 Take no interest from him or profit, but fear your God; that your brother may live among you.
37 You shall not lend him your money at interest, nor give him your food for profit.
38 I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan, and to be your God.
39 “‘If your brother has grown poor among you, and sells himself to you; you shall not make him to serve as a slave.
40 As a hired servant, and as a temporary resident, he shall be with you; he shall serve with you until the Year of Jubilee:
41 then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and shall return to his own family, and to the possession of his fathers.
42 For they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. They shall not be sold as slaves.
43 You shall not rule over him with harshness, but shall fear your God.
44 “‘As for your male and your female slaves, whom you may have; of the nations that are around you, from them you may buy male and female slaves.
45 Moreover of the children of the aliens who live among…
The message in order, in a few minutes of reading.
Pastor Scott walked through all of Luke 16, two parables connected by a short stretch of Jesus speaking directly to the Pharisees, and showed how both stories circle the same question: what does the way you handle money reveal about who you actually are?
What was said
The chapter opens with the parable of the shrewd manager, a man who gets fired and uses his remaining time in the job to cut deals with his master's debtors so that people will take him in after he loses his position. The text does not tell us exactly how he reduced the debts, and Pastor Scott laid out three serious possibilities: he undercut prices to make his boss look generous, he quietly removed illegal interest charges that violated Torah, or he gave up his own commission. Commentators have wrestled with this for centuries, and which option you accept does not really change the point.
What matters is that the master, even after firing him, looked at what the manager did and said, in effect, that was smart. Jesus uses that reaction to make a pointed observation: people looking out for themselves in worldly affairs are shrewder about it than the people of God tend to be about the things of God. The manager saw he had limited time left and acted. The question Jesus puts to his disciples, and to the Pharisees listening in, is whether they see their own situation the same way.
Jesus then presses into the heart of it. Money is called the wealth of unrighteousness, worldly wealth, and he says flatly that you cannot serve both God and money. The decisions you make about what to do with what you have will show your actual character, not the character you present to people. Luke notes that the Pharisees, who were lovers of money, were sneering at all of this, and Pastor Scott pointed out that the Greek word Luke uses there carries the image of blowing something out of your nose, which is about as dismissive as it gets.
Jesus responds to that scorn by telling them that what gets a person lifted up among people is often detestable to God, and that the law they claimed to represent had been pointing toward the kingdom all along. John the Baptist stood as the last in that line of the law and the prophets, and when John pointed to Jesus, the kingdom arrived. Now everyone has a strong opinion about what the kingdom should look like, and most of them are wrong, and the Pharisees who pride themselves on knowing the law are missing it entirely.
The second parable, the rich man and Lazarus, puts flesh on what has already been said. The rich man has everything and lives in daily splendor. Lazarus has nothing, lies at the gate covered with sores, and hopes for scraps. After both die, the positions are reversed completely, and the rich man in torment asks Abraham to send Lazarus back to warn his five brothers. Abraham tells him they already have Moses and the prophets, and if that is not enough to move them, neither will someone rising from the dead, which Pastor Scott noted is a striking piece of foreshadowing given what is coming later in the Gospel.
Pastor Scott tied both parables together at the close: the manager knew his time was limited and acted on that knowledge, and the rich man found out too late that time had run out. The chapter as a whole, he argued, is not primarily a lesson about the afterlife but about what you do right now with what has been given to you. Everything we have is received, not earned, and the way a person holds it, whether tightly or with an open hand, shows whether their faith has actually shaped their character.
Doing a Bible study?
Here is a guide we have prepared for you: the passages
in order, questions for the group, and room to write.
Pastor Scott described the shrewd manager as someone who recognized he had limited time left and acted urgently on that. Where in your own life do you find it hardest to act with that same sense of urgency about the things God has called you to do?
Three possible explanations were offered for how the manager reduced the debtors' bills, including removing interest that was already against Torah but that everyone quietly accepted anyway. Can you think of areas where we treat something as an acceptable sin the way usury was treated then?
Holy moccasin. All of the ground is sinking sand. All of the ground is sinking sand. Is sinking sand.
When he shall come with trumpet sound, oh, may I then
Yeah. Did she buy a ticket? Can we get security? We have yours. She is the a number one right there.
Good call. Three part harmonies. It's like a.
If your
Good morning. How are y'all? That's fun. Good morning. How are y'all?
Are you visiting? I know. Yeah. Breakfast was good too.
But I was
The first You can tell us. The weather was just right. That's right. It's good.
Time to start. We ran Ray off, but we wanna welcome you all.
Alright. Can you hear me now? Would you stand with us after all those folks out there on the lawn or sitting on the premises? Would you all stand on the promises with us?
Yeah. And here and here's a... Just a a little word of encouragement to lead us into this song. It's let us hold unswervingly to the hope that we profess for he who promised is faithful. We're single and faithful God.
We're standing on his promises. Here's a great verse here from, John fourteen nineteen. It's one of my favorite It's because I live, you also will live. Isn't that just short, but absolutely profound that Jesus is the resurrection and the life? Anyone who believes in him will live even though they die.
Amen. We'll continue on. The party continues. Amen. Let's sing.
Because he lives.
Amen. Y'all can have a seat. There are few announcements. Before I forget about it, the first one is usually Monday night, but the first one, forgot it in the last service. This is a card you might have gotten in the mail.
It is from the board and staff of Compass Women's Center. That's, turning point, basically, for those of you here in this room probably. Compass Women's Center from July... The eleventh twenty twenty three, the annual summer benefit gala is happening. If you want more information, it's written on this card right here.
You can ask us or you can call the Compass Women's Center, but I've got the information right here. If you wanna know more about let me know afterwards, and I'll hand that over to you. Monday nights is happening.
Yep. We're on down the hall tomorrow night, 06:00, meal, music, and message, and we're in chapter 12 Jesus gives of Mark. Jesus gives the greatest command to love with the heart, soul, mind, and strength, love our neighbor as ourselves. And then there's this beautiful picture of it, of this widow who puts puts in coins in the treasury. I just...
I absolutely love it and love going through Mark right now.
That's tomorrow night.
Available if
you Yep. Lexi Boyer
coming on Monday.
Lexi Boyer is making the meal. You're handling the music with as much of the band as can show. And then I think we might ought to close that door. And then a message after that. So that reminds me.
Vacation Bible School is this week. You skip right there. Vacation Bible School is happening. June twenty sixth to twenty eighth. I think we have our volunteer team together, but if you said, I didn't know about it and I wanna volunteer, let them know.
They'd still be glad to put you to So it's 9AM to noon starting out right here in this room, and they'll spread out all over the church and the grounds tomorrow. 9AM to noon, June twenty sixth through twenty eighth, Monday through Wednesday this week, Pets Unleashed, where Jesus cares for you. Alright. 2023 church directory. Also, Nick is standing up right there.
He has a camera with him. He has all that he needs to get a horizontal photo of you and then take down your information for the church directory. If you want to be recognized and known here, it would probably be a good idea to talk to him. You You don't need to be a member. It's just the community here of people who, come to church here.
That's that's good. So that's good. Talk to Nick, and he'll get a picture of you. The first week camp out is happening early this year, so it's earlier than usual. It is July the seventh through the ninth down at Palisades Lake rather than being up at Jackson Lake.
It's gonna be at Palisades July seventh through the ninth. For more information, talk to Mike Demetrius. He is our youth leader. He... That's his phone number right there, and he's around.
He's pretty easy to get in touch with, and he'll tell you what you need to know. That's it. July seventh through ninth Palisades. This that you walked past to get in here this morning was the first BBQ. Okay.
That's the first first one of those we've ever had. They plan on doing it three times this summer, July 23 and August 27 being the next one. And we might even adjust to have like a singing in the afternoon at some point. That sounds like.
Few jokes.
Few tell some jokes. Yeah. Stand on stage with a bunch of guys. Yeah. Feed them good then bring them in and put them to sleep.
Alright. This is good. If you want the church emails that are sorta like the old bulletins we used to get, we'll send you those if you'll just let us know you want them. Firstbjackson dot org. And I think that's the last of the announcements.
Is there anything else? Oh, yes. There's a missions moment. It's not written in front of me. I forget it.
So come on up. Kimberly, Fordyce app. You can take some... There you go, Scott. Just hand her off your microphone.
Kimberly is a member of our very active missions committee.
Why don't the other members of the Missions Committee that are here in this service stand up as well? Just because you can ask any of us questions. Okay? So if you have questions as a result of what I say or just about the entire missions program, by all means, speak to any of us that you can. Jesus' last words before the ascension in Acts one eight say, you shall be my witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and over the remote...
To the remotest parts of the earth. Well, this church takes that commission very seriously that we need to get the news about the wonderful love of Jesus out to the world. So since COVID, we have not been able to have quarterly visits from our missionaries, and many of you have arrived since then, so we just wanted to bring you guys up a little bit to the current time that we do have missions in Jerusalem. That would be the local organizations we support, like Compass.
Like Compass. Yep. And the Good Samaritan Mission, and there are lots of them actually. And
then in Judea and Samaria, we have several missionaries around the country that we submit a support, and then the uttermost parts of the world, we have missionaries in various parts of the world, some of them visit many places and some are just resident in one area, some of them in very dangerous places, and we don't put out every detail about them in the public, but we can certainly answer questions if you have them, so, and we are the sending organization, you may remember just a few weeks ago, we sent Florina and Violetta off, we are their sending organization, and Paco and Didi, we're their sending organization. Everyone else has a bigger organization they belong to, but we want you to know and we want you to support our mission to world.
Amen. Thank you very much. You can hand that back to Scott. Thank you. Would you stand with us?
Good job. Good job, Kimberly. Thank you. Preston, would you flip us to the next song there?
That is so true. And and this is why from Matthew, Jesus says, anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise like a person who builds a house on solid rock. And here's another encouraging word from first Peter five seven. It's cast all your anxiety on him. Why?
Because he cares for you. Amen. So leave it there.
Amen. That was fun. I think I'll go ahead and say an operatory prayer. How about that? Ushers come forward.
Y'all can have a seat. Lord God almighty, I'm pleased to be in the house of the Lord this morning. I'm so thankful lord to get a part of this bright and sunny summer day here in this place with people who call upon you and are saved. And those who, Lord, are being called by you to come into the family of God. In Jesus' name, Lord, I pray that these praises would ring out from here unto the very uttermost parts like Kimberly said.
I pray, Lord, that you'd use everything that's given, whether it's a conversation or a little bit of time to sit with a loved one or sit with just a stranger, a neighbor who might have lost a loved one. God almighty, would you do what it is that only you can do in directing us? Would you direct us by your spirit? Would you give us the power, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead? May we know that that is at our disposal that we just need to be living it out.
In Jesus' name, I pray, Lord, that the word would sink deep into our hearts and our minds, and that we would be able to articulate your loving kindness, because surely it goes on forever. In Jesus name, we ask your blessing on this offering that we would be about your business, doing your will, in your way. Amen.
Amen.
Amen. Thank you, Adam and Ryan and Carl and Scott and Lisa. That was fun. That's a that's not a bad pickup band right there. Golly.
Luke 16. If you're... Been coming for a while, you know we've been in a a kind of a chronological study of the New Testament, and we've gone back to pick up the synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke. And so Matthew, Mark, and Luke, we've been going forward in the narrative. And at this point, only Luke is speaking.
So we don't have something from Matthew and Mark that's telling the exact same story. So we're just gonna go with Luke 16, and you might see that and not see a colon in a couple of verses. And you might think, this thing's not working up here, Preston, if you wanna click off of that. You might think, all of it? Oh, gracious.
All of it? All of Luke 16? And I'm saying, really, yeah, we're doing all of it. So it's 31, 32 verses. We're gonna go through it.
It's two parables, but in the middle of it, it's a little bit of Jesus going on. A bit of a rant. It's a quick rant, and then he goes into another story, but that's the way we're gonna go into it today. So I got about 10 pounds of sugar to put in a five pound bag. Y'all listen fast.
Okay? He was also saying... Now he was also saying... Also says that he was saying something else. Really, this unit is not just Luke 16, it's Luke fifteen and sixteen.
And he tells three parables, and then he's gonna hit us with two more in chapter 16. But this immediately follows the parables of the lost sheep, lost coin, prodigal son. I preached that two weeks ago and then did Psalm 23 last week. So the lost sheep, the lost coin, the prodigal son, or I kinda prefer to call the prodigal son story the parable of the loving father or maybe the parable of the older brother because all three of those are mentioned, and we get an idea of how God is, and he is looking down the road for anyone who would turn to him in repentance. And then it says, he was also saying to his disciples...
So if you're wondering who he's speaking to, he's surrounded by the same crowd. It hasn't stopped. No break in the action. He's told those three stories, and now he's gonna tell two more. It says he's talking to his disciples, but we know from the text that the Pharisees are also there and listening.
So he was also saying to his disciples, listen. There was a rich man who had a manager, and this manager was reported to him as squandering his possessions. So the rich man summoned that manager in and said to him, what's this I hear about you? Give an accounting of your management for you can no longer be my manager. Basically, he says, you're fired.
Okay? I've heard and believed what they said about you, and you can't be trusted, so you're fired. And the manager said to himself, he didn't argue with him, he didn't fuss about it. He said to himself, uh-oh, what am I to do since my master has taken the management away from me? This is a desperate situation.
Why? Because I am not strong enough to dig. A desk job will do that. Right? He's been managing money for a while.
He's not ready to dig ditches. And unlike the Motown Temptations, he is too proud to beg. He's he's ashamed to beg. He's not going to beg. But he says, I know what I'll do.
I have an idea. What I'll do is this. So when I'm removed from the management, people will welcome me into their homes. So he's looking out for the future. He knows he has a limited time because the manager's already called for the accounting.
And you know, he didn't have it on his phone. He didn't have it on his computer close at hand. He doesn't have a laptop. He's gotta go home and get the the stacks of markers and books and whatnot. And so when he goes, he's got an idea.
He summoned each one of the master's debtors, and he began saying to the first, How much do you owe my master? Now, it's interesting that he's asking, he's the manager. Do you think he just didn't know? No. He knows.
He's got it written down. How much do you owe my master? And the first one says a 100 jugs of oil. He knows exactly. 100 jugs of oil.
That's a psychological thing though for it to be put in right in your court to say, how much do you owe? 100 jugs of oil. Now for me, I don't do the shopping very much. I certainly don't buy oil very much. But I don't know how much that is.
What's 100 jugs of oil, the quantity on that? Eight seventy five gallons. Those are huge jugs of oil, right? That's barrels to me, big barrels. That's a lot of them.
55 gallon drum, that's the big drum, right? So that's a lot of them. Eight seventy five gallons. So what's the value on that oil? It's about a thousand denarii.
Now, denarius is a day's wages for a laborer. So that is about three years salary. Yeah. That's a lot. That's a lot.
So he says, how much do you owe? I owe a 100 jugs of oil. And he says, here, quickly. Take your bill. I've got them right here with me.
Take your bill, sit down quickly, and write 50. Wow. That's pretty good. Next guy. He said to another, and how much do you owe?
And he said, I owe a 100 cores of wheat. Does anybody know what a core is? Me neither. Jeff Cephas in his antiquities does. And a 100 cores of wheat, the quantity is a 100 acres worth of wheat.
That's a lot of wheat. And so what's the value of that? About 3,000 denarii. So that's eight to ten years salary for a laborer. Do you think they're going be able to pay that anytime soon?
So he says, Here, take your bill and write 80. So he gives him a reduction. It's not half, but hey, every little bit helps. It's 25% less than he did. So this is Dale Carnegie's way to win friends and influence people, isn't it?
You give them a good deal, and then they'll be like, that guy's that guy's alright. He's alright. So there are three options to consider though. If he's trying to make friends, how is it that he did this? He's already called an unrighteous manager.
He's already called, unscrupulous, I guess it is. And using the authority he still had, he could have just lowered the price. He just said, you did owe a 100, now you owe 50, you did owe, I mean, you did however that was. I have to turn back. It was half off and then it was from 100 to 80.
So using the authority he still had, he just lowered the price and it made the boss look bad. It's like he was overcharging him. He says, no, that's not That's not right. I'm gonna give you... That's crazy.
You should get a better price than that. And that makes the boss look bad, makes him look good. That's one option. The second option, and I don't care which one of these you believe. These these are the three major choices.
This passage is notoriously difficult. Every commentary says notoriously difficult because there are some editorial choices you have to make. I like I use the New American Standard every week, but I feel like New American Standard is the best at the editorial choices on this one. The second option is he removed the interest charge because usury, you all know what usury is, charging interest on a loan, usury is against Torah. And so this manager knows it.
The boss also knows it. Everybody that they loan to knows it. But everybody still did it anyway. It was an acceptable sin. Exodus twenty two twenty five.
If you lend money to my people, to the poor among you, you are not to act as a creditor. To him, you shall not charge him interest. Leviticus 25. Now in case a countryman of yours becomes poor and his means among you falter, then you are to sustain sustain him. Like a stranger or a resident, it even says it extends the bounds from just my people, so that he may live with you.
Do not take any kind of interest from him, but fear your God so that your countryman may live because of you. You shall not give him your silver at interest nor your food for profit. Oh, boy. I just said that out loud in a capitalist society in the middle of summer in Jackson. If there's a poor person among you, one of your brothers, if any of your towns, in your land, which the Lord your God has given to you, you shall not harden your heart nor close your hand.
So you're supposed to give it if they're asking and not charge them interest. Wow. But you shall fully open your hand to him and generously lend to him enough for his need, whatever he likes. You are not the charge it goes on and on. Are a lot of these.
Usury is against Torah. So it's possible that he said, listen, we're not going to do that to you. I don't want to do that to you. I'm going to just let that go. The boss can't say anything about it because he knows it's against the rules too.
Third one is a possibility too. He might have removed his own commission so that that half of the oil and the percentage off of the wheat might have been his commission that he was supposed to take. And he just said, Listen, I'm not going to take that commission. I'm going to lower that commission down to nothing so that you get a deal. He removed his own commission, sacrificing his own money, not the master's.
That's the best way to look at it. Most favorable for the shrewd manager, but we don't know which one it is, really. Doesn't really matter. The point is his master complimented the unrighteous manager. Really.
He has a sneaky underhanded employee that he just fired, and he looks at him and says, doggone, that guy got me. Because he had acted shrewdly, he was looking out for his interest. For the sons of this age are more shrewd in relation to their own kind than the sons of light. Luke adds, the sons of this age are more shrewd in relation. They will get the deal.
Right? Looking out for number one, you're gonna figure out how to benefit yourself. And he says, they're more shrewd than the sons of light. And then Jesus begins speaking. Oh, this one you might not...
This game recognize game. Have you all heard this? Anybody heard this? Yes. There are two of you that have heard this.
Yeah. Everybody else is going, no, Ray. Game recognizes game means that when when you have a... You see the the opponent as having skills, then you just recognize that. Because you have your skills too, and you recognize that.
In this case, that manager may well have gotten his game by the same sort of means. And he recognized it and said, well, that was smart. So he commends him on that. And then Jesus picks up right here and says, and I say to you, to whom, to the disciples we know, but from the next verse we see it's the Pharisees too. Jesus says to you, make friends for yourselves by means of this wealth of unrighteousness.
What? Jesus said that? Make friends for yourselves by means of the wealth of unrighteousness. Now, I believe that this probably should be in quotes. That's the wealth of unrighteousness.
This is the Greek, Mamona tes adicaios. And it is the mammon of unrighteousness. That's what, you know, old King James would say, the mammon of unrighteousness. We might say worldly wealth. Really, it's just money.
It's you've got this resource and Jesus says, unrighteous resource. We might say worldly wealth. It also equates to the King James filthy lucre. It's not the same exact thing, but you all heard that. Right?
Don't do Don't ever hire an elder or call an elder who is given to strong drink or filthy luker. It's somebody that's overly concerned about money in Titus one eleven. Jesus says, I say to y'all though, make friends for yourselves by means of this wealth of unrighteousness so that when it is all gone, and it is all going to be gone. Right? We can't take it with us.
I've heard a thousand pastors say, you never see a U Haul behind a hearse. You cannot take it with you. So it is all gonna be gone. We have a limited time. It says they will receive you into the eternal dwellings.
That they is confusing for a lot of people too. So editorial choice, you have to see it. It does say they. What does it mean? It could mean so that these friends that you're winning, by the way that you are generous with your money, are receptive to that, and they will receive you into heaven, basically.
Jesus says whatever you do for the least of these, possibly could be the friends. It could be the angels. It's a very common Hebraism to say that the angels carry people away after death. And so so that you will be received by the angels into the afterlife. And it could just be a circumlocution for God himself since they don't use the word...
The names of God. So it could be that. Any three of those are acceptable answers. I tend to think it's a circumlocution for God himself. But I also like number one.
But he's not saying you can buy your way in. Okay? That's not it at all. But he is saying that the one who is faithful, he caps it off and quotes, the one who is faithful in a very little thing, how you use your resources, is also faithful in much. Greater resources, greater responsibility.
And the one who is unrighteous in a very little thing is also unrighteous in much. Right here, Jesus is saying character is character. Character is what you do when nobody else is watching. That unscrupulous manager when nobody else is watching was dishonest. Character is character.
Therefore, if you have not been faithful in the use of unrighteous wealth or just money, who will entrust you with true wealth? If you're not faithful with your money, how are you gonna be entrusted to have things that are more important than money? This is Jesus speaking. And if you have been... Not been faithful in the use of that which is another's, who will give you that which is your own?
So if you're not responsible with the master's goods, who's gonna pay you and give you something of your own? Jesus speaking and kind of directing this towards heaven, towards God. If you have not been faithful in the use of that which is another's, who will give you that which is not your own? We're all managing someone else's resources, are we not? All that we have is a gift from God.
And so, to be able to use that in the way that he desires is important. So there it is. No servant can serve two masters for either he's going to hate the one and love the other, or he'll be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and wealth. The decisions you make about what to do with your wealth are either going to be godly or worldly.
Those are the ways. And I think you have to listen to what God is directing. You cannot serve both God and wealth. Some of the decisions you make to make make make more money are gonna be contrary to what God wants. Now the Pharisees, and Luke says flatly, who are lovers of money?
If you know much about the political situation of the time, the Sadducees were the ones that were more or less complicit with the Roman government, and they were set in the seats in the Sanhedrin. And they had... Since they were complicit, they actually got paid a little bit from the government, and they were known to be wealthy. And so when Luke points out that the Pharisees also were lovers of money, both sides like money. Right?
Even if you disagree theologically, both of them, Luke says, love money. The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, they were listening to all of these things, and they were ridiculing Jesus. I hit a word here. And when I was doing the the grammar study of this and the the word study of this, this word is is hilarious and gross. If you're a Greece...
Greek scholar, this means... It's from two words, ek. Ek, it means out of, and micturiso means to blow the nose. It is out of a blowing of the nose. That's what they were doing properly.
They were turning their nose out or up. They were sneering, scoffing, figuratively, scornfully rejecting. They were blowing someone off, like expelling mucus out of the nose, sort of like, that. Is that gross or what? That's the word.
That's what Jesus says. That that... And that's what Luke says the Pharisees were doing to Jesus. I'm glad Tanya is not in the room right now. Golly.
And he said to them, he said, y'all are the ones, Pharisees. Y'all are the ones who justify yourselves in the sight of the people. Like I said, the Sadducees didn't really care what people thought. They were being paid. They were doing alright.
They really didn't believe the scriptures. Jesus points that out, I think, in the chapter that you're going into this week in Mark. They really didn't pay attention to the scriptures. They just were in the catbird seat, and the Pharisees wanted to be seen as being people of the people. Right?
Servants of the people. They were standing up for God's word, and they did do that. They just misunderstood it. Jesus says, y'all are the ones who justify yourselves in the sight of the people. You want to be known as the grassroots movement that is the people, but God knows your hearts.
He knows your real motives. He knows why you're doing this. And you Pharisees, because that which is highly esteemed among people is detestable in the sight of God. The very things that'll get you lifted up on a platform for the world are the things that are detestable to God. So the law and the prophets, this is Jesus' little rant between the two stories.
Okay? The law and the prophets were proclaimed until John came. If you see italics in the New American Standard, it means that those words were added to make it flow better in English. But the law and the prophets till John. That's what it says.
The law and the prophets till John. John is known as the last of the prophets. And when he pointed to Jesus and said, there he is, the lamb of God, the one who takes away the sins of the world. He must increase. I must decrease.
And that's the one to pay attention to. You go, disciples, follow him. When he said that, that was the coming of the kingdom. John stands as the last in the line of the law and the prophets, and Jesus says, since that time, the gospel of the kingdom of God has been preached. He knows that because he's been preaching it.
He also knows that because he sent out his disciples to preach the kingdom of God, and they've been doing it. And this next line causes a lot of confusion. I'm not even gonna give you options on this one. I'm just gonna say what I think. Okay?
It's per... It's my own way that I think. There are lots of people that have been arm wrestling over this verse for thousands of year... Couple of thousand years. Everyone is forcing his way into it.
What I think Jesus is saying because he's speaking to the Pharisees and rebuking them, blowing their nose at him. He says, John was the last in the line of the prophets. You didn't pay any attention to him. The kingdom is among you. It's in your midst.
It's right here. I've been proclaiming it. My disciples have been proclaiming it. It's right here, and now everybody is forcing their way into it. Everybody wants to be right about that their opinion is the right one about the kingdom of God.
They're forcibly saying, no. Messiah is gonna come and whip these Romans, and that's the way it is. And the Sadducees might have said, there's no need to whip the Romans. They're not that bad. Right?
Everybody's trying to force their way. I I have the real perspective on God's way. Jesus is saying, John was proclaiming the coming of the kingdom. The kingdom has come in me, and everybody's got their own version of it, but you're rejecting this. He does say, it's easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one stroke of a letter of the law to fail.
God gave us the law for our good. He gave us the 10 commandments for our good. He gave us 603 other rules that work for our good. He gave the law for our good. Man was made...
I mean, the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. Jesus has already corrected the Pharisees on this. He's already pointed out the way that God has given a good gift. And he's gonna give just one example, and he's gonna move on. It's kinda odd because he could've given us so many more.
Says, it's easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one stroke of a letter of the law to fail. Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery. Some people think, why did Luke put that right there? Maybe it was lost and put back in. I think it's original.
It's an example. Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery. That's what the law says. He who marries one is divorced from a husband commits adultery. So this one, I believe, is given as an example of the law.
I'm not alone in that, by the way. I'm not out on a limb. A lot of people believe that. Perhaps though, one of this one example might have been something that's kind of aggravating to these Pharisees. By this point, we've already seen them come to him and said, what do you think about divorce?
He goes, what's your reading of it? Come on. Tell me. They said, well, Moses says we can. Right?
Because that's what they wanna hear. Moses says we can. He goes, he he does. You're right. That's in there.
There's provision for that. It was given as a good for you. But, yeah, there is that way out. God is merciful. Divorce is not the unpardonable sin.
He does give that in cases of the hardness of heart. Jesus would go on and say, and sexual sin. But it may have been that he used this example to aggravate that group of Pharisees. I don't know. He goes right into this story.
And this story most often is used in an evangelistic way, but it's in this chapter. I think it further illustrates the point that he already has made in the first parable of the shrewd manager that we should live life with an open hand. Now there was a rich man, another rich man, and he habitually dressed in purple and fine linen. The purple was the most expensive dye, the most expensive color, and fine linen was a very expensive fabric. So he habitually dressed that way, and he enjoyed himself in splendor every day.
That's a pretty magnificent guy. And then, it's stark contrast, and there was also a poor man named Lazarus. He was laid at this rich man's gate. Poor man's name, the rich man isn't. This poor man was covered with sores.
That's a vivid picture. Certainly not fine linen made of purple. He was longing to be fed just from the scraps from the trash, which fell from the rich man's table. Not only that, dogs were coming along and licking his sores. Yuck.
That's so vivid. Now, happened that the poor man died, and he was carried away by the angels. Like I said, it's a very common Hebraism to see that the angels carried a good man away. It happened that the poor man died and was carried away by the angels to Abraham's arms, and the rich man also died and was buried. No angels.
And in Hades. Hades is the place of disembodied spirits. It is a Greek word that is mean unseen. It's the unseen world, typically usually the lower world, unseen world. And it goes on to describe what it's like, so it's an image of hell.
In Hades, he raised his eyes. Being in torment, it's not a comfortable place, this rich man saw Abraham far away and saw Lazarus in his arms, in his bosom technically. The bosom is the place where the folds of the robe land together, and it's the place of the utmost intimacy. And he cried out saying, father Abraham, this guy was one of the Jewish people, one of the line of Abraham. He calls him, father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus so that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue for I am in agony in this flame.
I I see that it is Hades being in torment in this flame, and I said most often it's used evangelistically That's... Because you gotta give them the bad news before you give them the good news. But in this context, it is a rich man who has everything, lives in splendor every day. Poor man who has nothing, and then the roles are reversed. In Luke, the great reversal is a very common theme.
And so, father Abraham, with Lazarus at his bosom, and he says, send me Lazarus so that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool off my tongue for I am in agony in this flame. But Abraham said, child, remember that during your life, received your good things. You received. I mentioned a minute ago that all that we have, we have received. It's not necessarily because of what we have done or not done.
We'd like to think that it is. But if we have been blessed of God to have resources, we have received them. Child, remember that during your life, you received your good things. And likewise, Lazarus received bad things. It's just the way it is.
But now he's being comforted here, and you are agreed. You are in agony. Besides all this, between us and you, a great chasm has been set. It is fixed. It's just the way that it is.
Abraham is speaking from his experience right now that if you think back, father Abraham Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness. Abraham believed God, and because he believed God, when he said, go, leave the land that you know and go to a place I'll show you, because he believed him, he went. So go went. It's what the text says. Abraham believed God, and so he stepped out on faith believing and was blessed for that.
Besides us and you, a great chasm has been set so that those who want to go over from here to you will not be able. I couldn't send Lazarus even if he wanted to go. Nor will any people cross over from there to us. This is a common line, against postmortem conversion. So we have a certain amount of time.
This reflects back to that manager who had been fired and he still had a little time left. This, we have some time left. But at death, that time ends. Nor will people be able to cross over from there to us. And he said to him, then I request of you, father, that you send him to my father's house.
Send Lazarus back. Not here to me in Aedes, but send him just back to earth to my father's house because I have five brothers in order that he may warn them. I don't want them to go through what I'm going through so that they will not come to this place of torment as well. But Abraham, wise old Abraham says, they have Moses and they have the prophets. Let them hear them.
That's... They are... They have the truth. They're disregarding it. Or maybe they'll accept it, but they have what they need to know.
They have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. But he said, no. No, father Abraham. But if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.
Isn't that a foreshadowing? If someone were to go to them from the dead, they would... Will repent. But Abraham said to him, if they don't listen to Moses and the prophets, they're not gonna be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead. Man, that's the end of the chapter right there.
I think that that all goes together. Jesus has some more hard stuff to say in 17, but this is enough for today. This is 16. So application. How do you apply that?
The the shrewd manager, are we supposed to be unscrupulous managers? No. That was never lifted up anywhere in the text that said act like that guy. It was saying act like him in recognizing that you have limited time left. We have a limited time to do the the job that God has given for us to do.
If we have a limited time left, we ought to be making the most of the time that we have left. The days are evil. Use money in a way that pleases God and serves him. Be generous to the poor. That's definitely what the first story says.
If you examine the second story, it's less about heaven and hell and more about what you do with what you have because it has been given to you by God. It will show whether you have character of a believer or not. Actually, to show what the character is of what you believe. If you have received freely, then you will be able and you'll want to be giving freely. Living life with an open hand, I think, is what all of chapter 16 is about.
Would you stand? And I'll invite the whole band back up here, as many of them as and and will. We went from a sextet to a quartet. How about there's power in the blood? Amen.
I pulled up a benediction for today that I I... It's it's rattling around my brain the whole time and I didn't see a connection point till now. How about that? Jude only chapter twenty four and twenty five says, now, to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to make you stand in the presence of his glory blameless and with great joy. To the only God our savior through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory and majesty and dominion and authority before all time and now and forevermore.
Lord God Almighty, would you stand us up? Would you allow us, Lord, to stand on your promises and to trust trust your precepts that we would live life generous with an open hand, that we would have plenty and be able to share with others. Amen. Oh, and if you would, are we moving these away? If there are any of you who are able and willing, would you help Barry to clear the chairs?
Is that good? Yes. Okay. We're having vacation Bible school tomorrow and he'd like a little bit of help. He's got somewhere to be.
