Reconstructing The Parable Of The Shrewd Manager, Part 5: The Parable

What is a parable?

Yes, it’s a story…but what kind of story? What is its purpose? Why did Jesus tell so many parables? How can we better understand parables so that we can better understand (and thus reconstruct) the Parable of the Shrewd Manager?

Let’s begin at the beginning. Jesus told a  lot of parables; I bet Jesus told more parables than those which exist in the Bible. Why did he tell so many of these little stories? For one thing, stories are easy to remember. Stories are also very effective at conveying large and complex ideas with relatively simple language. For an itinerant preacher who was trying to change the world, no better tool existed than the parable!

According to Gordon Fee and Douglas Stuart in their book How To Read The Bible For All Its Worth, the word parable originally comes from the Aramaic word “mathelin” in Mark 4:10, which means “riddles”. “Mathelin” was later translated into the Greek word “parabole” which can mean “riddle” or “puzzle”. Fee and Stuart point out that there are at least four types of parables: True parables, similitudes, metaphors, and epigrams.

• The parable of the Good Samaritan is a “true parable”; it is a simple story, nothing more
• The parable of the Yeast in the Dough is a “similitude”; what is true of the ‘yeast’ in the parable is always true of yeast
• The parable of the Salt of the Earth is actually a metaphor
• The parable of Picking Grapes From Thorn Bushes is an epigram

Fee and Stuart contend (and I agree) that the true reason Jesus used parables was that the purpose of a parable is to “call forth a response on the part of the hearer.” Jesus wasn’t just trying to paint word-pictures or impart truth; He was trying to get people to DO SOMETHING.

But to understand what Jesus wants us to do we must first understand the “points of reference”  in each parable. Luckily, our earlier analysis of the Characters in this parable did this work for us. Do you remember the main characters called out in the parable?

1. The Rich Man
2. The Shrewd Manager
3. The Debtors

The meaning of this parable also lies in understanding who the original audience was, and yes, we’ve covered this ground as well in our analysis of the Setting! Based upon the text (and the preceding three parables in Luke) the primary audience was probably a gathering of Jesus’ disciples and a separate group of Pharisees.

Questions:

1. When you look at the list of characters in the story (Rich Man, Shrewd Manager, Debtors) and the people who were probably present at the original telling of this parable (Jesus, Disciples, Pharisees) what stands out to you? Do you see Jesus drawing any comparisons between the ”points of reference” in this parable and His audience?
2. What kind of parable is the Parable of the Shrewd Manager? How should this influence our interpretation?

Reconstructing The Parable Of The Shrewd Manager, Part 4: The Gospel Genre

Today’s post will briefly explore the genre of the Gospels and attempt to identify any characteristics of these writings that might influence our understanding of our chosen parable.

As you know, there are four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John). Of these four Gospels only Luke includes the parable of the shrewd manager. As I discussed yesterday, there is likely a significant reason why a Gentile, writing to other Gentiles, would choose to include this parable in his version of the Gospel.

Some people may bristle at the idea that human authors were selective in the material they presented, but as Gordon Fee and Douglas Stuart point out in their exception book How To Read The Bible For All Its Worth, the stories and sayings of Jesus were handed down orally for at least thirty years before the Gospels were written. By this point in history distinct Christian people-groups existed as audiences to the life of Jesus, each with its own needs; Luke wrote his Gospel differently (under the guidance and influence of the Holy Spirit) to effectively reach his unique audiences.

Knowing this, let’s ask ourselves once again: Why would Luke, a Gentile convert writing to other Gentile converts, be the only person to include this parable in his recording of Jesus’ life? For a clue, let’s look at a list of the other parables which appear only in the Gospel of Luke:

• Moneylender (12:35-40)
• Good Samaritan (10:30-37)
• Friend in need (11:5-8)
• Rich fool (12:16-21)
• Unfruitful fig tree (13:6-9)
• Lower seat in the feast (14:7-14)
• Great banquet (14:16-24)
• Cost of discipleship (14:28-33)
• Lost coin (15:8-10)
• Prodigal son (15:11-32)
• Rich man and Lazarus (16:19-31)
• Master and his servant (17:7-10)
• Persistent widow (18:2-8)
• Pharisee and tax collector (18:10-14)

Well I don’t know about you, but that list doesn’t do anything for me. I don’t see anything that helps me understand the parable of the shrewd manager…but that doesn’t mean it’s not there, so let’s keep this in the back of our minds: Luke included this parable for a reason when no-one else did.

There’s one last point I’d like to consider. Fee and Stuart discuss the fact that many of Jesus’ sayings in the Gospels are not recorded in their original context. Rather, the authors (under the guidance of the Holy Spirit) created contextual storylines for the purpose of including the parables. In other words, the context of the shrewd manager was probably created by Luke to facilitate our understanding of the story. Obviously Luke (and the Holy Spirit) felt the created context was close enough to the original context to convey Jesus’ intended meaning. Our challenge is to delineate between the created context and the purpose for which the context was created. Yesterday one of our readers (Mary) noted that this parable follows on the heels of the Prodigal Son story, and that both parables shared similarities. It is very likely that Luke grouped these two parables because they do share topical similarities.

Questions:

1. Are there any important aspects of the Gospel genre that I missed?
2. Do you see anything in the list of parables above that might help us understand the parable of the shrewd manager?
3. Is there anything about the context of our parable that can help us understand its meaning? What similarities do the parables of the Prodigal Son and the Shrewd Manager share?

Reconstructing The Parable Of The Shrewd Manager, Part 3: The Author

To quote the NIV Study Bible,

“Luke was probably a Gentile by birth, well-educated in Greek culture, a physician by profession, a companion of Paul at various times from his second missionary journey to his final imprisonment in Rome, and a loyal friend who remained with the apostle after others had deserted him.”

Luke was a Gentile convert to Christianity and was exactly the kind of person the Apostle Paul spent his life trying to reach. Luke’s commitment to Paul, his authorship of the third Gospel and the Book of Acts suggests he was one of the most committed non-apostolic followers of Christ in the early church. Tradition holds that Luke was with Paul at Paul’s martyrdom, and that he continued to serve the Lord unmarried and without children until his death in Boeotia in Greece at 84 years of age.

It is significant to me that a highly committed Gentile convert who accompanied the greatest missionary to the Gentile world (Paul) is the only Gospel author who included this parable in his account of Jesus’ life. Without going into too much detail regarding the genre of the Gospels (which will be covered in a future post), I do want to explore for a moment why Luke was the one to write about this parable. Luke was a medical doctor; could it be that he was intrigued by the psychological implications of this parable? Or could it be Luke felt this story would be particularly meaningful to other Gentiles?

I don’t believe there is any language in the parable which suggests the nationality of the Rich Man or the Manager, and as I noted yesterday the location Luke places this story was multi-cultural. Perhaps Luke was the only one to include this parable because it translated well from the Jewish world into the Gentile world. Romans and Greeks would have been easily able to relate to the idea of rich men, managers, slaves and servants…but now I’m straying into another post topic!

Questions:

1. Are there any salient details of the life and/or person of the author I missed?
2. Do you think there is any significance to our understanding of the parable related to the identity of the author? In other words, how does our understanding of the author inform us about the parable?
3. Imagine for a moment Luke’s life before and after hearing about Jesus. What kind of transformation do you think took place?

 

Reconstructing The Parable Of The Shrewd Manager, Part 2: The Setting

Part 1 of the series discovered and discussed the primary and secondary character in Jesus’ Parable of the Shrewd Manager. Part 2 of the series will briefly discuss the setting of the parable within the context of the Gospel of Luke.

Who:

• Chapter 16 opens with, “Jesus told his disciples…” so we know that Jesus’ disciples are the audience for this parable. It is very likely that “his disciples” refers to the larger body of Jesus’ followers, and not just the Twelve Apostles.
• Verse 14 states, “The Pharisees, who loved money, heard all this…” so we know that a number of Pharisees (who were not Jesus’ disciples) were also witness to this parable.
• Chapter 15 shows Jesus speaking to a group of ‘sinners’ and tax collectors; it is unknown whether that group was present.
• Chapter 17 also opens with, “Jesus said to his disciples…” It is possible that Jesus repeated this parable often to his larger group of followers.
• Based on the location this parable was probably told (see Where below) it is likely that those in attendance included Galileans, Samaritans, and Romans. In terms of first century Palestine, this was a diverse crowd!

What:

• It’s a parable, of course, which means that Jesus wasn’t just ‘flapping His gums’. He told this story to make a point, which is of course why we’re studying it at all.

When:

• The exact date and time of the telling of this parable is unknown; it is very likely that Jesus told the parable more than once. However, we know from previous and following chapters that Jesus was telling this and other parables as he moved through towns on his final trip to Jerusalem. This parable can be included with a handful of others (including the Prodigal Son) which Jesus attempted to impart on His followers as he knowingly approached His own execution.

Where:

• The exact location is unknown, though previous and following chapters reveal that Jesus was teaching in towns and villages as He made His final trip to Jerusalem.
• Chapter 17, verse 11 puts Jesus in a village on the border of the provinces of Galilee and Samaria, possibly near the town of Nain (where Jesus previously restored a widow’s son to life) and just south of His hometown of Nazareth.

Why:

• I assume because He wanted to impart additional wisdom before He was executed in Jerusalem.
• The gospels don’t always record events in chronological order (so it’s impossible to know for sure) but this parable is nestled close to several others, including the parable of the lost sheep, the parable of the prodigal son. The proximity of those beloved (and well understood) parables to this rather confusing story is part of what agitates me…and, I suspect, many others.
• Even if the chronological order isn’t correct (according to our modern understanding of time) the author of this gospel felt compelled to group these teachings together before Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem. There is significance to this fact: Either Jesus was imparting His final wisdom to His wider audience, or the author felt this was the best place to insert these teachings.

Questions:

1. Did I miss any important aspects of the setting for this parable?
2. What do you think the significance is of the placement of this parable within the larger context of the Gospel?
3. Does it seem odd to you that such a difficult parable comes directly after arguably the most beloved and well-understood parable in the Bible (the prodigal son)?
4. Does the probable location of the telling of this parable pose any significance?

Reconstructing The Parable Of The Shrewd Manager, Part 1: The Characters

I’ll begin the reconstruction of this challenging parable by looking at the characters of the story.

Primary Characters:

• The Rich Man - The source of this person’s wealth is unknown, but the parable reveals that he has dealings with agrarian society. Once the story is set in motion the Rich Man is largely ignored. His primary function seems to be to provide the means and opportunity for the Manager to misbehave. Of course, Jesus’ attitude toward ‘the rich’ cannot be ignored in any parable that begins with, “There was a rich man…” More details will emerge for this character as our study evolves.
• The Manager - The main character of this parable; the theological lesson revolves around his behavior. He is a curious character because while he seems to be untrustworthy, he is in fact considered “shrewd” (a word with far more favorable connotations). Furthermore, it seems as though Jesus holds up the Manager as the character in the story His disciples should model their own behavior after.

Secondary Characters:

• Debtor #1 (olive oil, v.6) - The first of, potentially, many of the Rich Man’s debtors with whom the Manager meets. At first blush this person (along with Debtor #2) appears as a less important member of society than the Rich Man. Perhaps a good comparison might be the ruling class (Rich Man) and the merchant class (Debtors #1 & 2). It’s too early to draw conclusions, however, or to begin looking for 21st century equivalents.
• Debtor #2 (wheat, v.7) – The second of, potentially, many of the Rich Man’s debtors with whom the Manager meets.
• Unknown Party (brings charges against the Manager, v.1) – The source of the catalyst of the story, the Unknown Party reveals the behavior of the Manager to the Rich Man. There is nothing in the text to suggest who this might have been, and because the other characters (particularly the Manager) dominate the story this character is often overlooked. But note that without the Unknown Party, the Manager would have continued his behavior ad infinitum. In other words, without the Manager there is no theological lesson, but without the Unknown Party there is no parable. The role this character plays is fascinating, and the longer I think about him and his silence throughout the rest of the parable the more convinced I am that the Unknown Party is one of the keys to our contemporary understanding of this parable. Did Jesus create the Unknown Party simply to act as a literary device to create tension, or is there more to the Unknown Party? Who would stand to gain in a situation like this? Who would have the motivation to reveal the Manager’s actions to the Rich Man? Most importantly, would this motivation have been important to the original audience of the parable? The most obvious candidate for the Unknown Party is a rival Manager working for another Rich Man, perhaps settling some long-standing dispute. Another possibility is that a second Rich Man hoped to embarrass the first Rich Man by revealing the Manager’s behavior. A third possibility is that through his actions the Manager angered one or more of the Rich Man’s debtors, and one of these individuals reported the Manager. Furthermore, the motives in these examples are anger and jealousy; could these be a part of the parable as well?
• The ‘Master’ (who commends the Manager, v.8) – I suspect most people who read this parable assume the “master” noted in verse 8 is the Manager’s master, i.e. the Rich Man. However, that assumption rests on the interpretation of the word “his” which comes directly beforehand, “And his master commended the…” However, note that verse 7 ends with the Manager adjusting a bill for Debtor #2. It is possible (though too early to say definitively) that the “master” of verse 8 is the master of Debtor #2, i.e. a second Rich Man. This could mean Debtor #2 is a second Manager, or perhaps even a household slave. Once again I am drawn to the rich possibilities of the second silent, and largely ignored, character in this parable. The commendation of the “master” is what makes the parable so difficult for contemporary audiences to comprehend, thus understanding the “master” in verse 8 is critical to our understanding of the entire story.

Questions:

1. Have I missed any characters?
2. Do you have any initial insights into these characters not already discussed? Try to base your observations on a reading of the text alone, and be careful not to regurgitate what you think you already “know”. Remember: We are trying to discover this parable, not rehash the last bad sermon you heard on it.
3. Do you disagree with any of my conclusions or assertions?
4. What questions do you still have about the characters I’ve identified?

Reconstructing The Parable Of The Shrewd Manager

I’m super-excited about this next series! I’ve wanted to re-write one of the parables of Jesus for quite a while, and I think I’m finally ready to tackle this challenge…and I’m going to need your help!

Jesus communicated significant theological principles through simple, memorable stories. The Problem: His audiences lived 2,000 years ago in a Near Eastern agrarian society. Our Challenge: Reconstructing a parable so we can understand them as Jesus’ original audiences would have.

The phrase “first understanding” refers to a near-subconscious recognition and understanding of a literary device or story. For example, if I start a story with, “Once upon a time…” you instinctively know a fairy tale is coming. When Jesus told His parables, His audiences would have instinctively understood many nuances we miss today…and that’s where the fun and challenging part of reconstructing a parable comes in!

I chose the Parable of the Shrewd Manager (Luke 16:1-9) because no matter how many times I read it, and no matter how many bad sermons I hear on it, I always walk away confused. I believe the reason is because I (we) are missing some of the nuance that Jesus’ audience grasped at the “first understanding”, subconscious level.

Over the next few days I’m going to work methodically through this parable in an attempt to deconstruct, then reconstruct, the story. My hope is that at the end of the process you and I will have a new understanding of, and appreciation for, this story. We’ll also have a great evangelical tool: A parable of Jesus written in contemporary language we can tell to anyone we meet, and they won’t need to understand Christianese!

Remember, I’m going to need lots of audience participation…I’m really looking forward to this interactive exercise with you all!

Rabid Mongoose

Putting On The Yoke Of Jesus

In my last post I tried to describe the difference between Jesus’ yoke as noted in Matthew 11:30, and the yoke of expected performance the Church places on us. In response, a reader posed the following question: “What do I do now?”

To answer that excellent question, let me refer to the concluding lines of my last post:

In context, then, I believe verses 1-27 of chapter 11 provide justification for why we follow Jesus: He is the Son of God. Furthermore, I believe chapter 12 tells us about following Jesus: He lives only to fulfill the expectations of His heavenly Father, not priests, pastors, legalism, culture, or His biological family.

I believe Jesus wants people to serve the Father, not culture (no, not even ‘Christian culture’).

I believe Jesus wants people to worship the Creator, not the creation.

I believe Jesus desperately desires for people to see with absolute clarity the difference between Truth and Idolatry.

So what does this mean? What should you do? Here are ten ideas:

1. Make up your mind to serve God, not the Church
2. Be prepared to serve God more often Monday through Saturday than on Sunday morning
3. Consider whether you use the Church to make yourself feel better
4. Consider whether the Church is the most important thing in your life
5. Remember that the Church was made for man, not man for the Church
6. Ask yourself if you are often forced to choose between doing what’s best for people and doing what’s best for the Church
7. Remember that Jesus is in heaven and all the Apostles are dead; your pastor’s name is not in the Bible
8. Make a list of the rules and cultural expectations of your Church that have more to do with where you were born than what’s in the Bible
9. Quit serving at your Church if you’re doing it because you think you ‘have to’ or because a member of the Church staff pressured you
10. Take responsibility for your relationship with Jesus Christ; quit forcing your pastor to spoon-feed you every Sunday morning

His Yoke Is Easy!

I hope the sense of irony in yesterday’s post was not lost on you. I believe there is an absolute (though not always easily discernible) difference between the yoke of oppression the Church lays on us and the yoke of Jesus Christ. Compare the list of Church and cultural expectations I published yesterday (40 items) to Jesus’ two expectations: Love God, love people.

I believe Jesus’ yoke is easy; I know His burden is light. In my recovery from pornography addiction I have personally experienced the unbelievably, extraordinarily, miraculously easy burden of Jesus Christ. It is a freedom and a lightness I never dreamed existed.

I believe the Church wrongfully exchanges the burden of Christ with its own arduous yoke, and that many an unsuspecting Christian now lies prostrate on the floor of the Temple, crushed under the weight of Holy Expectations.

The phrase “My yoke is easy” comes from the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 11, verse 30. To try to understand what Jesus meant by these words let’s analyze His statement in context:

• Chapter 11 opens with Jesus preaching in Galilee. John the Baptist is in prison, and he sends his followers to ask Jesus to confirm or deny that he is the Messiah. Jesus confirms to the crowd that John is a messenger sent from God and that John’s purpose was to announce Jesus’ coming
• Jesus answers John’s followers’ challenge by asking them to observe the miracles He performs and the fact that “the good news is proclaimed to the poor”
• Jesus goes on to chastise those who fail to believe in Him despite His miracles
• Finally, Jesus prays to the Father and confirms His own identity as the Father’s Son, and concludes with the text we are analyzing: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

This closes chapter 11…but let’s not stop our analysis there:

• Chapter 12 opens with Jesus challenging the Pharisees on the laws of the Sabbath
• The chapter goes on to deal with additional conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees over the legalistic expectations of the priesthood, as well as the spiritual expectations of His mother and brothers (“whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother”)

Thus we see that the closing remarks of Chapter 11 (our primary text) set up Chapter 12 beautifully!

In context, then, I believe verses 1-27 of chapter 11 provide justification for why we follow Jesus: He is the Son of God. Furthermore, I believe chapter 12 tells us about following Jesus: He lives only to fulfill the expectations of His heavenly Father, not priests, pastors, legalism, culture, or His biological family.

I believe Jesus wants people to serve the Father, not culture (no, not even ‘Christian culture’).

I believe Jesus wants people to worship the Creator, not the creation.

I believe Jesus desperately desires for people to see with absolute clarity the difference between Truth and Idolatry.

Yes, His yoke is easy, and His burden is light.

If His Yoke Is Easy…

If Jesus’ yoke is easy, and if His burden is light (Matthew 11:30), why am I so damn tired?

• Read the Bible (“…here’s a reading plan!”).
• Pray (“…for at least 15 minutes!”).
• Confess my sins.
• Go to church on Sunday…and sometimes on Wednesday nights.
• Dress to impress.
• Watch my language.
• Watch my thoughts.
• Give the pastor an “Amen!” every time he asks for one.
• Try to follow the pastor through yet another labyrinthine sermon.
• Try to sit through the worship team’s ‘stirring rendition’ of a Chris Tomlin song.
• Follow the pastor on Twitter.
• ‘Like’ the church on Facebook.
• Read the pastor’s blog.
• Volunteer at church.
• Tithe to the church.
• Give to the children’s ministry.
• Give to the youth ministry.
• Give to the women’s ministry.
• Give to the men’s ministry.
• Give to special collections.
• Sign up for special volunteer events.
• Join a prayer group.
• Lead a bible study group.
• Join a marriage encounter group.
• Attend special church events, conferences, retreats and fundraisers.
• Sign your kids up for a group.
• Ignore glaring church problems (“…there’s no perfect church!”).
• Read ‘Christian’ books, devotionals, etc.
• Listen to ‘Christian’ radio stations.
• Watch Veggie Tales and the 700 Club.
• Watch Joel Osteen sermons online.
• Attend church business meetings.
• Attend repetitive group leader training sessions.
• Don’t drink (too much).
• Don’t smoke (unless people can’t see you).
• Don’t chew (see note above).
• Be a ‘good Christian’ in public.
• Be a ‘good Christian’ in private.
• Model the ‘Christianity’ of my father’s generation.
• Fulfill the spiritual expectations of my pastor, my in-laws, my parents, my wife, and my kids.
• And, oh yeah, in my spare time: Make a living, raise a family, and ‘get a life’!

The yoke of the Church is no less onerous than the yoke of addiction…and I would know. Replacing one addiction (pornography) with another (religion) is not progress, it’s not healthy, and it sure as hell isn’t easy or light.

Top 10 Reasons Why The Modern Church Is Irrelevant

I love the church. Of course, when I say ‘the church’ I’m talking about a collective body of believers, not an organization. And though the Church as an organization is probably one of those necessary evils we must endure in this life, it could be so much better than it is today! So in the spirit of David Letterman here are the Top 10 reasons why the modern church is irrelevant:

10. The Modern Church relies upon a shared theological view, or ‘meta-narrative’; the post-modern world is moving rapidly away from this point of view.

9. The Modern Church wielded power because its organizational leaders held the keys to biblical knowledge and wisdom not widely available to the general public. Then those Google guys came along…

8. The Modern Church uses clichéd stories to educate children and adults. These are usually the same stories our pastors’ parents heard when they were kids. Yeah, kind of a lot has changed since then…we often don’t come away from the Modern Church with the tools necessary to deal with a post-modern world.

7. The Modern Church has (painfully) tried to keep up with contemporary music tastes in an effort to be relevant. Unfortunately most of this music requires a heck of a lot of money and talent to reproduce. Most churches would be better off playing YouTube video clips of our favorite songs and spending the money going to the Worship Ministry on helping the needy instead.

6. The Modern Church’s missionary efforts are based on a model designed before air travel, the Internet, and a global economy. We spend thousands of dollars to send Americans overseas for two-week ‘missionary experiences’, or worse yet tens of thousands of dollars to move American families overseas to serve as full-time missionaries, while people from those same countries live and work in our own communities.

5. Most pastors in the Modern Church were taught to preach three-point sermons to congregations with similar socio-economic backgrounds and who have a shared knowledge of Scripture. If your church’s congregation looks like this today, I’d bet good money it’s a small church on its last financial legs.

4. The Modern Church’s organizational structure is rigidly hierarchical, while the rest of the world is adopting more organic organizational models.

3. The Modern Church’s leaders are vested with the authority of Apostles…by the rest of us. Let me ask you something: If you can read the same books, have access to the same tools, and have the same Holy Spirit indwelling in you, why in the world do you behave as though your pastor is any more ‘holy’ than you? The post-modern world is moving away from positional authority; i.e, job titles don’t mean jack.

2. Most pastors in the Modern Church are trying to teach people the Bible: History, theology, doctrine, etc. But in the post-modern world people are far less interested in theology, at least up front; they want answers to the problems in their day-to-day lives. Ever noticed how many self-help books are on the shelf at your local book store? Yeah…

…and the number one reason why the Modern Church is irrelevant…

1. Social media…heard of it? Sadly, the Modern Church is a social club of sorts for many of its members. The post-modern church can finally shed this horrid function thanks to Facebook, Twitter, etc.