The Parable Of The Unjust Servant

The Parable of the Unjust Servant

Luke 16:1-13

This morning, we are studying one of Jesus’s parables. A parable is basically an illustration which is used to help understand an idea. This morning, we are studying the Parable of the Unjust Steward from Luke 16? What does Jesus want us to understand from this parable. Certainly, Jesus is not primarily concerned that one should be a faithful and accountable worker in one’s secular job. It is true that as Christians, we must strive to be both accountable and competent to our secular bosses. But this parable speaks to a higher accountability.

The parable begins with Jesus referring to “a certain rich man.” With the exception of the following parable of Lazarus and the Rich man in which Lazarus is named, parables always use the indefinite. the characters are not named. This does not mean that the parables Jesus taught use fictitious characters. This is up for debate among scholars. but just because Jesus does not name the characters as is typical of parables does not mean that Jesus has a certain person in mind when he spoke the parable. Perhaps this person was one of the people who heard the parable. We can look at the Old Testament where Nathan the Prophet told a parable about a certain rich man who stole a poor man’s only ewe lamb to Kind David. Then after David responds with indignation, Nathan cries out: “Thou are the man!” (2 Samuel 12:7). The “certain man” also causes us to replace the “certain man” with someone we know, maybe even ourselves. This is meant to personally draw us into the parable itself.

The steward is also unnamed. He is accused of wasting his master’s goods. This does not necessarily say that he was dishonest and embezzled funds. It is possible that he was lazy and incompetent. But one could say that incompetence and laziness are in a sense a type of theft. At any rate, this steward’s reaction to the idea that he was about to fail an audit was crooked.

You can see the slothfulness of the steward in that he considered himself too good to have to resort to the plight of a common laborer. Neither did he wish to have to beg. This man was proud of his sloth. He had to come up with another solution. So he called his creditors in and asked them how much they owed. Did not the steward know how much they owed? The first owed a hundred measures of oil. He told that man to scrap that invoice and write down 50. The next man owed a hundred measures of wheat. His bill was reduced to eighty. By doing this, he hoped that one of them might offer him a job when he got fired.

The question I would ask is why these two creditors would hire such a manager. There is a truth that the one who steals for you will also steal from you. But this parable isn’t about these two men.

There is even a more puzzling question as to why the steward's current boss would commend such a dishonest and slothful steward for his cleverness. In English, one might condemn rather than commend because the words are similar in spelling, and a quick read might have one substitute for the word. What did the owner of the business see in this wretch? Perhaps he saw himself. Perhaps he had used trickery and dishonesty to rise to the position he did. The world has a different understanding of value. Perhaps he saw that he could blackmail this servant by telling him that from now on this man would be dishonest for him rather than against him. If he did not obey, he could be put into debtor's prison or to public shaming which this servant greatly feared.

But, again, this does not seem to be Jesus’ main point. What is the parable illustrating? One possibility is to illustrate the words: “Make friends of the unrighteous mammon so that when you are thrust out, they will receive you into everlasting habitations.” This everlasting habitation will obviously not be heaven. This is not he type of steward Jesus wants in His kingdom. What Jesus expects is faithfulness to the smallest detail. There is no room for sloppy service and wasting the goods that the believer has been entrusted with. In the Parable of the talents, Jesus expected his Servants to trade and profit from the money He had given them. The one who was given the least did absolutely nothing with his talent and was condemned for his fear and slothfulness. He was faithless in the small amount he was given. If he had been given more, he would have wasted more. True is the statement Jesus makes here when He says that the one who is faithless in lesser things is faithless and the one who is a little unjust will be greatly unjust if opportunity was given. Perhaps this is why the lord only gave the one man a single talent in the first place.