You Cannot Serve God and Money

[Jesus] also said to the disciples, “There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was wasting his possessions. And he called him and said to him, ‘What is this that I hear about you? Turn in the account of your management, for you can no longer be manager.’ And the manager said to himself, ‘What shall I do, since my master is taking the management away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I have decided what to do, so that when I am removed from management, people may receive me into their houses.’ So, summoning his master’s debtors one by one, he said to the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’ He said, ‘A hundred measures of oil.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and sit down quickly and write fifty.’ Then he said to another, ‘And how much do you owe?’ He said, ‘A hundred measures of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and write eighty.’ The master commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness. For the sons of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light. 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. “One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much. If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful in that which is another’s, who will give you that which is your own? No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” (Luke 16:10-13)

The few verses above are the end to the section on the Parable of the Dishonest Manager, or rather the takeaway of the parable. The parable is about a rich man who had a manager that was wasting his possessions, so he called him to confront him and fire him. Being the dishonest manager that he was, and it notedly said he felt he was not strong enough to dig and ashamed to beg, he hatched a plan to short his now previous master of the debts owed to him by others.

The Dishonest Manager

The only thing the dishonest manager was commended for was his shrewdness. How sad that the only thing commendable about this man were his sharp-witted ways when it was used to prove his character and integrity was severely lacking. Being shrewd, or clever and sharp-witted may be deemed a good thing in the world’s eyes, but when it’s used for evil it’s certainly not a good thing at all in the eyes of God. Take a look what God not only says about a false balance (or in essence, shorting what is due like what this dishonest manager did), but also look at the contrast to those who are upright before the Lord versus the prideful and crooked:

A false balance is an abomination to the Lord,
    but a just weight is his delight.
When pride comes, then comes disgrace,
    but with the humble is wisdom.
The integrity of the upright guides them,
    but the crookedness of the treacherous destroys them.
Riches do not profit in the day of wrath,
    but righteousness delivers from death
(Proverbs 11:1-4)

Jesus’ Conclusion:

Now we can come up with our own conclusions and opinions about the dishonest manager, but really the only conclusion that matters is God’s in this and He laid it out pretty clearly here for us.

There are two aspects to this:

1. You should be a faithful steward with what you’ve been entrusted with by God.
2. If you can’t be honest and faithful in handling a little, you won’t be any better with a lot.

When it comes down to it, our level of faithfulness is not dependent on how much or little we have to be faithful in. So, the hard truth is, if you’ve been waiting for God to bring something bigger and better along for you to jump in head first in serving, all while pretty much phoning in the smaller stuff He’s already entrusted to you – it’s not a problem with how much or little, it’s a faithfulness problem. Now that’s not to say you can’t grow in this area, because you can. But again, having these heart check moments is so vital to our understanding of ourselves and where our hearts are at so that we don’t get on auto pilot in the wrong direction.

The reason Jesus mentions this goes beyond the physical here and is very much so spiritual when He said, “If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches?” The truth is that we as followers of Jesus have works that God prepared for us to walk in, Ephesians 2:10 tells us that clearly, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” But if we’re not being faithful to walk in them like we should, how can expect God to entrust more to us?

Choose Only One

At the very foundation of this all is the source of whom or what we serve. The dishonest manager was working in such a way that would enable him to have money even though he got fired for mismanaging his master’s wealth. The driving motive was centered around money because that was the dishonest manager’s god. But Jesus drew a solid line in the sand and on one side is God and on the other side is money/wealth/possessions. You cannot serve both God and money; you must choose only one.

Jesus didn’t even leave it at telling us we can’t serve both, He went further to provide the rationale – because we’ll either love one and hate the other or be devoted to one and despise the other.

Could you imagine hating and despising God? The whole purpose of life would become meaningless in that case.

It is clear here, that there is only one choice that doesn’t lead to destruction. Mark 8:36-37 says, For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what can a man give in return for his soul? Well we already read in Proverbs 11 that riches do not profit in the day of wrath, so that answers Mark, that it doesn’t profit anyone anything to gain the world and the riches of it and no one can give anything in return for their soul – only the blood of Jesus Christ has the power to redeem our souls and that’s not bought with money, it’s given freely and received through faith.

Serve God, Serve Faithfully

All in all, this parable warns us and encourages us. It’s a warning to not fall into the trap of serving money and to serve faithfully even in the smallest of things. And it’s also an encouragement that if we’re serving God and God alone, being faithful in the small, that we very well may be entrusted with more.

Does that mean everyone who is faithful in a little is guaranteed to be entrusted with more? No, but as we’ve seen throughout our study of the Bible, God is most interested in our hearts. It’s much better to be counted faithful even if we are only ever entrusted with little, than to be counted among the dishonest and faithless and even what we do have being taken.

My encouragement to you today is, no matter how much ministry work and service you’ve been entrusted with, serve God faithfully in it today, tomorrow, and the rest of the days you have here on earth.