The new season of The Apprentice started this past Thursday evening. This year’s candidates are average Americans whose lives and careers have been hit hard by the recent economic turndown. Each of the contestants will be vying for a 6-figure job in Mr. Trump’s organization, including Wade Hanson, a real estate agent from Woodbury. They will be judged on how well they perform certain projects and challenges. Unfortunately, each week along the way, one of them will have to hear Donald Trump say, “You’re fired.”
Jesus tells another story in today’s Gospel in which a rich man accuses his property manager of wasting his possessions. So he is about to fire him. But before he does, the manager must bring the books up to date and give a final accounting to the owner. Facing unemployment, the manager decides to stick it to the rich man one last time. He calls in each of his master’s debtors and lowers their debt by as much as 50%! He may not have any marketable skills or job prospects, but at least now he has friends!
If this is indicative of how the manager operated, we can probably understand why he got fired. He’s certainly not helping his master’s bottom line at all. While he was employed by the rich man, he wasted his property, and now, on his way out he loses even more money for the man’s business! Our Gospel reading identifies him as a dishonest man – you can say that again.
And yet the rich man commends the manager for his actions because he acted shrewdly. Once again, like in all the stories Jesus told, this parable kind of sneaks up on us and surprises us with an unexpected twist. Why would the rich man commend his manager for wiping out debts that were owed to him? Why would he celebrate the loss of more property and income? Yes, the manager was shrewd in making friends, but at his master’s expense!
Jesus is introducing us to a new kind of economics. And as you can guess, it’s completely upside down. What should be protected, is given away. What should be invested is thrown out. Debts that should be collected are cancelled. And management that makes no business sense at all is commended.
What Jesus is revealing to us in this story is not some new way to manage our personal finances or some new strategy for running a business or even how to run a church! What he is showing us is that the most important thing we have to manage – is not the result of our own efforts. The most valuable commodity that we have — the thing that matters the most — is something we share at the expense of someone else — it is something of great value and yet it is invested most wisely by throwing it away. It is the one thing on which all friendships and all relationships are based. It is the grace and forgiveness we have in Jesus Christ.
When we have the responsibility of managing something, we usually avoid waste by keeping as much of it as we can, by reducing our expenditures, by not taking great risks in how we spend, and protecting our assets. But God’s grace is unique in that it is only a waste if it is NOT used and shared. Forgiveness and grace are not things we should be stingy about. In fact, they are best used by taking great risks with them and even throwing them out to those who don’t deserve them.
The manager in Jesus’ parable threw away what his master had entrusted to him in order to establish relationships. Forgiving others, at Christ’s expense, is what establishes authentic and meaningful relationships with others. It is the foundation of Christian marriage. It is the greatest gift parents can share with their children. It is what is exchanged freely among Christian friends. Grace shared freely is never wasted.
In the novel made into a musical, Les Miserables, Jean Valjean begins as an outcast in society. He has recently been freed on parole after many years in prison for stealing bread during an economic depression. Although he is free, he must carry a yellow passport with him identifying him as a convict. He finds shelter in the home of the local bishop, a kind old man who understands grace. The Bishop feeds Valjean and gives him a place to sleep. But during the night, Valjean wakes up, steals the bishop’s silver and runs away. He is arrested by the police who drag Valjean back to the bishop’s house to return the silver. But the Bishop lies and says the silver was a gift. He even presents Valjean with the silver candlesticks and says, “You forgot these, my friend.”
Was that a waste of valuable property? Without a doubt. But through the Bishop God’s grace flowed abundantly to one completely undeserving of it. Valjean kept those candlesticks for the rest of his life as a sign of grace, as a reminder of debts cancelled, and as a result in his own way extended that grace to others.
Jesus teaches us today a lesson in economics – the economics of grace. Of course, he not only taught it, he lived it, and died it. He squandered his Father’s love on us who were undeserving. He cancelled debts we couldn’t pay by his sacrifice on the cross. He established a living relationship between us and God. He was the ultimate and best manger of God’s grace by using it to set people free – to set us free. He shows us with his life, death and resurrection the secret of true riches: generosity.
Much of God’s love is lost among us in the transactions between people, but in Christ God is constantly generating more love and forgiveness. He is doing that right now – right here. He is giving us his grace so that we can make friends with it, scatter it freely, take risks with it, cancel our debtors and set people free. God is looking for candidates who will live out this grace – who will dish it out without concern for self — who will spend his gracious capital – who will even waste it on the undeserving. “When you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven,” Jesus said. He’s calling you by his grace today to do what he has already done for you. During economic downturns, emotional recessions, personal crises and just everyday stress, there is nothing that is needed more than a sign of grace, a word of forgiveness, the power of God’s love in Christ. It’s yours to share. It’s not really a job offer from God, it’s more of a divine dare.
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