A Strange (and relevant) Parable (as all of them are)

Luke 16:1 He 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. 2 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.’ 3 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. 4 I have decided what to do, so that when I am removed from management, people may receive me into their houses.’ 5 So, summoning his master's debtors one by one, he said to the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’ 6 He said, ‘A hundred measures [8] of oil.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and sit down quickly and write fifty.’ 7 Then he said to another, ‘And how much do you owe?’ He said, ‘A hundred measures [9] of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and write eighty.’ 8 The master commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness. For the sons of this world [10] are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light. 9 And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, [11] so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal dwellings. 10 “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. 11 If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? 12 And if you have not been faithful in that which is anothers, 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 he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.”

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In a previous post I meditated on God's feelings about money. Coming back to that topic, I love this parable because he admits that dirty money is only good for one thing - advancing the Kingdom. Come hell or high water, we should do what it takes to help people know God loves them, even if we have to spend money to do it. Since you can't take it with you, might as well bless others with it; and in the case of this manager, we see that it isn't really money that we are dealing with, it's debt. Like our national economy, our own lives are not valued in how much we earn, but rather in how much we owe and to whom. in the realm of sin and forgiveness, paying off the bottom line is impossible. The best we can do is curry favor with others by forgiving their debts (and passing on the toxic loan to Christ to carry on his back). The irony is that the owner of the debt actually endorses this practice. Instead of scolding the manager for shortchanging him, Jesus is implying that God will say, "good job", your forgiveness of their debts was essential for your acceptance and understanding of my forgiveness of you.

The Ransom

Psalm 49:8 Truly no man can ransom another, or give to God the price of his life, 8 for the ransom of their life is costly and can never suffice,9 that he should live on forever and never see the pit. ... 15 But God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol, for he will receive me.

Matthew 20:28 ...the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
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I know it baffles reason, but it shouldn't, that there is something called cause and effect in all things. If the Enlightenment claimed to teach anything, it was that there was cause and effect and that by observing effects we might "know" certain things about their causes. And yet post-Enlightenment thinking has somehow separated this fact from its spiritual antecedent [because, supposedly, spiritual things are not within the realm of science and therefore are obsolete] But spiritual things have cause and effect as well. The cause of death, in the macro and microcosmic sense, is sin. It should be obvious to any observer that there is sin in the world and that something needs to be set right. How to do it? Can we identify a cause? Can we deduce from the cause a workable solution? Various ideologies have sought to draw conclusions about the human condition and its panaceas, but the Bible teaches that there is a high price be paid to make things right in the world. It cannot be paid by us. What has been done is too big for any of us to undo. Only Christ is sufficient to undo this cosmic conundrum. He can set the scales right again. This doesn't seem fair to post-modern sensibilities, and perhaps it never seemed fair to any one who thought themselves capable of omniscience. But grace seldom seems fair to the forgiven, so we will just have to deal with it in humility.

Spiritual Leprosy / Two Kinds of Doubt

Luke 5:12 While he was in one of the cities, there came a man full of leprosy. [11] And when he saw Jesus, he fell on his face and begged him, “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.” 13 And Jesus [12] stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I will; be clean.” And immediately the leprosy left him. 14 And he charged him to tell no one, but “go and show yourself to the priest, and make an offering for your cleansing, as Moses commanded, for a proof to them.” 15 But now even more the report about him went abroad, and great crowds gathered to hear him and to be healed of their infirmities. 16 But he would withdraw to desolate places and pray.
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Two points here:
1. Leprosy is such a powerful analogy of sin. Essentially, it causes the skin to lose sensation, to become numb to pain and pleasure, to die, as it were. This is the effect of our spiritual disease called sin. In our sinful flesh, we lose sensation for the "real" things of God's Kingdom. We are unable to sense when our hand is on the stove. We are unable to feel the loving touch of another. Eventually there is a complete breakdown of the body (read: spirit). Leprosy is incurable. The pragmatic solution is banishment, so the death of the sensations leads to the death of relationships. Sin divides us and is the antithesis of the Greatest Commandment which is true, whole, Kingdom community.
2. The second thing I get from this passage is two kinds of doubt - doubting God's goodness and doubting His power. In this case, the leper believes that Jesus is able to heal him, but isn't sure if he is willing. In other passages of the Bible we see individuals who believe Jesus is willing but not able. All of us fall into one of these two categories when we struggle with faith in God. We either doubt he is willing or doubt he is able to do what we ask. Maturity leads us to consider the possibility, with humility, that our requests may not be good requests. If this is the case, then it is certainly possible that he isn't willing to answer the request. But in the case of the leper, it is obvious that something which was created to be a certain way - the man's body - was in a state of disarray. God, as Creator and Maintainer of His creation, is in the business of setting things right - so he is certainly willing to heal the leper (both spiritually and physically). Doubting that he is able, on the other hand, comes down to a simple misunderstanding of God. We've all done that and will continue to do it because he is beyond the limits of our understanding. Job struggled with this (not seeing resolution to his agony) and was awakened to God's power when confronted by God himself. God makes it clear that he is able to do whatever he wants, which brings us back to the first doubt again. Why would God allow Job to suffer so much, to lose his family so tragically and go through so long a trial without any clear reassurance of love? Tough questions - and I am so grateful the writers of the Bible didn't shy away from them or pretend the answers were easy. It is something to bookmark and come back to again and again.

Strong in Spirit = Poor in Spirit

Luke 1:80 And the child [John the Baptist] grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness until the day of his public appearance to Israel.



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Father, today my prayer is that you would make me strong in spirit like John the Baptist, which I suspect comes through being poor in spirit since the Kingdom of God is upside down. What does it mean to be poor in spirit? Is it what some call piety? As I understand it, piety is the understanding of our position in the created order, both high and low in relation to everything else. We were created to be tenants of creation and in a sense to rule over it. In time we will even judge the angels. At our pinnacle, we will be called friends of God. And yet, our way forward is a humble, narrow path. In John's case, that meant living life in the wilderness and dying a death that, in the eyes of the world, was certainly humiliating and pointless. I am sure that Jesus felt the emotional pain of seeing his cousin go through the tribulation of a poor-in-spirit/strong-in-spirit life. And then Jesus went on to model it himself, pouring out his blood and spirit so that the Holy Spirit could then be poured out on us. What is a spirit? What is a soul? I am more aware, as of late, of the error of viewing myself in terms of my physical attributes alone. More and more, when I look at myself in the mirror, I am aware of myself within myself. I realize, like Adam and Eve did, that my physical body is insufficient in certain ways. But the road of introspection and meditation teaches me that my spirit is also insufficient, and recognition this lack becomes recognition of grace through faith.

Justice

Exodus 22:22 You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child. 23 If you do mistreat them, and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry, 24 and my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword

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When I look at the injustice of the world, these kinds of verses give me peace. Justice will prevail.

The Currency of the Kingdom

Mark 12:10 Bring me a denarius [11] and let me look at it.” 16 And they brought one. And he said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” They said to him, “Caesar's.” 17 Jesus said to them, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.” And they marveled at him....

Mark 12:41 And he sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box. Many rich people put in large sums. 42 And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny. [13] 43 And he called his disciples to him and said to them, “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. 44 For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”

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On first glance one might see a contradiction between these two passages. On one hand Jesus says, "render to Caesar what is Caesar's" and on the other, he praises a woman for giving all of her money to the church. The context, as always, is the key. In between these two teachings there is the famous Greatest Commandment in which Jesus explains the motive and priority which should inform our actions: LOVE. We see that Jesus is ambivelent about money when it comes to taxes and politics - he would just as soon give all the money back to Caesar rather than deal with the shackles that money offers society. There is nothing of love in the exchange of taxes (patriotism isn't the love we're talking about). The kind of love that God exudes and wants from us does in fact demand everything from us, and money is a small part of the package, but the currency of the Kingdom of God "is much more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices" or even a widow's two bits. God wanted her heart and he knew that he had it - which pleased him. Today I am trying to have the same heart with every aspect of my life - my own two bits.