Reformation Sunday Sermon 2 of 3 on Stewardship

10/28/12 Text: Luke 16: 8 Title: The Steward’s Purpose The text for the second week in our three-week stewardship sermon series “Living Each Day as a Steward” is from the parable of the dishonest steward as it is recorded in Luke, Jesus is talking, “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.” That text, as I just mentioned is found in a larger story concerning a dishonest steward who was fired and then to make sure he was taken care of he falsified the books so that the creditors would take care of him and his family after he lost his job. It is a hard text to understand, for it appears, until you look closer that Jesus is congratulating him for coming up with such a sweet plan. That is what it appears to teach. In fact many a Christian has used the text to justify making somewhat shady business transactions. But in reality it does not. What Jesus is saying is that Christians are to be just as concerned with their spiritual lives, as the dishonest steward was with making sure he was taken care of in his physical life. We, as Christians are to be just as smart, although not crooked to make sure that when we die, which we all will do at some time or other, that we will be welcomed into the house of God where we will be met by all of the brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers who have died before us in the saving grace of God. This parable touches us because we struggle to balance our relationship with God, keeping him first and foremost with our wants, desires and dealings with the things of this world, and what they offer to us. We are often tempted into thinking that having more and more things of this world will make us happier and more secure, which is totally not true. Ah, that we would spend as much time and energy taking care of our spiritual lives, as we do our physical lives, but we don’t do we? We, for the most part, have done a pretty good job at separating our spiritual lives from our physical lives and in doing so flirt with receiving God’s wrath. I say that because the way you live your life; your giving to the congregations work, the use of your time and talents, your worship, your family life, your performance at work, your attitude toward others is a reflection of your understanding of God and his wonderful grace toward you; who just as I am are poor miserable sinners deserving of God’s wrath now and forever more. In the confession of sins we acknowledge who we are and cry out to God for mercy. And he answers us with the wonderful good news “You are forgiven, for the sake of Christ.” “You are forgiven”; what joy and peace comes over us, as we thank God with all we have for all he accomplished on that bloody cross. We, who so many times don’t do what God wants us to do as redeemed people of God are loved and our whole perception of who we are is changed. And because you have been redeemed you are special; not because your mother told you, you were or because you have a trophy with your name on it, or because you are well known in the community or in your profession. But you are special never the less. This is what I mean. For Christians and only Christians the claim "That I am special" is grounded not in my doing whatever it is that I do in this life, no matter how special we might feel, but in the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, for it is what he has done for us that makes us "special," in a way that gives comfort and encouragement to those who are so painfully and fearfully aware that they are not really special. None of us can ever get a big head about being special because our specialness is Christ's achievement not our own. And yet, as we cling to his achievement in faith, his achievement does become ours. Not because we are nice people, but because it is God's gift in Christ given to those who are open and receptive to the call, gathering, enlightenment and sanctifying of the Holy Spirit. This is what Martin Luther proclaimed to the Christian Church so long ago. This is what the unaltered Augsburg Confession speaks of in articles I to VI: There is a God. We are not God. The man Jesus is God. What Jesus is we become, not because of our own merit, but by grace through faith for Jesus sake. All of this is done by the work of the Holy Spirit working through the Gospel and Sacraments, so that we who are “special” might bear God's "good fruit" in the world. It is interesting that even though all who follow Jesus are “special” because of Jesus’ specialness, he never calls his disciples or anyone else that I could find "special." Instead, when Jesus describes those that follow him he says, “You are the salt of the world." "You are the light of the world." "You are witnesses of these things." "You are the branches." "You are my friends." "Let your light so shine before others that they may see your goods works and glorify your Father in heaven." Jesus gives his disciples a job to do and a mission to share that is the very opposite of “specialness” as we normally define what it means to be “special.” It is in our “specialness”; the “specialness” given to us through Christ that we love and welcome those whom the world ignores or abandons. For in loving and welcoming them we love and welcome Jesus who first loved and welcomed us. We who are saved from God’s wrath, not because of anything we did or will do now have a purpose. We are no longer of the world even as we live in the world, for it is in Jesus that we live, and move, and have our being, bringing his “specialness” into our lives. His “specialness” motivates us as people of God to become wise stewards of the material things that God entrusts to us by using them to fulfill His purposes. We respond not from the Law, but out of thanksgiving and praise for who God is and what He has done for us, living each day as stewards who give Him glory and honor. Amen.