Parables for Bradford
STF 620 Thou God of truth and loveWhen I started as a Prison Service chaplain the very first prisoner that I got to know was a man in his thirties. He was three years into his life sentence, convicted of murder. Over a week or two, as he began to trust me, he began to talk to me about how he came to be in prison. He told me how he had got into a lot of financial trouble with his business. He was going bankrupt and his good name, and his standing with his family and his business community was on the point of disintegrating. Unable to face the reality of his problems, and unable to face the future, he had decided to kill himself. Unable to contemplate the enormous problems that this would leave his family in he also decided to kill his wife, and two young children as well. He did not tell me the details and I didn’t inquire, but I gather it was done by using the fumes from his car exhaust and feeding them into the car with a hosepipe. He alone survived. He was convicted for their murder. I saw no reason to doubt his story, unlike some of the stories told to me by other prisoners. We all know, theoretically, that people who suffer the most intense problems and stress, can do the most extraordinary and non-sensical things. Here was a young man who had to carry the weight and guilt of what he had done for the rest of his life. He also carried the burden of blame which his own family, and the family of his wife, put upon him. He was someone who was still battling with the shame and grief he felt for what he had done. He also struggled with the reality that he had survived, while his family had not. He hated himself. It was an uphill struggle, and for every step he made forward, there seemed to be a step back.
Why had no one helped this young man? What could someone have said to help him rise above his problems and his fears about his impending financial disaster? In addition to the ruination of his business, there was the ruination of his reputation, his trustworthiness as an honest and hardworking businessman. What could someone have said that could put him in touch with his inner strength, and courage so that he would not succumb to the impulse to end it all with such tragic results? What could someone have said to help him see that there’s more to life than reputation? Who could have told him that survival is what really matters, not what people think of you. If only someone had been able to break through to this man in his lowest moments, perhaps the tragedy that unfolded could have been avoided. In a few minutes we will look at one of Jesus’s parables. It is about survival – about doing whatever you can to keep on going when you face ruination.
Song
STF 102 For the beauty of the earth
Reading
What do you make of this parable?
‘There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering his property. 2 So he summoned him and said to him, “What is this that I hear about you? Give me an account of your management, because you cannot be my manager any longer.” 3 Then the manager said to himself, “What will I do, now that my master is taking the position 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 dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.” 5 So, summoning his master’s debtors one by one, he asked the first, “How much do you owe my master?” 6 He answered, “A hundred jugs of olive oil.” He said to him, “Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.” 7 Then he asked another, “And how much do you owe?” He replied, “A hundred containers of wheat.” He said to him, “Take your bill and make it eighty.”
Acknowledgments: Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition, copyright © 1989, 1995 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
If you followed my introduction to our worship series on Parables on June 6th you would have heard me talking about how Matthew, Mark, Luke and John wrote their Gospels several decades after the death and resurrection of Jesus. They had to rely on the memories of people who had witnessed the things that Jesus said and did. These memories had been collected together in various places before those witnesses died out. The difficulty the gospel writers faced was how to make sense of the various stories and sayings of Jesus that were passed on to them because virtually all of them were without context: the why, where, when, and to whom were all missing. The reading we have just heard is the bare bones of one particular parable story that Jesus told. Luke doesn’t know anything about the situation surrounding Jesus actually telling that story. Although it’s quite a vigorous story it seems to lack a particular punch. If only we knew who Jesus had told it to and why, perhaps it would make more sense. What impact did it have on that person? How did it help them?
Luke tries to make sense of the story by putting some comments around it. In the seven verses that follow there are no less than seven separate sayings which, although they are all related to money or wealth as a topic, are not directly related to the story. It frankly looks like Luke is lumping them together here because he doesn’t know where else to put them in his gospel, and he doesn’t want to leave them out because, after all, it’s what people remember Jesus having said, sometime, somewhere, and he doesn’t want to leave them out. As sayings of Jesus, they all have value, but they don’t really help us to understand the Parable. In fact they tend to confuse us, which is why I haven’t included them in the Reading today. If you’re interested you can read those verses in your Bibles at home.
Over the years Christians have taken the Parables of Jesus as containing messages which are meant to help us live better lives. If we carry that idea over into our understanding of this particular Parable we’re going to get into trouble. We wonder what the message is in a story about a criminal manager, compounding his fraud by insisting his customers to take part in even greater fraud. The thing about Parables though is, I believe, that they are not (as one Bible study group told me) ‘earthly stories with heavenly meanings’, but tools Jesus used to show people where they were going wrong in their thinking. If you look at the logic of the story here is a man who is caught cheating his employer. He is going to lose his job. He is too old to do physical labour, his reputation is lost so he will never get another job as a manager, and he is too proud to become a beggar. What else can he do? How is he going to survive? If he does nothing he will go under: probably die from starvation because of his rejection by everyone in society. The logic of the story is that he does the ONLY THING POSSIBLE, which is to buy the favour of his employer’s customers so that they will take him in. This isn’t a story about morals, it’s a story about survival. The choice to make was to live, or to die. He chose to live.
Back to my story about the young man in prison. I asked if there could have been someone who could have spoken to him when he was at his lowest ebb, what could they have said that could have helped him? Many people would have told him to “do the right thing” – own up to the difficulties and face the music. In other words, go through bankruptcy and risk losing his family and his reputation, but that felt too much. He couldn’t find the inner strength. The young man chose another way – with tragic results.
But, if we imagine Jesus being the person able to speak with him how might it have gone? “My friend,” says Jesus, “Why are you so anxious?” “I’ve lost all my money, I’m in terrible debt, I’ll probably lose my family, and I just want to kill myself.” And Jesus tells him this parable,
‘There was a rich man who had a manager. And the rich man received complaints that the manager was squandering his property. So, he sent for him. “What’s this I hear? Produce your accounts for you can no longer be my manager!” “What am I to do now that I’m sacked?” He thought. “I’m not strong enough to dig and I’m too proud to beg. I know what I must do to make sure that when I have to leave there will be people to give me house and home.” “Bring my masters debtors to me. How much do you owe?” “1,000 gallons of olive oil.” “Make it 500 and be quick. And you?” “1,000 bushels of wheat.” “Make it 800!”he said.
Jesus then turns to the young man and says, “What was the choice the manager faced? ”
Looking up the young man might reply, “Whether to live, or to die.”
“And what did he choose to do, my friend?”
“He chose to live, rather than die.”
And Jesus might reply, “And so can you, my friend.”
‘There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering his property. 2 So he summoned him and said to him, “What is this that I hear about you? Give me an account of your management, because you cannot be my manager any longer.” 3 Then the manager said to himself, “What will I do, now that my master is taking the position 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 dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.” 5 So, summoning his master’s debtors one by one, he asked the first, “How much do you owe my master?” 6 He answered, “A hundred jugs of olive oil.” He said to him, “Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.” 7 Then he asked another, “And how much do you owe?” He replied, “A hundred containers of wheat.” He said to him, “Take your bill and make it eighty.”
Acknowledgments: Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition, copyright © 1989, 1995 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
If you followed my introduction to our worship series on Parables on June 6th you would have heard me talking about how Matthew, Mark, Luke and John wrote their Gospels several decades after the death and resurrection of Jesus. They had to rely on the memories of people who had witnessed the things that Jesus said and did. These memories had been collected together in various places before those witnesses died out. The difficulty the gospel writers faced was how to make sense of the various stories and sayings of Jesus that were passed on to them because virtually all of them were without context: the why, where, when, and to whom were all missing. The reading we have just heard is the bare bones of one particular parable story that Jesus told. Luke doesn’t know anything about the situation surrounding Jesus actually telling that story. Although it’s quite a vigorous story it seems to lack a particular punch. If only we knew who Jesus had told it to and why, perhaps it would make more sense. What impact did it have on that person? How did it help them?
Luke tries to make sense of the story by putting some comments around it. In the seven verses that follow there are no less than seven separate sayings which, although they are all related to money or wealth as a topic, are not directly related to the story. It frankly looks like Luke is lumping them together here because he doesn’t know where else to put them in his gospel, and he doesn’t want to leave them out because, after all, it’s what people remember Jesus having said, sometime, somewhere, and he doesn’t want to leave them out. As sayings of Jesus, they all have value, but they don’t really help us to understand the Parable. In fact they tend to confuse us, which is why I haven’t included them in the Reading today. If you’re interested you can read those verses in your Bibles at home.
Over the years Christians have taken the Parables of Jesus as containing messages which are meant to help us live better lives. If we carry that idea over into our understanding of this particular Parable we’re going to get into trouble. We wonder what the message is in a story about a criminal manager, compounding his fraud by insisting his customers to take part in even greater fraud. The thing about Parables though is, I believe, that they are not (as one Bible study group told me) ‘earthly stories with heavenly meanings’, but tools Jesus used to show people where they were going wrong in their thinking. If you look at the logic of the story here is a man who is caught cheating his employer. He is going to lose his job. He is too old to do physical labour, his reputation is lost so he will never get another job as a manager, and he is too proud to become a beggar. What else can he do? How is he going to survive? If he does nothing he will go under: probably die from starvation because of his rejection by everyone in society. The logic of the story is that he does the ONLY THING POSSIBLE, which is to buy the favour of his employer’s customers so that they will take him in. This isn’t a story about morals, it’s a story about survival. The choice to make was to live, or to die. He chose to live.
Back to my story about the young man in prison. I asked if there could have been someone who could have spoken to him when he was at his lowest ebb, what could they have said that could have helped him? Many people would have told him to “do the right thing” – own up to the difficulties and face the music. In other words, go through bankruptcy and risk losing his family and his reputation, but that felt too much. He couldn’t find the inner strength. The young man chose another way – with tragic results.
But, if we imagine Jesus being the person able to speak with him how might it have gone? “My friend,” says Jesus, “Why are you so anxious?” “I’ve lost all my money, I’m in terrible debt, I’ll probably lose my family, and I just want to kill myself.” And Jesus tells him this parable,
‘There was a rich man who had a manager. And the rich man received complaints that the manager was squandering his property. So, he sent for him. “What’s this I hear? Produce your accounts for you can no longer be my manager!” “What am I to do now that I’m sacked?” He thought. “I’m not strong enough to dig and I’m too proud to beg. I know what I must do to make sure that when I have to leave there will be people to give me house and home.” “Bring my masters debtors to me. How much do you owe?” “1,000 gallons of olive oil.” “Make it 500 and be quick. And you?” “1,000 bushels of wheat.” “Make it 800!”he said.
Jesus then turns to the young man and says, “What was the choice the manager faced? ”
Looking up the young man might reply, “Whether to live, or to die.”
“And what did he choose to do, my friend?”
“He chose to live, rather than die.”
And Jesus might reply, “And so can you, my friend.”
Song
STF 429 Lord we turn to you for mercyPrayers of intercession and The Lord’s Prayer
• Loving God, we want to pray for all who work to spread the good news of your love, for all who face insults and danger in the process.• Loving God, we want to pray for our world’s leaders, for all in positions of authority and influence.
• Loving God, we want to pray for the people we are fond of, and those we find it difficult to get on with.
• Loving God, we want to pray for those who feel trapped by illness, oppression, disability or guilt.
• Loving God, we want to pray for your mercy on those who have died and on those approaching death.
Song
Song for covid times: We will meetWe will meet when the danger is over, we will meet when the sad days are done,
We will meet sitting closely together, and be glad our tomorrow has come.
We will join to give thanks and sing gladly, we will join to break bread and share wine,
And the peace that we pass to each other, will be more than a casual sign.
So, let’s make with each other a promise, that when all we’ve come through is behind,
We will share what we missed and find meaning in the things that once troubled our mind.
Until then may we always discover, faith and love to determine our way
That’s our hope, and God’s will, and our calling for our lives and for every new day.
[Original Norwegian and translation: Hans Olav-Moerk; adapted: John L Bell; Music: John L Bell.
Permission given for use during Covid19 pandemic by Iona Community]
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