Gospel Reflection on Luke 16:1-13

September 21, 2025

He also said to the disciples, “There was a rich man who had a steward, and charges were brought to him that this man was wasting his goods. And he called him and said to him, ‘What is this that I hear about you? Turn in the account of your stewardship, for you can no longer be steward.’ And the steward said to himself, ‘What shall I do, since my master is taking the stewardship away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I have decided what to do, so that people may receive me into their houses when I am put out of the stewardship.’ 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.’ And 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 steward for his prudence; for the sons of this world are wiser in their own generation than the sons of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous mammon, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal habitations.

“He who is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and he who is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, 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 mammon.”

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Some people believe in luck. They blame the challenges that come their way of bad luck and the good things that happen on good luck.

Other people believe that you make your own luck, the hard work and learning from experience.

And some people believe in a strange thing called providence. Providence is the

belief that the benevolent heart of God is at work in the world if we have the eyes to see.

We could define providence as a kind of conspiracy of ordinary accidents within which we can hear God's voice.

Our grandparents actually believed in providence. Bad things happen. They believe God wanted them to learn something from that event. God didn't cause the bad things to happen but God was speaking through that.

You were supposed to look for a message from God and everything that happened.

And that's why Jesus praises the manager who changed the invoices to benefit his master's customers. He looked at his upcoming unemployment for some way to see it as a message from God. And the message he heard was 'before you leave, use your office to do something good for others.'

Some of them knew that everything contains within it an opportunity to learn to be kind, to do good.

Everything that God gives us finds its true purpose in love, in mercy.

The manager is praised by the master and by Jesus, not for his dishonesty, but because he has used the master's assets to reduce the debts of others. He has used them to exercise mercy.

If our love is genuine, then we must use the goods we have been given in the service of others.

Money, possessions, and any office we hold must be subject to love. Only then will we and our gifts achieve their deep purpose.