“There was a
certain rich man, which had a steward; and the same was accused unto him that
he had wasted his goods.” The rich man calls the steward but he doesn’t check
whether the accusations were true or false and whether the steward was guilty
or not. He writes the steward off, tersely and clearly demanding from the
steward, “give an account of thy stewardship; for thou mayest be no longer
steward.” Neither does the steward ask his master, “Why?” He doesn’t attempt to
justify himself or repent. He evaluates his status, abilities and possibilities
realistically: “What shall I do? for my lord taketh away from me the
stewardship: I cannot dig; to beg I am ashamed.”
He is looking into
the future: “What shall I do?” It is the only question, which the Lord has
always answered directly, unlike other questions. Finally, the steward comes up
with a solution, “I am resolved what to do, that, when I am put out of the
stewardship, they may receive me into their houses.” He called every one of his lord’s debtors unto him
and suggested that they re-wrote their bills and thus cut their debts.
It seems strange
that the lord commended the unjust
steward for his actions because he
had done wisely. It is even more surprising how the Lord finishes this
parable: “And I say unto you, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of
unrighteousness; that, when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting
habitations.” Someone might say that it’s appalling to leverage someone else’s
riches in such a way. Let’s recall the Parable of the Prodigal Son whose return
felt repugnant to the older brother. The younger brother had used up all his
possessions carelessly but then he shamelessly came back to enjoy the riches
that he hadn’t moved a finger to preserve!
The Lord commends
both of these strange characters for their determination. The Lord in these two
parables is not just the house owner but also the father—and not just a father
but the Heavenly Father. The prodigal son came to use the property that wasn’t
his own, and that was exactly why his father showed him a lot of kindness. The
steward in this parable also got the chance to survive at someone else’s
expense. He received praise, too. However, the Prodigal Son had wasted all his
money and hadn’t acquired friends thanks to the wealth that he fiddled away. On
the contrary, the Steward stopped in his tracks. Instead of stealing more of
his master’s possessions one last time, he decided to use them to help others.
Of course, he was
stealing and wasting the things that weren’t his own. The point is, everything
that we have in this life doesn’t belong to us by any means. Apostle Paul
writes, “[W]hat hast thou that thou didst not receive?” (1 Cor. 4:7) We must
learn to make use of everything for our genuine benefit, so as to achieve the
eternal bliss and find those who will pray for us. It is really valuable when
someone prays for you or at least remembers you with kind words.
As far as justice
is concerned, we all live at the expense of the Only Innocent Savior who
suffered for us, which is a horrendous breach of justice, don’t we?
By Fr. Viacheslav Reznikov
Translated by The Catalog of Good Deeds
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