The Ninth Sunday after Trinity – Pr. Anderson sermon
St. Luke 16:1-9 “The Master’s Commending Mercy”
August 2, 2026 | Christ Lutheran Church
In Nomine Iesu
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Lord God, heavenly Father, You have bountifully given us Your blessing and our daily bread: We beseech You, preserve us from covetousness, and so enliven our hearts that we willingly share Your blessed gifts with our needy brethren; that we may be found faithful stewards of Your gifts, and abide in Your grace when we shall be removed from our stewardship, and shall come before Your judgment, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one true God, now and forever. Amen. (Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary, by Veit Dietrich, p. 160)
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. (Rom. 1:7, etc.)
The sermon text for today is taken from the 16th chapter of the Gospel according to St. Luke. We read selected verses in Jesus’ name:
“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.’ 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 manager for his shrewdness. For the sons of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal dwellings.”
These are Your words, heavenly Father. Sanctify us by Your truth, Your Word is truth. Amen. (Joh. 17:17)
In Christ Jesus, the One who has taken our debt, our failure to love before God holy, and lived a holy life in our place so we may inherit His eternal dwellings, dear fellow redeemed:
How serious is it to have debt? For some, it is bad to have any kind of debt. There is a kind of debt that can be considered a good debt. A house could fit into this category. As you buy the house with a loan, throughout the time you have the home, you are building equity. The problem with debt is that we see people have so much of it they are having trouble paying it. This is the risk when one picks it up. We may even have good intentions at the time but all it takes is for one unexpected thing and then we can run into issues. So, now we see the many, many commercials of different ways for people to try and get rid of their debt. When in debt, it means that you have taken something that you are going to return. At some point, it will have to be returned or there could be consequences. As we all have inherited a debt, Scripture points out because of our master’s commending mercy, the debt has been removed. With its removal, we now have a message for the unrighteous, eternal dwellings await us!
From dealing with the unrighteous and inheriting eternal dwellings, this is all happening because of the great mercy from the Master. The Master in earlier sections of Scripture points out His mercy, seeing that many are lost in their sinful condition and He is the only One who can find them. Going from the finding the lost and making them found, now we see the wealth of the Master. He certainly is a rich man as He has what we need so we don’t end up lost. The manager who has been fired because he became lost, he is about to change two people’s lives. They do not have small debts for the rich man. A significant change of the debt took place. This plan to remove their debt was to save face. “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. I have decided what to do, so that when I am removed from management, people may receive me into their houses.’
If you think about it, this has to be a good deal. The manager knows he is going to put out and be in a really bad spot. “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.’ 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.’ Even though only one guy has his debt cut by half, the other guy still had a huge chunk of his debt forgiven. Remember who this debt belongs to. It is not the manager’s debt to be owed, but the rich man, and now He is not going to get what He is owed. With this last-ditch effort, it works and the Master is put into a predicament. He even has to smile because He is not commending the manager for his dishonesty, but for his diligence in planning for the future, when he would not have his job any longer. The manager had hit rock bottom. And in his plan, he didn’t hinge it solely on the people he was helping, but he is also assuming the Master will give him some time before he is all on his own, and won’t punish him because of his deeds.
His past deeds of how he had failed at his job and with the Master’s possessions and by changing the debt reveals what we have been given is not fully ours. Even as people try to put wealth and possessions in a bad category, and in one sense it is revealed that wealth belongs in a fallen world, Jesus is teaching with this parable to the disciple’s that stewardship can follow higher principles. For the physical and spiritual go hand in hand. St. Paul clarifies this when he writes, But godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs (1 Timothy 6:6-10). With the craving for the physical and the faith can disappear on the spiritual side.
Scripture is clear with many passages about guarding oneself against becoming enslaved to the pursuit of wealth. This doesn’t mean having wealth is bad for the rich man has much wealth and He is doing a lot of good with the people He has found. Unlike the manager who had failed at his job of managing, we should use our possessions for godly and eternal purposes. This can be hard because in the world with our possessions we see how they are used by others. This is not the first manager who did not use what he had in the right way. And just as he crafted his sneaky plan, the unrighteous are more prudent in worldly matters to accomplish their goals by knowing how to bend the rules, play the game, or beat the system. It can be easy to take what we have, great or small, and we can use it and leverage it against someone else. And with these thoughts that do not commend mercy, Scripture reveals that anyone who struggles with using their possessions in a godly way is nothing new. We witness this very early on in history when the LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it” (Genesis 4:6-7). Greed and laziness can sink any chance of ruling over the sin that is crouching at the door.
Like the manager who sees his sin has bitten him and is putting him out onto the street, in his plan he sees that he can’t rely only on his plan fully. He believes the Master is honorable and will respond with mercy as he has done in the past. The Master reveals his mercy by not throwing the man in jail and punishing him. And because of the managers plan, He also does not go to the individuals who owe Him the large debts and demand that they pay back in full. His mercy is extended to them as well. With this mercy, Jesus’ application of the parable works, as He tells His listeners that they likewise should plan for their future when their mammon will run out, by using the mammon they have now in a God pleasing way. As these disciples go out, there could be a rock bottom with following Christ, a rock bottom that doesn’t deserve an escape and yet the Master has mercy. The change of debt didn’t hurt Him. In the business of management, salvation is still found in the mercy of it all. In that mercy we are called sons of light instead of sons of this world. “For the sons of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light.” So, Jesus teaches the shrewdness of the spiritual, which turns into the only thing that is needed to survive this world. From this stems the link to eternal dwellings forever.
Just as the manager was going to find a dwelling place with “the master commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness,” so are the eternal dwellings there for the sons of light. A light that burns in them because of the commended mercy by the rich man. A mercy that isn’t deserved since the manager is only looking out for himself and the Master could put him in jail and throw away the key. But God offers you lasting treasure in Christ, and so a true perspective on money and goods. Money and goods will never sustain you forever. The world will use them, but as they stay put, the hope of life, and the commending of mercy is found in the One who had no use of wealth and possessions as it was all His. Instead, He used and managed a perfect life and gave it to you on the cross, satisfying the desire of the Father for the world to inherit eternal dwellings. With the cross pointing to the life that has been won for you forever, you can use money for godly and eternal purposes. The sons of light are to focus carefully on where God’s mercy resides. You can use physical belongings for good as they are given to others, but more importantly, you point to the eternal goods found in the cross. For the love of Christ, the love of God and neighbor is how mankind finds its eternal survival from the world. God’s merciful kingdom is here giving life to all.
And it is there for all as the unrighteous repent and see their lives become righteous because of the same spiritual possession of the cross of mercy that sees their sins taken away. Witnessing this gracious mercy as you do, you can use your money in the interest of the kingdom of God. Your synod has given you many avenues in which you can support the teaching of the divine dwellings found in the work, mercy, and salvation of Christ. St. Paul reminds you that in your efforts, keep an eye out for the manager tendencies when he writes, keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5). “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” The manager thought he was on his own. The Master who has it all had not left, had not forsaken. Instead, He reveals mercy. “And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal dwellings.” As that generation of the disciple’s day who was searching for wealth was temporary so is this generation. It has its different things that it is searching for, but the answer is still the same. Only the eternal dwellings promised from the salvation won on the cross will sustain them forever. For your eternal dwelling is coming and you have been given great zeal to pursue it. Found in the message you hear preached. Where the kingdom of grace gifts those who seek it eternal life. The forever where God’s mercy sees the debt wiped clean. Amen.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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