Bank

Luke 16:10-14 (The Message)

Jesus went on to make these comments:

If you're honest in small things,
you'll be honest in big things;

If you're a crook in small things,
you'll be a crook in big things.

If you're not honest in small jobs,
who will put you in charge of the store?

No worker can serve two bosses:

He'll either hate the first and love the second
Or adore the first and despise the second.

You can't serve both God and the Bank.

When the Pharisees, a money-obsessed bunch, heard him say these things, they rolled their eyes, dismissing him as hopelessly out of touch.

Folks, I couldn't make this up...this really is the point in Luke at which we find ourselves today..."you can't serve both God and the Bank."

Did Jesus read the headlines this morning? Wow.

I've had a few days away from the blog...away from the Gospel of Luke.

What a few days it has been. I had the wonderful honor of re-connecting with family, and being with my dad during a surgery.

I got to spend time with grandparents. I got to remember.

There are things in life that truly matter.

Money? I know, I know. It does matter, I suppose.

Spoken like someone who has always lived in American abundance, right?

Absolutely. And I'll be the first to acknowledge that. We have all lived in a time of affluence (or at least the appearance of affluence), and perhaps the air is coming out of the bubble and we're going to enter a period of economic sacrifice.

No one knows the future, and I'm not saying there's not reason to take notice and be alarmed by the things that are happening in our economy right now.

But I am saying that I, for one, find a lot of peace in these 2,000 year old words from Jesus that seem just like they were written for us on this day.

They were.

What a beautiful reminder..."you can't serve God and the Bank."

You can only have one master. That one master...God our Father, in Jesus Christ his son...is unchanging.

Jesus is clear..."crookedness" will always come home to roost. So will honestly, but in an entirely different, peace-giving way.

No matter what the stock market does today...or tomorrow...we will have the same master. And he will provide for our needs.

Do you believe that? The "money obsessed" bunch heard Jesus' words and "rolled their eyes."

That's not who we're called to be. Dare to hear him, and believe.

Prayer: When we are fearful, we place our trust in you. Teach us to know what our real needs are...to be sources of peace in turbulent times...and to know that your love is unchanging.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be. World without end. Amen.