“A Crooked Christ?” A Sermon for the Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost 2025

A sermon for the Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost preached at the campus ministry service for the St. Thomas Aquinas Episcopal Campus Ministry at West Virginia UniversityFocus Text: Luke 16:1-13The Parable of the Shrewd Manager (or is it the dishonest steward or the unjust steward?) is considered among the most perplexing of Jesus’ parables. Many preachers grumble and groan when it comes up once every three years on the Sunday Lectionary shared by many denominations (What a lovely day to preach on the Collect of the Day!). It’s hard to know what to make of Jesus’ story here and the connection between it and the sayings directly connected to it. Some commentators try to shield Jesus, and our sensibilities, from the scandal of it all by saying, “He never said that.” But that just doesn’t add up, does it?Why would we hide the offense? Why do we blanche at scandal in the Gospel narratives? Is that not the direct context in the chapter preceding this? The Pharisees are scandalized that Jesus would publicly eat with tax collectors and sinners. Then we receive a progression of thematically connected parables (with some unrelated ones in between today’s and what follows on this list):​ The Parable of the Lost Sheep​ The Parable of the Lost Coin​ The Parable of the Prodigal Son​ The Parable of the Shrewd Manager​ The Parable of the Persistent Widow (and the Unjust Judge)​ The Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax CollectorJesus doesn’t balk at scandal. The truth is that the Gospel is scandalous. That the Son of God would become man and die for us “while we were still sinners” (Romans 5:8) is scandalous. And, after, what could possibly be more scandalous than the way Christ died on the cross, a mode of Roman execution reserved for runaway slaves and violent criminals — Jesus, the Son of God, nailed naked to a cross for all who passed by to see.The means of our salvation were and are inherently scandalous. The shrewd manager in our parable cuts what the debtors owe in half. Jesus abolishes our debts entirely. Grace is dishonest wealth and heavenly glorification with Christ is true riches received when we are faithful with the grace given us. Jesus was killed like a crook for crooks — you and me. Is it fair? By no means. Is it just? Absolutely not! But that’s the promise of the Gospel — we don’t get what we deserve. How fortunate we are that Christ isn’t fair. How “lucky for us that we don’t have to deal with a just steward,” (Robert Farrar Capon, Kingdom, Grace, Judgment: Paradox, Outrage, and Vindication in the Parables of Jesus, p. 309).