Lu-ca 16

A manager who acted shrewdly

¹Jesus also told the disciples this: “A rich man had a manager, and word reached him that this man was squandering what he owned. ²So he sent for him and said, ‘What is this that I keep hearing about you? Hand in a report on how you have managed my affairs, because you cannot be my manager any longer.’ ³The manager thought it over: ‘My master is taking my position from me. What am I to do? Digging is too hard for me, and I would be ashamed to beg. ⁴Now I know what I will do, so that when I am put out of my job, people will open their homes to me.’ ⁵He sent for his master’s debtors one by one. To the first he said, ‘How much do you owe my master?’ ⁶‘About 600 gallons of olive oil,’ he answered. The manager told him, ‘Here is your bill. Sit down quickly and write 300 gallons.’ ⁷Then he said to another, ‘And what do you owe?’ ‘About 600 bushels of wheat,’ he replied. The manager told him, ‘Take your bill and write about 500.’ ⁸So the master gave the dishonest manager credit for acting so shrewdly. For the people of this age deal more shrewdly with others of their own kind than the people of the light do.^{a 9}And I tell you, use the wealth of this unjust world to make friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, they will welcome you into the eternal homes.^bc

¹⁰Someone who is faithful in the smallest matter is faithful in large matters too, and someone who is dishonest in the smallest matter is dishonest in large matters too. ¹¹So if you have not been faithful in handling unjust wealth, who will put real wealth in your care? ¹²And if you have not proved faithful with what is another’s, who will hand you what is your own?^{d 13}No servant in a household can serve two masters. Either the servant will hate one master and love the other, or be loyal to one and look down on the other. You cannot serve both God and wealth.”

Lovers of money

¹⁴The Pharisees were listening to all this. They loved money, and they turned up their noses at him. ¹⁵He said to them, “You are the ones who make yourselves out to be righteous in front of people, but God knows your hearts. What people think highly of is loathsome in God’s sight.

¹⁶The law and the prophets lasted until John. From then on, the kingdom of God is announced as good news, and everyone is pressing their way into it.^e

¹⁷Yet heaven and earth will pass away more easily than one tiny stroke of the law will fall away.

¹⁸Any man who divorces his wife and marries someone else is committing adultery, and the man who marries a woman her husband has divorced is committing adultery too.

A rich man and a poor man named Lazarus

¹⁹There was once a rich man who wore purple and fine linen and feasted in great style day after day. ²⁰And a poor man named Lazarus had been put down at his gate. His body was covered with sores, ²¹and he longed to fill his stomach with whatever dropped from the rich man’s table. Instead, the dogs would come and lick his sores.^{f 22}The day came when the poor man died, and angels carried him off to be at Abraham’s side. The rich man also died, and was given a burial. ²³From Hades, in the midst of his torment, he raised his eyes and saw Abraham a long way off, and Lazarus close beside him. ²⁴So he shouted, ‘Father Abraham, show me mercy! Send Lazarus here. Let him wet the end of his finger with water and cool my tongue, for this flame is causing me terrible pain.’ ²⁵But Abraham answered, ‘My child, remember: while you were alive you had your good things, and Lazarus in the same way had the bad things. Now here he finds comfort, and you are suffering. ²⁶What is more, a vast gulf lies fixed between us and you. Anyone who wanted to go across from here to you could not, and no one can cross from your side to ours.’ ²⁷‘Then, father, I ask you this,’ he said. ‘Send him to my father’s house, ²⁸where I have five brothers. He can give them a solemn warning, so that they do not come to this place of torment as well.’ ²⁹But Abraham said, ‘Moses and the prophets are there for them. Let your brothers listen to what they say.’ ³⁰He answered, ‘That is not enough, father Abraham. But if someone goes to them from among the dead, they will repent.’ ³¹Abraham said to him, ‘If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets, then even someone rising from the dead will not persuade them.’”