On Wealth and Justice
September 21, 2025
Traceymay Kalvaitis

Amos 8:4-7
“Hear this, you that trample on the needy, and bring to ruin the poor of the land, saying, ‘When will the new moon be over so that we may sell grain; and the sabbath, so that we may offer wheat for sale? We will make the ephah small and the shekel great, and practice deceit with false balances, buying the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, and selling the sweepings of the wheat.’ The Lord… will never forget any of their deeds.”

Luke 16:1-13
Then Jesus said to the disciples, “There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering his property. So he summoned him and said to him, ‘What is this that I hear about you? Give me an accounting of your management, because you cannot be my manager any longer.’ Then the manager said to himself, ‘What will I do, now that my master is taking the position 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 dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.’ So, summoning his master’s debtors one by one, he asked the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’ He answered, ‘A hundred jugs of olive oil.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.’ Then he asked another, ‘And how much do you owe?’ He replied, ‘A hundred containers of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill and make it eighty.’ And his master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes.
“Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.”
***

Today’s sermon is titled On Wealth and Justice.

Isn’t this a strange parable that Jesus tells? It doesn’t follow the predictable pattern at all. The main character in the parable, the crook, goes even more crooked and is “commended because he acted shrewdly.” This is not what I have come to expect from the teachings of Jesus. In the parable we meet this manager who cheats his employer and when he realizes he has been caught, he tries to make inroads with the merchants by reducing what they owe, cheating his employer out of even more just to score a few points with people that may be able to help him when he is out on the street. I want that guy to get his due. It is not very Christian of me, I admit, but I want him to lose his job and be sent away in disgrace but that is not the way the story goes and what’s more, Jesus is the one making up this story; he can make it turn out however he wants it to to get his message across. I must have read this story at least twenty times this week and it was not until about 48 hours ago that I began to appreciate why Jesus told this story the way he did and why, in particular, he gave such an unsatisfying ending to the parable.

Jesus ends the parable with the following line: “And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes.” Did he just say that? I checked two other translations. That is what Jesus is recorded as saying: Go ahead, make friends for yourselves by dishonest means and you will always have a place to go. In this statement, which sounds a lot like a command, Jesus is giving us a sobering dose of reality and he is presenting us with a choice.

Jesus is admitting that is the way of the world, is it not?… this quid pro quo?…some of this for some of that? The problem is that everyone is always trying to get the better deal and the greatest profit margin. Prices go up and quality goes down but someone is benefitting and that someone is probably making friends along the way, creating chains of people who are all scratching each others’ backs.

The prophet Amos speaks of the same system, corrupt with injustice. In the time of the prophet Amos, around 800 B.C., the monetary system was not yet in place. Goods were traded based on volume and weight so you can imagine the wide margins of error that could be exploited to one’s benefit. The prophet writes: “Hear this, you that trample on the needy, and bring to ruin the poor of the land, saying, “When will the new moon be over so that we may sell grain; and the sabbath, so that we may offer wheat for sale? We will make the ephah small and the shekel great, and practice deceit with false balances, buying the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, and selling the sweepings of the wheat. The Lord… will never forget any of [your] deeds.” Amos speaks of the ephah, which was used to gauge volume and the shekel, which was used to gauge weight. The prophet warns of the “wide practice of deceit using false balances buying the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, and selling the sweepings of the wheat.”

Friends, there have always been those who would exploit others; I am not sure that will ever change, but the prophets of Israel railed against such exploitation. The Torah and the writings of the prophets could not be more clear in demanding nothing less than fairness, advocating even for lending without charging interest. Jesus, schooled in Torah, was not seeking to create another religion; he was another in the long line of prophets who was calling for social change, calling for justice, especially justice in the marketplace because, as we know, it is the price of staple goods that impact us the most. Jesus is bearing witness to the injustice of high taxes and the pressures of an economy that rewards the unjust at the expense of the poor. Sound familiar? Jesus is exposing this age-old problem and his message in this parable is as follows: If you want to maximize profits by dealing unjustly then that is your choice. Go ahead. You can live your lives this way. It may work out quite well for you, too. You may, indeed, gain a great deal; you may rise to a position of power. You may even rise to be the leader of a great nation. Others will flock to you for what you can do for them.

Was Jesus smirking when he said this? Perhaps. Were the disciples confused? Probably. I can imagine Jesus looking at them and reading their faces, realizing that they were not really grasping the message of the parable. That last line must have left them hanging. “Make friends for yourself by means of dishonest wealth…when it is gone they may welcome you into the eternal homes.” This is such an unsatisfying ending to this story, and that is precisely Jesus’s point. To live in such a way is unsatisfying for it is unconnected, myopic, and self-serving.

We can choose that life; we have free will. The choice doesn’t come once or twice or even a hundred times. The choice comes over and over and over again. Jesus says, “…no slave can serve two masters. You can not serve God and wealth.” We must choose, again and again, what or who comes first.

Personally, I like the idea of serving God with the wealth we have and serving justly. You may think, “I am not wealthy.” But, my Friends, we are fed, we are housed, we have community and, at the very least, adequate resources to survive and in some cases thrive. Personal wealth is valued far beyond the balance in our bank accounts.

Forbes magazine annually ranks the world’s billionaires by how much they give to charity, listing the top 25 philanthropists. Conspicuously absent from the list is Elon Musk, supposedly the world’s richest man.* In an effort to motivate philanthropists, Bill and Melinda Gates, Warren Buffet, Oprah Winfrey, David Rockefeller and Michael Bloomberg met 15 years ago to discuss what they later named The Giving Pledge. Those who have signed it, numbering now over 250 from 30 different countries, pledged to give at least 50% of their wealth away. There have been many critics that claim those individuals won’t even miss 50% of their wealth but I applaud their effort because it sends a powerful message. As a result of The Giving Pledge, 206 billion dollars thus far has been channeled out of personal holdings and into the public sector. **

What we choose to do with our gifts and with our resources does make a difference. We don’t have to be billionaires or millionaires. But we do have to choose whom we are serving; are we serving only ourselves or are we serving the greater common good? Are we supporting major corporations or small businesses? We make these choices each and every day. Our very presence here today is the result of a choice we made this morning; it was a choice to serve something greater. It was a choice to join with a larger community, a community of faith, a community of seekers, a community where we become known by one another, a community that practices acceptance, a community that will pray for us and celebrate with us and grieve with us. We find a wealth in one another that will see us through the best and worst of times.

In closing now, I invite us to consider just how uniquely wonderful we are as a gathered body that we call church. I can not think of another entity that is so thoroughly self-supporting as is this church. Our operating budget is not supported by grants or subsidies; we give what we can and we make it work. Jesus said, “You can make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth…” but what we have here is perhaps the most honest wealth gathered together under one roof. We come as we are, we look to the example of Christ as our teacher, and we look to one another for encouragement as we learn more and more of how to love. May we put our wealth to good use in the service of humankind, to create a just world for all. So be it. Amen.

*https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/inequalities/2025/01/02/ten-facts-about-wealth-inequality-in-the-usa/

**https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbeswealthteam/2025/02/03/americas-most-generous-philanthropists-2025/

***https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2025/08/29/billionaires-pledge-charity-bill-gates-warren-buffett/85782065007/

Pastoral Prayer

God of All, in the stillness of this place I pray that each one of us feels safe enough to reach farther, deeper in whatever direction leads us closer to your divine presence. In the words of your prophets we have been assured that your love lives within us, yet at times you feel so far away. In those times, Lord, help us to ask ourselves if we are actually the ones that distance ourselves from you. Then help us to find our way back home to the place where you are all that is. From that place, we find strength for the living of our lives and for helping those among us that are struggling. For those coping with illness, God, please comfort them. And for those facing death, grant them peace. In all we face in our everyday lives, help us remember the power of prayer. This we ask in Jesus’s name.

Benediction

I leave you with this 3000 year old blessing from the Old Testament book of Numbers, chapter 6:

“The Lord bless you and keep you.
The Lord let his face shine upon you and be gracious unto you.
The Lord look upon you kindly and give you peace.”
Amen.