The Manager's Choice - Luke 16:1-13

I recently read a headline in a local publication about the property sale at the Heifer International Headquarters, here in downtown Little Rock. The company sold their building, but will continue to rent a few offices on the top floor. Never fear, Heifer International is still a thriving non-profit organization and they have not downsized their personnel. The reason for the sale, the headline announced, was employee’s strong preference for a hybrid work environment. I love the coded professionalism of this headline. In layman’s terms, those workers learned during the pandemic that they can do their work at home, and they do not want to go back to the office. 

These workers are not alone. A Pew Research survey revealed that in October of 2020, just a few months into the pandemic, 64% of Americans who worked from home did so because their office was closed, and only 36% did so by choice. By January of 2022, nearly two years in, these statistics had almost completely reversed, with only 38% of people working from home doing so because their office was closed, and 61% doing so by choice. 

And what’s more, while many people are choosing to work from home, many are choosing not to go back to work at all. The Bureau of Labor Statistics revealed that jobs took a nosedive and unemployment skyrocketed in April 2020. However, unemployment fell back to pre-pandemic numbers over 6 months before the most of the lost jobs were re-filled. This means that while people were going back to work, they weren’t going back to the work they were doing before. I suspect that if I took a survey of this room, almost all of us would report that there is some aspect of our pre-pandemic routine that we have not gone back to. And sometimes, this is a good thing.

For so many of us, the pandemic revealed that we are capable of living full and faithful lives in totally new and unexpected ways. We learned that we don’t have to be exhausted all the time. We learned that productivity doesn’t plummet when we work from home and take breaks. We learned that working nonstop from 9-5, Monday to Friday, week after week, month after month, year after year, is not the only way to achieve professional success. In short, many people have realized that they do not have to live the way they’ve been living. 

Let’s take just a moment to remember one of God’s most memorable acts around labor: the Exodus. When God delivered the Israelites from generations of backbreaking, unpaid, undervalued, enslaved labor, it took time for them to adjust to their new life of freedom. They were sorely out of practice in developing communities that were not based on exploitation, cheap labor, or economic growth at all costs. 

And so God gave them the Ten Commandments to help guide them, and not just guide them in how to treat each other, but in how to live in a way that would help them thrive. And so the fourth commandment is to remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. No longer were the people bound to work every day with no rest or reward or enjoyment. Like many of us in the pandemic, the people learned, truly learned, that they did not have to live the way they’d been living.

Of course, this newfound wisdom did not last forever. By the time Jesus began his ministry, society was back to a set of labor practices that exploited the underprivileged and benefited those who were already wealthy. Landowners in first century Palestine were often nothing short of loan sharks. The working class would rent the land, work the land, give most of what they grew back to the landowner, and then accrue debt on the land via exorbitant interest rates that went unchecked by the local government. For many, the only way to feed their family was to enter the endless cycle of land-lease debt. 

Now managers were middle men, an extra layer in the chain of command between the landowners and the field workers. They could only earn their wage by participating fully in the high-interest scheme. The more money the poor laborers owed the landowner, the larger the cut due to the manager. It was also common for managers to skim off the top before turning in the profits to their bosses. Clearly, the entire system was brutally oppressive to the poorest workers, not at all unlike the slavery their ancestors experienced in Egypt. 

This morning, Jesus tells a parable about one of these land managers. We don’t know for certain if the manager has embezzled funds, but we know he’s been accused of it, and that was enough for his boss to fire him. But he still has to present the books to the landowner. He is at the very edge of the cycle of financial oppression, and in that moment I think the manager recognizes that a crucial choice lies before him. He can go back to the grind, find another position within the system and continue to serve the wealthy, or he can choose an altogether different way of life. 

Our manager chooses the latter. He opts to use his remaining power to relieve the debts of others. He trusts, with no certainty that it will pay off, that those he treats well will treat him well in return when he needs it most. He begins to create a new system built on rest, trust, forgiveness and relationship instead of constant economic increase. Jesus commends him for his choice, and in an unexpected twist, so does the landowner. Maybe he also found this new and different way of life appealing. 

In spite of the parable’s lesson, we still struggle with choosing between God and wealth. We still prioritize exploitative labor because we want more affordable goods. We still ignore God’s call to rest, God’s call to turn away from enslavement to an economic system. My personal favorite example is the 40-hour work week. Henry Ford popularized the 40-hour work week in the 1920’s, claiming that 40 hours maximized productivity from workers. But not all employers agreed, so many workers continued to unionize, strike, and lobby for better treatment and fewer hours, especially for women and children. 

Eventually, the 40-hour work week became law in the United States in 1940, when the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 was amended. Essentially, our modern standard was actually a compromise between the desire of employers for more production and the desire of workers not to be overworked. In fact, many still argue that 40 hours per week is too many. This standard was not designed for human thriving. It was designed for economic growth. And as our scripture reminds us, we cannot serve both God and wealth. 

Perhaps the staff at Heifer International have tapped into the wisdom of the shrewd manager. Perhaps we can too. The manager’s choice was a big, life-altering choice, and it surely required a certain amount of privilege. We know that not everyone can afford to quit their jobs. Some cannot afford to focus on anything other than a paycheck or a next meal. But for those of us who can, I think God is calling us to explore some ways in which we contribute to a system that seeks only economic growth. Are they ways we can make the manager’s choice with our money? Our time? Our rest? 

The good news is that we’ve had some practice during the pandemic. We were reminded of the value of quality time with friends and family. We spent time outside and we took up new hobbies. We learned that the world still turns if we are not in an office from 9-5, Monday to Friday. We were grateful for health and safety and rest, not unlike the Israelites freed from bondage and the shrewd manager freed from the corporate hamster wheel of his day. We have seen a glimpse and now it’s up to us to reach out and grasp the joy and rest God has prepared for us. This is how we will truly thrive as God’s people. Amen.