God Loves a Whiner

'
Background
We are following Jesus' final approach to Jerusalem, but we had jumped over to an episode in John which had happened in Jerusalem, where Jesus said that people should believe that He is God based on the miracles that He performed. Right after that, John records that Jesus went to the region where John the Baptist had been baptizing (John 10:40-42). This is roughly in the region where we again pick up trail in Jesus' final approach to Jerusalem. In Judea, Jesus said that divorce was not OK, despite the fact that God had permitted divorce in the Law. Luke had skipped that dissertation on divorce. Instead, Luke's unique precursor to the study below was an anecdote where Jesus stopped the Pharisees' scoffing by telling them that Kingdom of God was within them. We continue now with more material unique to Luke.

God Loves a Whiner

We all get asked to do things. See this patient. Add that up. Write this report. Weld that L-bracket. Make this presentation. Etc. Etc. Depending on our tasks, our types of jobs, and our schedules, we may not fulfill a request immediately. We have got our own mental lists and plans, and when we have such a plan in place, the last thing we want is to be repeatedly reminded by the original requester until we get that task completed. To us, such nagging represents a lack of faith in our commitment to get the job done. Apparently, God is of another persuasion.

In Luke 18:1-8, we have a parable from Jesus with a rather odd beginning. It begins with an explanation of its purpose, a protocol not found in any other Gospel. The purpose can be seen in Luke 18:1:

Then Jesus told His disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. NIV

So that is the purpose, but let us come back to that in a moment. The parable goes like this:

There was a ruler who did not care about providing justice to anyone. However, a widow kept nagging him over and over again to bring justice against her adversary, so the ruler provided her justice just to stop her nagging. Jesus explained that God is much better than such an unjust ruler, and that He will provide justice swiftly for those who cry out to Him. However, will Jesus find anyone with faith when He returns? (My paraphrase)

That last part deserves a closer look. So here is Luke 18:8:

"I tell you, [God] will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?" NIV

It may be tempting to bundle this mention of swift justice to the final Judgement fated for all of mankind, and to call this yet another reference to the then-soon-coming Apocalypse, based on the mention of the return of Jesus, but that does not appear to be the case when Luke's writing is considered more fully.

Luke, more than any other Gospel writer, emphasized prayer. Matthew used "pray words" (pray, prayer, praying, etc.) 17 times, Mark used them 12 times, Luke used them 27 times, and John used them least of all; only 7 times in his Gospel. It is widely thought that the author of Luke also wrote Acts, and within Acts "pray words" are used 33 more times. Furthermore, Acts emphasized the power of prayer and the direct and timely answering of it in episodes such as Acts 4:23-31.

So, unlike people, who only want to be told once what to do, and then be granted faith that they will get it done, Luke's Jesus is advocating patient and persistent prayer. To not do so is to not have faith in God.

Perhaps there is a little more we can learn here.

I suspect that Luke wrote or included this parable with a purpose, and that it did not originate with Jesus. As we discussed in the study about how Jesus instructed people to pray, this would partially contradict what Jesus said in Matthew 6:7-8:

"And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him." NIV

I say "partially contradict" because this verse has more to do with prayer length than frequency, but the principle is the same: God already knows what you need, so stop thinking you can persuade Him by how you pray. Just make your request and be done with it.

Furthermore, we need to consider that Luke was likely written sometime after the fall of the Temple in Jerusalem, an event which many early Christians would have taken to be a sign of the End Times. Yet the Second Coming did not occur, even decades later. Some people, being people, were probably becoming discouraged. Unanswered prayer would have been just one more source of discouragement, ultimately leading some to walk away from the new faith. This apostasy is echoed in the words Luke puts in Jesus' mouth at the end: "when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?" It appears that Luke was trying to thwart a problem of weakening faith within the early church.

This was not the only problem that Luke had to confront. At that time, though the church was still young, it was likely mature in ways and issues that we still see in the modern church today. While some were struggling to keep the faith at all, others were parading around self-righteously in their knowledge of the "true" faith. That kind of smug behavior was both isolationist and unattractive to the outside world, which made it difficult to grow the church constituency.

Facing that problem, and already having inserted a targeted parable to deal with the apostasy issue, I suspect that it was easy for Luke to insert another targeted parable. So we see the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican in Luke 18:9-14, where Luke follows the same protocol of explaining his target explicitly in the beginning so that there would be no misunderstanding. In Luke 18:9, we see:

To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: NIV

So, from these elements, we can see the likely craft work of a man, not God; a man dealing with the real issues of expanding a new faith, while attempting to preserve the faithfulness of the present flock of believers.

Faithless, Unworthy Slaves

'
Background
On our path through the Gospels, we recently studied how Jesus said that if any two believers pray for the same thing together, God will make it happen, but we know that is not true. Mixed in that same study we observed the difficulties in Matthew's policy of forgiveness, and the adjustments made by Luke in that regard. Following Matthew from there, Matthew 18:23-35 uses a parable to emphasize the fact that if you do not forgive your brother (a.k.a. a fellow believer) from your heart, then God will not forgive you. Following Luke leads us to this unthankful study...

Faithless, Unworthy Slaves

In a recent study, we examined Luke's episode where Martha had invited Jesus, and at least the Twelve Disciples, into her home while they were on their way to Jerusalem. I had suggested that Jesus insulted Martha's generous efforts of hospitality when He effectively told Martha that her sister Mary, who had been sitting around listening to Him talk instead of helping Martha with the preparations, was doing the only thing which was important to do. This perceived slight to Martha sparked on a great comment-debate with a Jehovah's Witness, and prompted me to write a post on my other blog, asking the question "would God thank you?" Little did I know, the definitive answer was chapters away in the same Gospel.

Yet before we get to that, let us proceed from where we left off; after Luke's Jesus clarified that you should always be willing to forgive, no matter how often, as long as the transgressor repents each time.

From there, Luke 17:5 has the Disciples ask Jesus to increase their faith. Apparently, despite the witness of John the Baptist and the many miracles, such as exorcising demons who announce that Jesus is God's Holy One, giving the Disciples the power to cast out demons themselves, calming the storm, resurrecting a girl, the miraculous feedings, Peter identifying Jesus as the Christ, and a few of them witnessing the Transfiguration, the Disciples still needed a little help believing that Jesus was the Messiah, or perhaps believing that God was really in control.

In Luke 17:6, Jesus replied, not with some miracle or proof of the power of God, but by saying that if they had just a little amount of faith, they could uproot and relocate trees with a mere command. Just like what was pointed out in the previous study, preachers have difficulty strategically saying that this is true, when they know it to be false. When, ever, in all recorded history, has anyone ever commanded a tree to be planted in the sea and then had it actually happen? Forget trees. When has faith ever worked with such instantaneous and absolute power on anything? Never.

Then, Jesus provides an illustration in Luke 17:7-10 which you just need to read for yourself:

"Suppose one of you had a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Would [you] say to the servant when he comes in from the field, 'Come along now and sit down to eat'? Would [you] not rather say, 'Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink'? Would [you] thank the servant because he did what he was told to do? So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, 'We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.' " NIV

This. Speaks. Volumes.

First, we get a sense that Jesus condones slavery. (While the NIV uses the softer interpretation of "servant," the Greek word "doulon" means a slave with no rights of their own.)

Next, Jesus considers that the treatment of slaves should be as inferiors. So your slave has been working all day for you? So what? He is a slave. Have him make you dinner and serve you before he gets the chance to eat. And a slave's labor is not worthy of thanks.

Finally, obviously Jesus thinks that you should behave like a slave to God, an idea supported in Romans 6:15-23, 1 Corinthians 7:22, and Ephesians 6:5-6. You are not going to receive thanks for your efforts. Instead, you are to consider yourself an unworthy slave; a slave who is just doing what a slave is supposed to do.

So, no, Jesus did not offer thanks to Martha for her volunteer work. She was just acting appropriately as a slave to Him.

Given our modern sensitivities, this is an uncomfortable message at best. From the worst aspect, God comes across as, well, a pompous slave-driver. Yet that is not the real issue here.

The real issue is how this approach shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the human mind. This is a God who knows nothing of the beauty and strength and drive of an empowered human.

But then, we never were really dealing with God here, were we? This is a message of subjugation, and it is the kind of message that a leader of the early church would have been all-too-happy to use to manipulate the will of the believers. This is not to say that such a church leader would have necessarily ordered people around with evil intents, but we can understand how such a leader would have benefited from self-enslaved masses who were ready to take any instruction and follow any commands without asking questions, like slaves unworthy of exercising their own wills.

The Strangest Parable

'
Background
Following Matthew from the recommendation to cut off sin-causing body parts, we came to the Parable of the Lost Sheep. Luke had a parallel version of that parable, but with a different focus; celebration over the conversion of a sinner. Luke carried that same theme through in the subsequent Parable of the Lost Coin and the more-famous Parable of the Prodigal Son. In Luke, these parables are within a contiguous section of Jesus' teachings and parables, and that section continues on with...

The Strangest Parable

Although Jesus had spoken in parables to prevent people from understanding, and despite the fact that there are some accuracy problems within them, these parables often do provide a convenient platform and vivid illustrations for teaching purposes. Some parables are better than others; becoming favorite sermon starting points. This study is not about one of those better parables. Instead, this is about one parable which most pastors would prefer to skip or gloss over.

In Luke 16:1-13, you find the Parable of the Unjust Steward/Shrewd Manager, as well as some associated teachings. The parable goes like this:

A wealthy man heard that his hired manager was wasting that wealthy man's money, so he confronted the manager and demanded that he produce a record of his management. The manager knew that he would be fired, so he contacted people who owed debts to the wealthy man and recorded that their debts at a much reduced charge than what they should be, thinking that he would then be welcomed into the debtors' houses after he lost his job. When the wealthy man discovered the manager's actions, he commended him for acting wisely. (My paraphrase)

That makes sense, right? The wealthy man was going to fire the manager for wasting his money, but then turns around and commends the manager for reducing the debts owed to that wealthy man, which thereby cost the wealthy man money. What a brilliant parable. It really reflects reality, does it not?

Perhaps we should not be too hasty here. We need to consider the meaning of the parable. Luke 16:8-9 begins the revelation of meaning:

"The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light. I (Jesus) tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when [your wealth] is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings." NIV

It appears that Jesus is saying that the "people of the light" need to be more like the "dishonest manager!" Indeed, in a sense, He is saying just that. Not that you should be dishonest, but that you should use your wealth for your salvation. Except that the manager was not using his own wealth, but that of the wealthy man. Yet on the Biblical side of things, your wealth is given to you by God, as verses such as Genesis 24:35 and Deuteronomy 12:21 suggest. So in a manner of speaking, the rich man in this parable is like God, and manager of the resources represents you, or rather the parable indicates the level of shrewdness (not dishonesty) which you should have in your wealth management; if you want Salvation.

This parable is tainted. Using criminal behavior as an example of what you should do, even in a metaphorical sense, is as awkward and inappropriate as using a screwdriver to hammer in a nail. It is no wonder pastors avoid it... well, not all of it. The meaning and associated teachings are not often lost, because they are far too valuable.

You see, what follows continues on in that same vein. Luke 16:10-12 effectively state that, compared to the wealth of eternal life, the wealth in this life is meager; so if you have not been trustworthy with the meager wealth you have been given in this life, how then would it be justified to give you your own great wealth in the afterlife? This path reaches fruition within Luke 16:13, with "You cannot serve both God and Money."

In an earlier study on the Sermon on the Mount, we had seen how Jesus' teachings promote poverty, including Matthew 6:24 which matches Luke 16:13 word-for-word. However, what Luke is doing here is one step beyond that. As noted in the previous study, this is poverty with a purpose, but this passage in Luke brings into the picture the sense of responsible stewardship of the resources provided by God inextricably tied into that poverty. There is no reasonable excuse for holding on to your wealth.

That may be the key here to understanding this passage. When you see "the people of the light" in Luke 16:8, it appears to be a reference to the church; as in the church which was not-quite-yet-established at the time of Jesus. So it seems as if Jesus' message is anachronistic; not appropriate for the time at which He allegedly said it. Luke was writing in a time when the church was well established, and at a time when the leaders of the church would have financially benefited from loosening the purse strings of the congregation. Just like with the Parable of the Prodigal Son, there appears to be an ulterior motive here. That is (of course) speculation, but combining the oddity of the parable, the timing of the mention of "the people of the light," and its potential benefit to the religious leaders, the speculation appears grounded in reason.

The Prodigal Guilt Trip

'
Background
Jesus is having a discussion with His Disciples, which started with Him explaining how they needed to humble themselves like children if they wanted to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. According to Matthew and Mark, He then discussed how serious sin was, and what extreme measures you should take to avoid it, because you do not want to be cast into Hell. Matthew continues the conversation further, which is paralleled by Luke in another location. Following Luke leads to a famous parable.

The Prodigal Guild Trip

If you are studying the Gospels with an eye for construction, it becomes fairly obvious that Mark, in one form or another, was a primary source for material in Matthew's and Luke's Gospels. However, when you encounter material which is not contained in Mark, the origin becomes more mysterious. Of course, believers would say that this material comes from actual eye-witness accounts. If so, if the same material is covered in Matthew and Luke, we would expect some divergence owing to the imperfection of memory and perception. Details would change. Tone may be altered. Yet the underlying emphasis should be the same, but is it?

Matthew 18:10 continues a conversation where Jesus had used a little child as a living metaphor for how humble they should be, and how cautious they should be about causing such humble people to sin, because then you would be thrown into Hell. So Matthew 18:10 is another warning not to mistreat these humble "children" of God.

Then, depending on which version you are reading, in Matthew 18:11 you find:

"For the Son of man is come to save that which was lost." KJV

This has been removed from new versions because it was not included in the oldest copies of Matthew. Instead, this is an insertion from a later transcriber, probably based on Luke 19:10.

Following that, we get to the Parable of the Lost Sheep in Matthew 18:12-14:

If a man had 100 sheep, and one of them had wondered off, the man would leave the 99 to find the one. If he were to find that one errant sheep, he would be happier about that one than about the other 99. God is like that; not wanting to lose any of these "children." (My paraphrase)

Of course, there are a couple of difficulties with this parable. God represents the man who owns the sheep, and He already owns the full 100, yet according to Hebrews 6:4-8, if you are Saved, and then you wander away, it is impossible for you to rejoin the flock. Even more significant is the fact that the man, God, anxiously and diligently searches for the lost sheep. How then it is possible for the sheep not to be recovered? How is it possible for God to fail in His effort? The saving of the sheep is not reliant on the sheep in any way.

Luke 15:1-7 also has the Parable of the Sheep, but in a completely different setting. There, Jesus had been teaching the crowds, and Pharisees and Teachers of the Law were upset because of the type of people He was teaching. The parable itself also takes on a different focus:

A man loses one of his 100 sheep, and so he eaves the 99 to find the lost one. When he finds it, he throws a party. Similarly, there is more rejoicing in Heaven over one repentant sinner than over 99 righteous people who do not need to repent. (My paraphrase)

In Luke's version, the man is not a stand-in for God, except for his similar expression of joy at recovering his lost sheep.

(Luke's version has its own slight problem, in that due to the relatively close proximity of mention of Pharisees and Teachers of the Law, the mention of the 99 "righteous persons who do not need to repent" appears like it refers to them, but it does not.)

Luke 15:8-10 continues this party theme in the subsequent Parable of the Lost Coin:

A woman loses one of her ten silver coins, and then, after a fruitful search for her missing coin, she celebrates with her friends. Similarly, there is rejoicing in Heaven over one sinner who repents. (My paraphrase)

Then, as if the third time was the charm, Luke 15:11-24 continued that same party theme yet again with the Parable of the Prodigal Son, but with a little twist:

One of two sons of a wealthy man asked for his inheritance early. Then that son left and squandered his share of wealth on prostitutes and other luxuries in a foreign country. When the money ran out, he became a pig-feeding servant. He realized what he had lost, and decided to return humbly to his father at the level of a servant, not of a son. However, upon seeing the son return, the father rushed out to embrace and kiss his son, and then threw an extravagant party for him. (My paraphrase)

So far, this parable maintains the theme of joyous recovery, and goes further to provide an explicit example of a sinner and the caliber of repentance which is worthy of celebration. This again confirms Luke's emphasis of this series of parables; that of the joy in a sinner coming to repentance.

However, this parable drops the owner-search aspect. The father does not go out looking for the lost son. Rather the lost son "came to his senses" all by himself. In contrast to Matthew's Parable of the Lost Sheep , this speaks of personal responsibility in your own recovery/repentance instead of God coming out to find you.

I promised a twist, and here it is, as we continue the Parable of Prodigal Son in Luke 15:25-32:

The other son, who had stayed with his father the entire time, became angry with his father for throwing the extravagant party for his brother, because his father had never made any gesture of reward for his own loyalty and obedience. The father answered him that all the father owned belonged to him, but the celebration was right for his brother, who was once dead but now lives. (My paraphrase)

This twist ending is exceedingly odd. Story-wise, there is nothing wrong with it. We can easily understand the loyal son's indignation, even if we cannot imagine ourselves acting that way. But this is not just a story. This is a parable. While not every single facet of a parable needs to have a corresponding meaning, this final section accounts for well over one third of the total parable. Its prominence implies significance. So what does it mean?

Due to the Pharisees and the Teacher's of the Law being present, it would be tempting to say that they represent the indignant son who is already entitled to the father's possessions, especially given that this series of parables was kicked off by their own indignation. However, this part of the parable is not likely to be targeted at them, given the condemnation of the Pharisees and the Teachers of the Law in Luke 11:39-52.

So who was the target? This falls squarely into speculation, but my theory is that this was actually aimed at existing believers. When exactly Luke wrote his Gospel is questionable, but it was clearly after Mark's Gospel had been written, and it was likely multiple decades after the death of Jesus. This means that the early adapters to Christianity had already been "harvested." New converts for any given region would have been trickling in; one here, one there. Meanwhile, much of the body of the church had been laboring for Christ for years upon years.

Perhaps this parable is actually an analog to the emergent customs of those times. Perhaps there were feasts or parties held for the newer converts, and some of the older converts had started to grumble against the fuss made about the new converts while no reward or honor had been given to them, despite their loyal service.

If this is close to the actual history, then Luke's political intentions become obvious; snuff out the fire of indignation by turning these new-convert-parties into something implicitly ordained by Jesus.

Stormy Faith

'
Background
Depending on which Gospel you follow, there is a different chain of prior events to this study. According to Matthew, Jesus (non-)prophetically healed a bunch of people and emphasized the extreme urgency of His mission on earth by telling a would-be follower to skip his own father's burial in favor of following Jesus and preaching about the Kingdom of God. According to Mark, Jesus dishonored His mother and brothers, and then taught a large crowd through several parables while sitting in a boat. According to Luke, Jesus taught people through parables while traveling town to town, and then dishonored His mother and brothers. According to John, you would never know that this story happened at all. It seems that John was not impressed by the event described below.

Stormy Faith

Faith is a curious subject. The word “faith” is used around 240 times in the Bible. Only nine of those times are in the Old Testament (OT), and only three of those times are in the sense a faith in God. The other six OT references of “faith” are in terms of honoring an agreement. Yet every single time of the roughly 230 times the New Testament (NT) uses the word, it is in connection with believing in God. As Hebrews 11:1 puts it:

Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. NIV

To see such a stark contrast between OT and NT usage should give you pause about your faith. While you are paused, let us take a closer look at one of the times when Jesus commented about faith.

Matthew 8:23-27, Mark 4:35-41, and Luke 8:22-25 all recount the tale of how Jesus and some unnamed, unnumbered disciples joined with Jesus in a boat ride to cross the lake of Tiberias (a.k.a. Sea of Galilee). A fierce storm quickly appears. The boat nearly sinks while Jesus sleeps. The disciples awaken Jesus, who then rebukes the weather, making it calm and peaceful.

Before (according to Matthew 8:26) or after (according to Mark 4:39-40 and Luke 8:24-25) calming the storm, Jesus rebukes His disciples; asking them why they are afraid and asking why they have little or no faith.

Little or no faith? At first glance, that does not make sense at all. The lake of Tiberias is about 8 miles (13 km) wide, so this is a lake in which you could drown from exhaustion in trying to swim shore, especially in a storm. As Luke 8:23 renders it, “the boat was being swamped, and they were in great danger.” And what did the disciples do in their peril? They turned to Jesus for help! They woke up Jesus and, as Matthew 8:25 renders it, exclaimed "Lord, save us! We're going to drown!" They did not say “Jesus, would you please help us bail out the boat?” They had faith that Jesus could save them supernaturally.

So why did Jesus say that they had little or no faith? The classic Christian exegesis says that their “little faith” was evidenced by the fact that they either did not believe that God would protect them, or did not believe that Jesus could not protect them while He was sleeping. That exegesis is all wrong. By all appearances, God was not saving them. They were indeed in danger. (Now if the boat was completely calm and dry despite the raging storm all around, that would have been a good indicator that God was protecting them!)

Some pastors will latch on to the fact of this danger like it was the central message; to encourage belief regardless of what was happening around you because God will protect you, but that was not the message. As I pointed out, the disciples did believe that Jesus could save them. So this claim of “little faith” has got to mean something else...

I suspect that this was meant to be a rebuke that these disciples had not believed or taken to heart what Jesus had been preaching about the Kingdom of God. No, there is not much specific about the Kingdom in the Gospels thus far, but it does say that Jesus was preaching quite often about it (Matthew 4:23, Mark 1:14, Luke 4:14-15, Luke 8:1). Presumably, the afterlife would have come up sometime during Jesus' preaching. If so, Jesus would rightfully be wondering why they are afraid to die. That is part of the message of Salvation, right? Death, where is thy sting? (1 Corinthians 15:55)

This should be a reminder to Bible-thumpers everywhere that not everything that supposedly happened is actually recorded in the Gospels. You are going to have to do some interpolation to get at the truth of the story, if you could call it truth. The trick is that you have to stay within the limits of the text in your interpolation. Interpolate. Do not extrapolate.

OK, now for the skeptical punchline. Check out the basic mechanics of this story. Storm comes in. Believers solicit Jesus for help. Jesus controls the weather to save the believers.

Why is this same thing not happening today? Why is God not protecting believers which seek His protection from natural disasters? Surely people pray for protection during hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, tsunamis, etc. Yet you do not see any divine protection given, not at any rate above what could be called statistical chance. Even these mechanics point to my theoretical exegesis above.

Per the story, Jesus had to calm the storm for His own protection so that He could make it to the cross. Otherwise Christians would be praying to a boat, and that just would not do. So this divine intervention was a one-off, special event.

As for everybody else in the remainder of mortal time, why should God bother saving anybody's mortal life, when it is the deeper Salvation of the afterlife that really matters? So you may as well stop praying to God for healing or protection, oh you of little faith. God is not going to help you, and He is wondering why you want to keep living anyway.

That would have been an good message to send to new believers. It is not an attractive message in and of itself, but it does remind believers to focus on the afterlife, not on this life. Completely disregard the dangers of this life, and instead blindly follow, even to your death if necessary. The afterlife will be so worth it.

Oh, the power the early church leaders would have had over such sheep...