![]() ![]() It may be that the manager was being accused simply of being inept and unable to make an efficient profit. The word “squandering” is the same word used in Luke 15 about the Prodigal Son who squandered his wealth. We don’t know who was doing the talking, but there were people in the community or on the farm who suggested that this manager was squandering the owner’s property. ![]() Luke loves a good story about a rich man, but the focus on this particular story is on the manager. The story begins with classic story-telling words, “There was a certain rich man who had a manager.” We have already discovered that the gospel of Luke talks more about riches than any other gospel. What was Jesus doing praising a dishonest manager? Why did Jesus tell us that we should emulate a man who clearly stole property not belonging to him? It’s the kind of story that I wish were not in the Bible, but since it is, we need to wrestle with it and try our best to understand it. Our passage of Scripture for today is one of the most troubling in the Bible for me. We all know that it really is a bad thing to pull for the con men, the crooks and the train robbers, but that’s Hollywood! We often expect something like that from Hollywood, but not from the Bible and not from Jesus. But there I was again, cheering for con men who were clearly stealing. The audience cheered when they successfully fleeced the wealthy bad guy. There was much to like in this movie – the music and the complicated build-up to the surprising sting operation. I also liked these stars in the movie The Sting. I was hoping they would escape when the railroad tycoon organized a special posse of experts to hunt them down. They were such delightful characters that I found myself rooting for them even though they were robbing banks and trains. In Butch Cassady and the Sundance Kid, they played two Western outlaws who led a gang of cutthroat robbers. I remember at least a couple of those anti-hero movies which starred Robert Redford Paul Newman. Those are the ones where the star of the movie is the bad guy who is so lovable that the audience winds up pulling for him. Hollywood movies often glorify the anti-hero. ![]()
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