(Luke 16:)
'This chapter is a consistent whole, and it is very easy I to trace the unity of purpose in it. The parable of the unjust steward at the beginning is illustrated by the story of the rich man and Lazarus at the end :itself not a parable, as people often say, but plain solemn truth, although the language is necessarily not exactly literal, but drawn from the present life, as constantly that which is unseen is conveyed to us in terms of what is seen. As to these things, " we see through a glass darkly," or; as the word is, " in a riddle,"-things which it is not possible in plain words to utter.
The unjust steward is the picture of man intrusted by God with the " good things " of this life, but by sin having lost his stewardship, death being plainly the limit of his possession, when he goes out naked, able to carry nothing with him. These are the " goods " of the previous chapter, which the Father of all distributes to His children, the witnesses of a love to which men are yet blind, whether they wander, as does the younger son, into the far-off country, openly away from God, or, with the correct elder son, only nurse the spirit of the far-off country in their hearts.
The steward of the parable is unjust, and so declared to be, acts in this character all through, is not commended for his justice, but for his " wisdom,"-a wisdom which is employed, as with the " children of this world " to whom it is ascribed, entirely for himself. Nor is it God commends him, but his lord. He is shrewd and careful of the future, judges truly of that future before him, that he must depend then upon other resources than his own, spends what he might have appropriated and laid up to secure himself against that day. In all this there is that which can be pointed out to us for imitation, while the unrighteousness, of course, cannot. When the Lord comes to the application, He makes careful distinction as to all this, and there is not the slightest room left for mistake.
Riches, says the Lord, are the "mammon of unrighteousness "-the god that the men of this world worship. All earthly gain to one's self is included here :plainly all that can be included among the good things of earth. Good they are, not in themselves evil at all, the gifts of One who is good and gives what is good. This is the misery of sin, that man perverts what is good to evil, and makes a curse out of a blessing.
Not only are the good things "good" as regards the present life :we may make to ourselves " friends " with them of that future which men dread, but which so little influences them. This is not the gospel, and is not designed to be. It is, and must be, consistent with the gospel; or the Savior of men could never have uttered it. Certain it is our lives here witness for or against us,- are thus friends or enemies. As the apostle says, and says to professing Christians, "If ye live after the flesh, ye shall die ; but if ye through the Spirit mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live." (Rom. 8:13.) This also is not the gospel, but it would be a woeful mistake to suppose it inconsistent with the gospel. It is how, as he tells us, the children of God are manifested :" for as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God." (5:14.) Such texts, therefore, have their use in searching the conscience, and testing how far the gospel has clone its work with us. "The gospel is preached . . . that men might live according to God in the Spirit." (i Pet. 4:6.) If the bent of the life is not changed, the gospel cannot have been received aright. It is an infallible remedy for a diseased life, so that if the life be not healed, we have a right to argue that the remedy has not been taken.
"Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness," says the Lord, "that when ye fail"-or, as the critics read now, " when it fails, they may receive you into everlasting habitations." And this is faithfulness, not, as with the unjust steward, unrighteousness. " He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much ; and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much." How true is that! and how deeply important! Little and much make an immense difference in our eyes. How many there are who make conscience only of great things, and think of it as mere scrupulous nicety to regard the small! Yet these little things have tongues, like our children, to betray the disorder where all is outwardly correct. A child's chatter may reveal us to a stranger, sometimes to ourselves :and just so our inconsistencies of conduct reveal what is deeper than the surface, and as rottenness under what seemed living and true.
" If, therefore, ye have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the true riches ; and if ye have not been faithful in that which is Another's "-not "another man's"-"who will give you that which is your own ? "
Thus righteousness is insisted on, the unrighteous element in the parable completely antidoted, faithfulness as stewards made to be that which is profitable in the future, with how sweet and tender an appeal to us on behalf of Him who has turned the very lapse of earthly stewardship into fullest gain for us, giving us in the things that are heavenly and eternal "that which is our own " !
Thus indeed now the grace of God speaks to bankrupt and beggared man. His dispossession from what is earthly becomes the voice of God calling him to " come up higher." And that same grace will reward with eternal riches the devotion to God of that which is after all His ! How good is He !
Let us make no mistake :this is not yet the gospel. But it is truth, self-consistent of course, and consistent with all other truth. Moreover, it has its solemn side, intense in its solemnity. " No servant can serve two masters :for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon."
How clear, definite, positive, is this, as the word of a Master! The perfect Master, Teacher of truth alone, is He who speaks. He does not, let us mark well, say, " Ye ought not to serve God and mammon." Man's will can get through any number of "oughts." No, he is not speaking of duty here, but of impossibility :"Ye cannot serve ;" " no man can serve two masters." Thus the question is immediately raised, which in this shape ought to be readily answered, "Who is my master? God, or the world ? where are my interests? in this life, or the life to come?" To have the face in one direction is to have one's back upon the other :with one's face toward God, there is no alternative but to have one's back upon the world.
This is not the gospel ; we have not come to the gospel :but it is plain, pointed truth of the most personal kind. And the Lord often insisted on such truth as; this :" If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it, but whosoever shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it. For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul ? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Matt. 16:24-26.) Here He enjoins the most solemn counting of cost, and the alternative is put in the same decisive way :the present life, or the life to come -which will you have ? for both you cannot have :will you choose here, or there ?-in time, or in eternity?
The story at the end of the chapter, of Lazarus and the rich man, illustrates this choice on both sides. The covetous Pharisees, legal to the heart's core, but who never have penetrated the inner meaning of the law, are made to realize that the man upon whom the law seemed to have heaped its blessings might on the other side of the vail be found lifting up his eyes in hades, being in torment, and crying for but a drop of water from the tip of the finger to cool his tongue, while on the other hand the beggar, with his rags pleading against him-for who ever " saw the righteous forsaken, or his seed begging their bread ? "-is taken to Abraham's bosom,-for a Jew, the chief place of honor,-carried there by angels' hands !
How solemn is that condemnation, " Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and . . . now . . . thou art tormented ! " What crime is alleged against him here ? Not even his having left Lazarus at his gate without showing mercy. Perhaps he did get the crumbs from the rich man's table, a dole for his need, never missed from his abundance,-just what practically many give, and count it liberality. But there is nothing but this,-nothing charged but this :" Thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things." How intensely solemn is this ! May its voice be heard in the hearts and consciences of many !
The vail of Christianity thrown over such a life could have done nothing for it. It would have been only worse,-more self-condemned. No white robe of a Savior's merits could avail to cover the wretchedness of a life like this. True, God's grace can come in wherever, whenever, the heart is turned to Him. But it needs to be maintained that where it comes in it comes in to reign and sin and it cannot reign together. The life is saved where the soul is saved. " The grace of God which bringeth salvation teaches us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world." (Tit. 2:11, 12.)
On the other hand, there is a lesson in the fact that it is a beggar whom the Lord places in Abraham's bosom. True it was that as a beggar he had no legal righteousness. It is evident that to the rich man with his life wasted upon himself the beggar is not after all the contrast one might have expected. Had it been one who had sold all that he had to give to the poor, it would have been that. Is it not plain that the Lord has designedly given us something else than what the parable of the unjust steward might seem to have foretokened. He did not mean, then, to teach us that eternal happiness can be gained by human merit. Striking contrast indeed in this respect with him whose doom is gained by a life of self-indulgence, the beggar goes to bliss as every way a beggar ! Such surely are they who are justified through faith, and not by the works of the law.
At best, we are unjust stewards, and claim we have not. The grace of God stoops to us as sinners :when we have nothing to pay, we are freely forgiven. The cross of Christ was not needed for our righteousness :it was that on which He bare our sins in His own body, but that henceforth we, being dead unto sins, should live unto righteousness. Thus a new life begins for us, and with our faces turned Godward, our backs are upon the world. That world is as we were-godless :the cross which has brought us nigh is the full breach between God and it, and by the cross we are crucified to the world. Thus the gospel puts us upon a new path, qualifies us for the new life, conforms us to the divine conditions ; and all the joy, blessing and power of our life as Christians depends upon the steadfastness with which we maintain our course, our faces heavenward, our backs upon the world.