Luke 12:32-48 (NRSV Updated Edition)
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
“Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit; be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks. Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes; truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them. If he comes during the middle of the night or near dawn and finds them so, blessed are those slaves.
“But know this: if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”
Peter said, “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for everyone?” And the Lord said, “Who, then, is the faithful and prudent manager whom his master will put in charge of his slaves, to give them their allowance of food at the proper time? Blessed is that slave whom his master will find at work when he arrives. Truly I tell you, he will put that one in charge of all his possessions. But if that slave says to himself, ‘My master is delayed in coming,’ and begins to beat the other slaves, men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk, the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour that he does not know and will cut him in pieces and put him with the unfaithful. That slave who knew what his master wanted but did not prepare himself or do what was wanted will receive a severe beating. But the one who did not know and did what deserved a beating will receive a light beating. From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required, and from the one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded."
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"It is important to see that Jesus is not telling us to give up desires. The heavenly Abba has a profound Desire for a deep union of love with each of us, a union God would have us share with each other. If God is comprised of God's Desire, then it follows that we creatures are created with desires. What Jesus is doing here is redirecting our desires from the desires of rivalrous avarice towards God's Desire that is without rivalry. Isn't every fight, ultimately, over what we think we are entitled to as our inheritance? Yet aren't we all offered the whole world to be an inheritance rather than a bone for contention? Since these rivalrous desires embroil us with our rivals, the material inheritance we are fighting for is destroyed as if by moths. Of course, each rival blames the other for being the thief that has stolen the treasure.
"Jesus then shifts to an admonition to be ready for the Master's “return from the wedding banquet.” (Lk. 12: 36) If we servants are alert and ready to greet the master, the master will wait on us as Jesus waited on his disciples at the Last Supper. This little feast shared by master and servants is an image of the treasure our hearts should be set on. The progression of vignettes and admonitions throughout this chapter suggests that the best way to be prepared for God's coming is to set our hearts on treasure that moths cannot consume and thieves cannot steal. Fundamentally, being alert for the “master” consists of serving one another in the same way that the master serves us when he comes.
"The following little parable is comical and a bit threatening. The master who serves those who wait for him is transformed into a thief breaking into a house in the middle of the night. (vv. 39–40) If our hearts are not set on the treasure of serving one another, but instead we fight over our inheritance and try to gather it into bigger barns, then the God who serves us will be quite alien to us and will be perceived as a thief, a burglar. If our rivalry deepens as it does in the still more threatening parable that follows, so that our rivalry causes us to “beat the other slaves, men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk,” (vs. 45), then the gracious master will indeed rob us of our victims.
"God is both a burglar and a gracious master who serves. God only breaks in to take away all that draws our hearts away from God and from each other. What this burglar leaves in return is a treasure well worth setting our hearts on."
- Andrew Marr, Abbot of St. Gregory's Abbey (Three Rivers, MI), from blog post titled “The Burglar Who Serves.” (https://andrewmarrosb.wordpress.com/2016/08/05/the-burglar-who-serves/)
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"[W]e begin today's Gospel which starts: “Do not be afraid, little flock.” That's actually the only place where this phrase comes in any of the Gospels: little flock. It's this affectionate note. Jesus talking to his disciples here, that is this affectionate note, “For it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” And I think that that's really what is behind the whole of this passage that's coming up, which can be a very very difficult passage. Because it's asking us to sink into something which isn't evident and which is really absolutely central to the Christian faith, which is the notion that underneath everything that is there is a good pleasure in doing things for us, that there is someone who wants our wellness, wants our flourishing, wants our happiness, our safety.
"“Your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” In other words, there's a hugely powerful project going on, and we're already on the inside of it. It's as we're being given something and because we're being given something that we are then expected to behave in certain ways. This is incredibly difficult I think psychologically for any of us to get into because we are inclined to worry, we are inclined to strive after things and it's very very difficult to, what it says next: “Sell your possessions and give alms, make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven.” In other words, to treat anything that we have as something that is worth much more as we give it away. That our real treasure is what we've given away, and therefore is our contribution to other people rather than anything that we have. Psychologically that is incredibly difficult.
"You get an unfailing treasure in heaven where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. And then this line which sounds very beautiful but is in fact terribly challenging: “For where your treasure is there your heart will be also.” Well, this is a shocking Gospel message, particularly at a time when we're hearing about a financial recession, collapse going on all around us, prices going up, inflation etc etc. Worrying about our treasure here on earth is a full-time business for many of us. What on earth does it mean to have such confidence in what we are being given that we can happily give away and carry on giving away? And regard what we have given away and therefore no longer control as what our treasure is - something outside our control. That is incredibly difficult and yet that is the image of God which Jesus is giving us.
"But there is something being brought into being in the midst of us and it is brought into being in the degree to which we learn to give ourselves away, and that it's in the giving ourselves away that we have treasure. Oh so painful because where the tyre hits the road is always where I haven't got enough. How can I give away if I haven't got enough? And this seems an incredible challenge, an incredibly difficult challenge to that - to live, to dwell in the sense of an abundance that is prior to us, which is what faith is all about. Such that we are not frightened to give away.
[...]
"So I think [...] the notion of so much more being available to us that we can trust in what is being given to us, and that as we trust it we actually become someone. And as we become someone we can entrust more to others. And that this which is a gift, it's massively prior to us. It's what turns us into becoming capable of rejoicing.
"It does mean that we acquire responsibilities with it. It is as it were any failures can't be mitigated. And that is frankly very challenging. As someone who has often fallen asleep, and sometimes got drunk, I hope not beaten other servants but who could well be regarded as someone who's often asleep at the wheel. What does it look like to be alert, alive with our belt girdled and our lamp lit so as to be able to be ready for the service when the Lord comes? This I find a very very challenging Gospel."
- James Alison, from video "Homily for Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time 2022 C" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5ddiEqx7Tk)
[Source of link to Andrew Marr's blog post, and for analysis and discussion on all the lectionary texts for this Sunday: https://girardianlectionary.net/reflections/year-c/proper14c/]
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