Praying for Kings

I am not good at maths, numbers do give me a headache. I was quite good at algebra and I put this down to the use of letters in an equation. When I looked at the gospel reading (Luke 16:1-13) for this Sunday I thought that my mind was confused due to the use of money and the manager not treating people fairly. However, I may have spent so much time trying to work out the money owed, and the money written off that I lost the part of the parable where it is clear that there is dishonesty here.  The manager is being investigated, which is correct. He has been squandering the wealth and, as he knows, he has been found out. He gains some but not all of the money owed. By doing this he hopes that if he loses his job he will still have friends to turn to as he has not made them pay the amount they owed.  All well and good but then Jesus says that the listeners are to make friends for themselves through dishonest wealth.

This is all confusing, but then I remember that this is a parable. Did Luke the writer of the gospel remember the story he had been told of a Jesus speaking the parable incorrectly? It think that as with all parables we need to look at things in a less obvious way. 

Parables were told by Rabbis, and when they did this, their use of a master and a steward meant God and Israel. This turns everything around. God the master has entrusted His people and they have not been honest. They have tried to do the best that they could to stay in God’s good books by trying to hide what they were really like. It is a challenge to us as well. How often do we try and hide our true selves from God? There is no point trying, our creator knows us and all that we have done. 

The good news is though, that we are able to enjoy the riches that God gives us. Jesus challenged the people to think about the fact that if they were  dishonest with God, why would He trust them with the great riches that come from knowing Him.

To be honest, this is the part that makes it less uncomfortable. We know that God can see us, we know that we need to be faithful in following Him. We also know how great the riches are from following Him.

At the end of the reading Jesus pointed out that you if you can’t be faithful with what is your own, how can you be faithful with what belongs to others. The answer is that if we serve ourselves over God, if we don’t act with fairness when we are with others, then we are are not serving others. If we don’t help others, how can we be true to our relationship with God ?

The epistle reading (1 Tim. 2:-7) is so timely, it is incredible. We are told to pray for Kings and all those in high places so that  we will live a quiet and peaceable life. At the moment with our new King, and the loss of Queen Elizabeth II we can see the need to pray for the new role of the King and that he and all leaders will know the strength of God and the wisdom, clarity and compassion which is truly needed of our leaders. To a family in mourning we can pray for comfort and we also remember the resurrection hope of life after death.

We are told that as we pray for our leaders we will have a peaceable life. This could sound self serving almost. Except that, when we pray for those in authority we are being good stewards. This is because as we pray for those who have power so we pray that they will treat their power wisely. To be honest, I wouldn’t want to be in their shoes, and I am very happy to pray for them. 

The readings call for honesty in our relationship with God and others, they call for humility in acceptance of those in authority over us as we pray for them.