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Nobleton Community Church
29084 Sentinel Street PO Box 224
Nobleton, Florida 34661
Rev. Paul V. Lehmann, Pastor
813-389-8683
Nobletoncommunitychurch.org
info@nobletoncommunitychurch.org
OUR VISION IS:
To experience SPIRIT-FILLED WORSHIP AND PRAYER
To be involved in EVANGELISM, DISCIPLINING AND TRAINING PEOPLE
To use our SPIRITUAL GIFTS
To SERVE AND REACH PEOPLE FOR CHRIST, BOTH
“ACROSS THE STREET AND ACROSS THE WORLD”
Nobleton Community Church
Date August 10, 2025
Text Luke 16: 1-13 I Corinthians 4:1-5
Pastor Paul Lehmann
Verse two in this passage that Paul wrote to the Corinthian church says, “It is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful.
This morning, we have sung about the faithfulness of God and of our Savior Jesus Christ to bless us, help us to solve our problems, relieve the burden of the suffering heart, and so forth. It seems natural that we, in turn, should be faithful to Him for all He has done and is doing, and will continue to do for us. Yet we do not understand what it really means to be faithful stewards. I wonder if we would or could give an account of our stewardship like the steward in the parable, what we would say if our master would say to us, “What’s this I hear about you? Give an account of your stewardship or your management. The picture here was of a steward or servant who was in charge of an estate or household, dispensing tasks to other servants. He is called in the text a manager in some translations. He probably was a “slave” put in charge of running his master’s estate. In Palestine, there were many absentee landlords. This steward in this parable had followed a career of embezzlement. The debtors were dishonest, too. No doubt what they owed was rent. Rent in Palestine was often paid to a landlord not in money, but in goods. It was a lot like the old system of “sharecropping.” Someone who rents land and farms it for the owner, and he pays for the land by giving the owner a share of the crops he raises. Palestine was like that. It was often an agreed proportion of the produce of the part of the estate which had been rented.
The steward knew that he had lost his job. He therefore had a brilliant idea. He falsified the entries in the books so that the debtors were debited with far less than they owed. This would make them grateful to him, and he had also involved the debtors in his own misdemeanors, and if worst came to worst, he was now in a strong position to exercise a little judicious blackmail! The master wasn’t shocked but appreciated the shrewd brain behind it, and actually praised the steward for what he had done.
One important meaning is to teach that all men are God’s stewards. Those who are unrepentant are bad stewards without doubt, but also those who claim to want to serve their master sometimes are bad.
The apostle Paul writes in I Cor 4:2 about what is required by those who have been given a trust; a steward must prove faithful.
THERE ARE FOUR LESSONS FOR US TO LEARN FROM THIS PARABLE. In verse 8, the lesson is that:
I. CHILDREN OF THIS WORLD ARE WISER (IN THEIR GENERATION) OR (IN DEALING WITH THEIR OWN KIND), THAN ARE THE PEOPLE OF LIGHT.
If only the Christian were as eager and ingenious in his attempt to attain goodness as the man of the world is in his attempts to attain money and comfort, he would be a good servant for his Lord.
If only men would give as much attention to the things which concern their souls as they do to the things which concern their business, they would be good stewards.
It is a fact that people will spend twenty times the amount of time and money and effort on their pleasure or recreation, their hobby, their golf (or watching sports), their gardening, and so forth, as he does the Lord’s work. (ie. Things in church for the Kingdom.
Our Christian service will only begin to become real and effective when we spend as much time and effort on it as we do on our own worldly activities.
You may say, “But Pastor Paul, we are told that whatever we do, we are to do it for God’s glory. Can’t I serve the Lord just as easily doing the things you mentioned? They are legitimate activities. Yes, you can, and I trust you do, and some of you are doing them a large proportion of your time. Others, not so much. Many of us need to examine this area of our lives. We should be faithful in giving of ourselves to the Lord Jesus Christ and His purposes. This means a full life commitment of doing HIS WILL, not ours. We must quit trying to run our lives according to our selfish interests and allow the Lord to take control and show us areas where we have not yet surrendered to Him.
A few years ago, there was a small boy, described as a “shy” second grader, eight years old, “a little owlish in spectacles,” who was guilty of committing a crime in a New Jersey school. It was Valentine’s Day. He brought a Valentine and put it on the teacher’s desk; then he went down into the basement and set fire to the school by lighting wastepaper in the boiler room. When the Fire Commissioner conducted an inquiry, evidence pointed to the boy. He readily admitted that he had done it. When he was asked why, he explained, as the news report put it, with childish simplicity, “In class yesterday teacher took away my bubble gum.”
The child says in effect, “ I am on the throne of my life, and I want everybody else to bow down before me. I want to rule. When I want anything, I want it, and that is sufficient reason for my having it. If I want to chew bubble gum, I should get to do it. If anybody takes it away from me, I have a right to lash out and destroy anything that stands in the way of my whim and desire.” Maybe we don’t burn down schools, but we lash out in our own way. The only way to curb that desire is to have our Adam sin nature cleansed and changed by the Spirit of God by a new birth experience. This isn’t just “trying again” as the world sees it; “a new start on our own,” but rather by life-transforming power when Christ enters our life. II Peter 1:3, 4 says that His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by His own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.”
Day by day we must submit our lives to the control of the Lord Jesus Christ in order that He may keep the old nature crucified with Him. All He wants is our lives and that we yield to His will. Now that isn’t so bad, because we were created to serve God and to glorify Him. Some of you may have learned the Heidelberg Catechism (written in Germany in the 16th c. and used in the Reformed Church then, and many churches today), which says “the chief aim of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” Some of you have gotten that confused and have thought that your chief aim in life is to enjoy the good things God has given you forever.
THE SECOND LESSON IS FOUND IN VERSE 9
II. THAT MATERIAL POSSESSIONS SHOULD BE USED TO CEMENT THE FRIENDSHIP WHEREIN THE REAL AND PERMANENT VALUE OF LIFE LIES.
It could be done in two ways.
1.) It could be done as it affects eternity. The Rabbis had a saying. “The rich help the poor in this world, but the poor help the rich in the world to come.”
Ambrose, who lived from 340-397, was Bishop of Milan and later Governor of Northern Italy. was contemporary with other early Church fathers like Jerome and Augustine. In his commentary on the rich fool who, in the parable that Jesus told, built bigger barns to store his goods, Ambrose said, “the bosoms of the poor, the houses of widows, the mouths of children are the barns which last forever.” It was, in any event, a Jewish belief that charity given to poor people would stand to a man’s credit in the world to come. A man’s true wealth would not be in what he kept, but in what he gave away.
2.) It could be done as it effects this world.
A man can use his wealth selfishly or he can use it to make life easier for his fellowmen. Possessions in themselves are not a sin, but they are a great responsibility that God has given to us because he has given our possessions to us. We are stewards.
“You might say; “Oh, no wonder I don’t have much; I probably wouldn’t take care of it very well—I would blow it!”
Yes, you might be right, because you might misuse it.
Jesus made a point about this. He said; “whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.” So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches?
LOOK AT VERSES 10 AND 11. THE LESSON IS THAT:
III. A MAN’S WAY OF FULFILLING A SMALL TASK IS THE BEST PROOF OF HIS FITNESS OR UNFITNESS TO BE ENTRUSTED WITH A BIGGER TASK.
Jesus says that; “upon earth you are in charge of things which are not really yours. You cannot take them with you when you die. They are only lent to you, so to speak. You are responsible for them. You are only a steward or manager over them. On the other hand in heaven you will get what is really and eternally and essentially yours, and what you get in heaven depends on how you used certain things on EARTH.
IV. THEN FINALLY VERSE 13 LAYS DOWN THE RULE THAT NO SERVANT CAN SERVE TWO MASTERS.
In our economy today many people, if they still have a job, it isn’t enough, and they try to have two jobs, and work for two different people. We can use our spare time in this way but a slave could not, actually he had no spare time; every moment of his day and every ounce of his energy, belonged to his master. He had not time which was his own. So, serving God, can never be a part time or a spare time job. Once a man chooses to serve God every moment of his time and every bit of his energy belongs to God. God is an exclusive master we either belong to Him totally and altogether or not at all.
You probably remember the account of a former city employee in Albany, NY, who attended an evangelistic service, and received Jesus Christ as His personal Savior. The Holy Spirit convicted him of some of things he did when he worked for the State, but more importantly he was convicted of what he didn’t do; for the hours he wasted by “goofing off” instead of working. He then mailed a check for $100.00 to the then city treasurer Frank J. O’Brian, and with it a note which read;
“FOR STOLEN TIME”
Not very many people would have done that.
We should think about the way we use our time. I know I have thought about this. I believe all of us need to consider how we spend our time, in the days that the Lord gives us. Time at work; time for meditation, devotion, and prayer; time for the Lord in worship, “singing spiritual songs” (as they did in the early Church); time serving Him and listening to Him when He tells us we should do a certain thing; time in fellowship with God’s people.
Let’s ask ourselves the question this morning; “Am I serving self, and ultimately Satan when I do that, and is it he who has mastery over my time, or am I serving my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and is it He who is master over my time, my money,
over my talents, my abilities- maybe to sing, to teach or work with children; are there spiritual gifts the Lord has given me, that I am not using to serve Him?
Remember it is required that we as stewards be found faithful. Then, when we see Him some day, He will be able to say, “WELL DONE, MY GOOD AND FAITHFUL SERVANT.”