Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, do you know what Mammon is? Mammon is a word that is actually related to the word "amen." Mammon. Amen. Mammon. Amen. Get it? They even sound the same. Amen, as the Catechism teaches us, means "yes, yest it shall be so" or, even simpler, "true dat!" So "Mammon" is what you say "Amen" to. Mammon is what you trust in. Mammon is what you look to for your good. Mammon is what your faith clings to. So what's your Mammon? We know what the world's Mammon is: money. With enough money, the world can buy happiness. And the world knows that as long as the money is there, you can win friends and influence people. Just remember the Prodigal Son (who comes right before this reading in Luke's Gospel). As long as his inheritance money was flowing, he had loads of friends. But when it ran out, he was all alone wishing he could eat the pigs' food. In today's Gospel we hear of the unjust steward. This guy was a crook who wasted his master's money and goods. A cheat and a fraud, he was found out and his master was ready to fire him. So what does he do? The one thing he knows how to do: cheat and manipulate. He changes all the bills of his master's debtors so they'll owe less. Now, when he loses his job with the rich man, he'll at least have some other people who might take him in. And the rich man even applauds this wicked steward for being so clever! And then Jesus makes this astounding statement: "For the sons of this age are wiser than the children of Light." Whoa! Did Jesus just say that the cheats and crooks of this world are smarter than us Christians? Yep! And He says even more. He says, "Make friends for yourself with unrighteous Mammon so that when you fail they will receive into eternal dwellings."
Brothers and sisters in Christ, there are two kinds of "unrighteous Mammon." There's the world's kind and there's what you have been given by the Lord. The world knows about making friends with its money. The wicked steward has no problem cooking the books to make sure he's got some people who will take him in. The Prodigal Son had no problem filling his life with friends who liked him just for his money. The world knows this, doesn't it? That if you throw around money and gifts, you'll have lots of friends. With enough cash, you CAN buy happiness, if only for a little while. We even try this too sometimes when our hearts are all wrapped up in what we have, how much we give, what we can buy. But where the world always beats us is that it knows how to use its Mammon for its own advantage to secure itself a place, if even only for a little while. But you have been given a far greater Mammon, a far richer treasure, an infinitely more valuable gift. And we ought to learn to use that to make others dear to us, so that they will be our friends.
What is that Mammon? Remember that Mammon is whatever you attach your Amen to. What is that for God's people? Not the Mammon of the world, money and all that. No, your unrighteous Mammon is much, much more. What is it that Mammon that is given to us? Nothing short of God Himself! God the Father who sent His Son to save us from our sins. God the Son who took on Flesh and gave Himself into death in obedience to the Father to rescue us from sin, death, devil and hell. God the Holy Spirit who through the Gospel and Baptism and the Supper showers forgiveness, life and salvation upon us. All of these gifts—these are unrighteous, unfair Mammon. You haven't earned these gifts. You haven't deserved them. You haven't taken them for yourselves. You've been given them by the mercy of God in Christ Jesus. The wicked steward has to figure out a way to make sure that HE is taken care of and all he's got to use is the world's Mammon. But you, dearly beloved in Christ, all that God is and has and has done is given TO you and FOR you. It is all yours in Christ. It is splashed upon you at the font and fed to you in the Supper and proclaimed into your ears. For you. A Savior. Sins forgiven. God is your Father. The gifts are your proof and guarantee. And what do we say to such gifts? Amen! That is our unrighteous, undeserved, unasked for, freely given, graciously bestowed, Mammon! Not the money of this world that runs out but the gifts of God in Christ which are eternal.
Now, dear Christian, use that "unrighteous Mammon" to make people dear to you. Use such gifts as the Lord has given to make friends. What does that mean? It means this: all that we have from God: salvation, life, heaven, the forgiveness of sins—all of this is unfairly ours. It is gift from the Father who loves us in Christ, from Christ who loves the Father and obeys Him and the Spirit who dishes it all out lavishly upon us. The world knows how to make friends with its Mammon. But let us learn to make friends with what is unfairly ours: the forgiveness of sins. That means, brothers and sisters, that you can only have one kind of friend, you know, THOSE kind of people. The unlovable ones. The ones who don't deserve a bit of good from you or anyone else. Like the people in your family that are so much worse than you. The people in your neighborhood or where you work that are so easy to look down on. The people in this church that you can't stand for one reason or another. Make them your friends! Not by handing out cash but by splurging with the gifts you've been given. Forgiveness. Overlooking their faults. Imagine, if you will, brothers and sisters, what life would be like if we all lived as if Christ and His gifts were our true Amen. Our real Mammon. That Christ was the heart and center of our faith and trust. Imagine how differently we would treat one another! Think how few problems our little congregation would have if we all knew and recognized just how good we have it in Christ! Why, if that were true, we wouldn't have to worry about paying our bills or breaking up arguments or cold shoulders. We would live toward one another as the steward does: by making friends with someone else's money. By loving one another with someone else's gifts: with Jesus' forgiveness, life and salvation. Think about how happy you can make someone with that kind of Mammon, so happy that on the Last Day when they see you in heaven, they'll actually be glad to see you! Eternal dwellings! That's a religion the world knows nothing about.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, your eternal dwellings are secure. It's a done deal in Jesus. The Father has sent His Son into this world without our deserving it. The Son has taken on flesh and has died and risen for us, without our deserving it. The Spirit comes with water and word and body and blood to give us what we don't even want: forgiveness, life and salvation. These gifts give us and teach us to live in an even greater freedom than that wicked steward. Notice that when it all hit the fan, he didn't despair. He didn't throw himself off a cliff with one final "woe is me!" Nor did he become self-righteous and try to escape his consequences by excuses and self justification. No, he simply recognized that he was free from his master and could do whatever it takes to make friends to take him in. Likewise us, dear Christians. The Spirit has freed us from any sort of self-righteousness that looks down on others and from any despair of God's goodness. With His holy gifts, his unfair and unrighteous Mammon, the Spirit delivers us from having no place in this world and gives us a Mammon that we can use to make the people around us actually like us. Be our friends. Not for our own sake but as a blessing for their sake.
I've got to tell you, brothers and sisters in Christ, that I really didn't want to preach this week. It's been a rough week because of some personal stuff. But I figured I'd better preach or I won't get paid. But I'm forbidden to do that! St. Peter tells me not to preach for worldly gain. So let me preach to you today as one who desires you to be my friend. I can't buy everyone lunch at Don's and I won't be able to get you a new car if you need one. But that stuff doesn't last anyway! All I've got for you today is the promise that in Christ, God doesn't hold my sins against me. And He doesn't hold your sins against you. So on that basis, let's be friends...knowing that in Christ, we won't hold on to each others sins either, but live together in Christ, in the newness of life. Oh, we'll probably botch it up. But then it's right back here to the Lord's church, his ATM where we can withdraw some of that "unfair Mammon" the forgiveness of sins that gives us life and salvation. What is there to say to that but, Mammon! I mean...Amen!