How to Make Friends With Mammon - Why We Shouldn't Shun People

How to Make Friends With Mammon - Why We Shouldn't Shun People

You might be familiar with the parable of the unjust steward given by Christ and recorded in Luke 16. 

In summary: An unjust steward who had wasted his master's goods was soon to be cast out. Recognizing that he had no place to go, the unjust steward took what remaining authority he had and forgave his master's debtors up to half of their debts, winning their favor. The master then commends the unjust steward for acting wisely. 

After stating the parable, Christ concludes: 

9 And I say unto you, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; that, when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations.

 10 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.

 11 If therefore ye have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the true riches?

Does this mean Christ is commending wasting people's goods and upheaving their business affairs in the aftermath?

Of course not. We often relate wisdom with righteousness, so I can understand where the confusion comes from, yet in this case "wise" is used more in the context of "strategically."And though the master commends the unjust steward for his strategy, I'm sure he is not happy with the the steward for both wasting his goods AND forgiving his debtors. 

The principle isn't so much in the conduct of the unjust steward in abusing his master, as it is in his conduct towards the debtors. Watch how Christ explains the principle:

"Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; that, when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations."

The point Christ is making is in having a backup plan so "that when ye fail" you still have options, and if you've failed your righteous master, then all that's left are the unrighteous mammon. 

And not to discourage anyone into thinking that Christ is saying "you're going to fail, so get ready." Christ still expects us to succeed, but he expects us to succeed the same way the God's do, with a series of backup plans in place.

How to Make Friends With Mammon

For the sake of having our backup plan in place, let's consider how to befriend those who have varying levels of unjustness, which is everyone here on earth. 

In order to maintain a friendship, just like any other relationship, there must be trust. All relationships are built on trust. Hopefully that trust is based on actual experience, however some people get into relationships hoping that a person is trustworthy. Regardless of how the relationship is formed, when the trust is betrayed the relationship ends. 

Trust is based on law, or in other words, what the person is trusting is that the other person is going to live up to whatever expectations there are for the relationship. Once a person does NOT live up to the expectations, the trust is broken, and the relationship is damaged and once there is no trust the relationship ends. These expectations that govern the relationship can be considered the "law" of that relationship.

Law means consequences for actions, and justice is the actual enforcement of those consequences. Someone might break a law, and not experience a consequence for some time. Bringing that person "to justice" means that the consequences for breaking that law are enforced on that individual. 

This means that in order for there to be any friendly relationship with anyone, that person needs to have some level of justness, righteousness, or lawfulness. Otherwise it just won't work.

Some people are 90% just and 10% unjust. They might treat 9 people fairly, and treat 1 person unfairly. Some reasons they might give for this unfair treatment might be: race, background, ethnicity, belief system, bad mood, gender difference, or any difference for that matter. The point is, for the most part they treat people fairly, however there are exceptions, and you don't know when you will be that exception. 

Dealing with 100% just people is ideal, however if we offend those relationships, 99% trustworthy is our next best thing. 

Sometimes people get in the habit of feeling "holier than thou" or better than others. This is essentially burning the bridges with everyone except for the 100%. Though it's good to have confidence in what you want to achieve, it's not good to burn your bridges. As uncomfortable as 90% just is compared to 100% just, 90% just is still way better than nothing. 

This means we should never adopt a "holier than thou" attitude. Rather what Christ is trying to teach us is to always be building a backup plan. If there is an opportunity for trust, law, and relationship, we should accept it.

This is also why we shouldn't shun people who don't have our values, or rather, our level of law. These people are our backup plans, and to whatever extent is possible we should live law based relationships with them.

Now, in closing, I would add: In as much as a person is capable of living a law based relationship you should accept it, but don't confuse a 50% lawful relationship with a 100% one. Trust them in as much as they are trustworthy. If in the process of creating backup plans you find that a person isn't what you thought, you have every right to dumb down the relationship. What's important is that you don't burn good relationships because they are not perfect.