ISB ~ Luke 16 v8

his prudence:The master, although cheated by the debt reduction, commends the steward for his shrewdness. He recognizes that the steward’s last-minute efforts proved successful in winning the favor of the debtors and making his financial future more secure. The unjust strategy of the steward shows that he was motivated by an entirely selfish concern for his own temporal welfare. Jesus points to the steward as both an example and a warning. (1) As an example, the steward shows how to expend every effort in making use of our means to prepare for the future. Just as his cunning won him a comfortable living in the “houses” of his master’s debtors (16:4), so believers are challenged to make friends by almsgiving in order to be received into “eternal habitations” (16:9). (2) As a warning, the steward is intended to characterize the attitude of the Pharisees, who have been listening to Jesus since 15:2 and who are charged with being “lovers of money” in 16:14. It is implied that the Pharisees are despising God by their devotion to mammon, i.e., they seek not eternal riches but the esteem of men and the temporal comforts of this world (16:13).