Luke 16:1–13
When I was little, I was obsessed with “The Borrowers” — a movie about a tiny family living under floorboards who survive by “borrowing” what humans won’t miss. Inspired, I began borrowing from my older sister. One T-shirt here. A sweatshirt there. The scrunchie she just got for Christmas? All fair game — as long as I returned things intact and unnoticed. I told myself I was living out the spirit of “The Borrowers” — taking what was “technically hers” and making it temporarily mine.
I thought I’d grow out of that habit. But the older I get, the more I see adulthood as an extended game of borrowing. A cup of sugar here. A line of credit there. Parenting advice that just went viral? All fair game. So much of adult life is about being someone who can be trusted to borrow — and better yet, to use what’s been borrowed for the good of others. In church language, that’s called “stewarding.”
That question — how to borrow well — also shaped the life of the Rev. Dr. Rachel Henderlite, the first woman ordained in the Presbyterian Church of the United States. Prior to her ordination, she taught at Montreat College, Charlotte Technical High School and Harding High School. After graduating from Yale Divinity School and then being ordained (1965), Henderlite taught at Austin Theological Seminary. Henderlite was the first woman to hold a full-time position at the seminary. She saw teaching as a sacred trust, something passed down and passed on. Through her borrowed gifts, others learned to live — really live — too.
I wonder if that’s what Jesus is getting at in Luke 16, one of his more perplexing parables.
A dishonest manager is about to be fired for taking what was “technically his boss’s” and making it permanently his (read: stealing). But then he repents — stewards what he’s stolen. Somehow, Jesus praises him — not for being right, but for trying to get it right.
Eugene Peterson paraphrases Jesus this way:
“Be smart in the same way — but for what is right … concentrate your attention on the bare essentials, so you’ll live, really live.”
Prayer:
Faithful God, teach us not to own more, but to borrow wisely. To live not for preservation, but for peace. Amen.
Nikki Zimmermann serves as pastoral resident at Covenant Presbyterian Church in Charlotte, North Carolina. This is her first call out of seminary that has been primarily focused on doing life alongside unhoused people in Charlotte.
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