Will We Serve God or Mammon?

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus tells a puzzling parable. A rich man had a steward who was squandering his property. When the master discovered this, he demanded an account and dismissed him. Facing unemployment and desperation, the steward acted shrewdly: he reduced the debts of his master’s tenants so they might welcome him afterward. Surprisingly, the master commended the steward for his prudence, even though he had acted dishonestly.

Jesus uses this moment to make a striking point. If even a dishonest steward knows how to act decisively with what is passing away, how much more should the children of God act wisely with the gifts entrusted to them? He warns: “Whoever is trustworthy in small matters will be trustworthy in great ones.” But the teaching culminates with a clear challenge: “No one can serve two masters… You cannot serve both God and wealth.”

This call to prudence echoes the warnings of the prophet Amos. In his time, the wealthy often exploited the poor. Tenant farmers would borrow money simply to afford the sandals needed for harvest, pledging their children as collateral. When droughts came, the rich seized their children, buying a life for the price of sandals. Amos condemned such practices. The rich may not have broken the letter of the law, but they betrayed its spirit: the command to love God and neighbor. They adhered to the law in their external practices, but their true master was money, not the Lord.

Today, too, people are bought and sold. Not for sandals (Nike aside), but in sweatshops, exploitative labor, and even digital addictions that consume our attention and relationships. We commodify people in sex work, and the poor often bear the brunt of human trafficking. Amos’s warning has not gone away; it only wears a different face today.

Jesus, however, came for all, rich and poor alike. He poured out his life so that all might share in the true wealth of God’s grace. Though he was rich, he became poor for our sake (2 Corinthians 8:9). In his self-emptying, his kenosis, he relinquished every claim to worldly honor and wealth so that we might share in the riches of God’s grace. He shows us that freedom is found not in clinging to mammon but in entrusting everything to the Father.

The truth is, each of us is the steward in the parable. None of what we possess ultimately belongs to us. We are caretakers of God’s gifts. And like the steward, we will be called to give an account. The question is not whether we will serve, it is whom we will serve. Each day, in how we spend our time, use our money, or treat those around us, we answer that question.

Just like in the days of the prophets, going through the motions is not enough. Going to church is important. Receiving the sacraments is important. But if our hearts are attached to the wrong things, then that grace is not going to bear fruit in us. As Hosea warns, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge” (Hosea 4:6), and Isaiah echoes, “Therefore my people go into exile for lack of knowledge” (Isaiah 5:13).

Yet most of us are addicted to the things of this world. We prefer lesser goods over the greatest good, and too often we value possessions more than people. Jesus gives us a stark reminder: “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of heaven.”

So the choice lies before us: will we serve God, or mammon? And if we stumble, will we turn back to the One who emptied himself so that we could be truly filled?