Luke 16-18, Ecclesiastes 8

Let’s talk about two of today’s parables that are different from the others, because in them Jesus points to sinful men as examples of that which is good, which is confusing on the face of it, but let me explain. In the parable of the dishonest manager, his goal is to show his people how to think about wealth and earthly possessions: we are to use them to win favor with others while we still have them. In the parable of the persistent widow, God the Father is compared to an unjust judge. The goal, however, is to argue from the lesser to the greater. If an unjust judge will give justice through persistence, how much more so will the righteous judge grant justice to those who earnestly pray?