Luke 16
The Dishonest Manager parable is addressed to the disciples and produces a sustained meditation on the relationship between material wealth and kingdom faithfulness. The shrewd manager who uses his last days of authority to create social obligations is commended for his shrewdness — not his dishonesty — and the disciples are instructed to use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings. The faithfulness-in-little principle governs the whole passage: trustworthiness in the small test of material wealth reveals the character that will be given true riches. The two-masters saying — you cannot serve both God and Money — is the summary. The Pharisees who love money sneer, provoking the response that what people value highly is detestable in God's sight. The Rich Man and Lazarus story is the chapter's culmination: the reversal of the Magnificat enacted — the rich man in torment, the poor man at Abraham's side — with the final word that those who do not listen to Moses and the Prophets will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.
Luke 16:9
I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings — use worldly wealth (tou mamōna tēs adikias, mammon of unrighteousness, unreliable wealth) to gain friends: the positive application of the manager's strategy. Money used to create relationships of generosity produces the welcome into eternal dwellings when the money is gone. The friends who welcome into eternal dwellings are those who have been served by the generous use of wealth.
Luke 16:10
Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much — the faithfulness-in-little principle: the character displayed in small responsibilities reveals the character that will operate in large responsibilities. Trustworthiness is not contextual but character — it doesn't vary with the size of the trust.
Luke 16:11
So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? — the progression from worldly wealth (unrighteous mammon) to true riches (the spiritual realities of the kingdom). Who will trust you with true riches: the faithfulness in material things is the criterion for receiving kingdom responsibilities.
Luke 16:12
And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else's property, who will give you property of your own? — the property-you-hold-in-trust (the material wealth that belongs ultimately to God) versus the property that will be genuinely yours (the eschatological inheritance). Faithfulness with the entrusted property is the condition for receiving one's own.
Luke 16:13
No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money — the two-masters principle: divided service is impossible. Hate/love and devoted/despise are not the emotions of the heart but the practical orientations of service — what one serves in practice defines what one loves. You cannot serve both God and Money (mamōna): the capital-M Money is the personified rival deity.