The Faithful and Wise Steward

The danger to most Catholics’ faith is quiet. We allow ourselves to drift. We tell ourselves there will be time later for confession, for the phone call to the brother we haven’t spoken to in years, for the prayer life we keep meaning to start. Then somewhere along the way we begin to treat what we’ve been given as simply ours: our time, our money, our children, even our faith. We hold it like private property and spend it on our own terms. Nobody announces the shift. It happens the way rust happens: slowly with time until what we started with is almost unrecognizable. Underneath it sits an assumption we would never say out loud: the Master is slow, nobody is checking, and whatever is in my hands belongs to me.

Today’s Gospel puts that assumption into words. Jesus tells of a steward, a slave put in charge of his master’s household, who says to himself, “My master is delayed in coming,” and starts beating the other servants and drinking himself senseless. Peter interrupts with the question many of us would like to ask: “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for all?” Paul, writing from a prison cell, provides a succinct answer to the question Peter asks. He calls his whole apostolate “the stewardship of God’s grace that was given to me for you,” and he calls himself “the very least of all the saints.”

Today we remember Saint Hilarion, the fourth-century monk of Palestine who spent his life trying to slip away from the crowds who kept finding him. He died on Cyprus telling his own soul not to be afraid. These readings press one question on you and me: are we living as owners of what we hold, or as stewards who wait up for the One who entrusted it to us?

The Readings

First Reading: Ephesians 3:2-12

assuming that you have heard of the stewardship of God’s grace that was given to me for you, how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I have written briefly. When you read this you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit; that is, how the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.

Of this gospel I was made a minister according to the gift of God’s grace which was given me by the working of his power. To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all men see what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things; that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places. This was according to the eternal purpose which he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and confidence of access through our faith in him.

Gospel: Luke 12:39-48

“But know this, that if the householder had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would have been awake and would not have left his house to be broken into. You also must be ready; for the Son of man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”

Peter said, “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for all?” And the Lord said, “Who then is the faithful and wise steward, whom his master will set over his household, to give them their portion of food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master when he comes will find so doing. Truly, I tell you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that servant says to himself, ‘My master is delayed in coming,’ and begins to beat the menservants and the maidservants, and to eat and drink and get drunk, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know, and will punish him, and put him with the unfaithful. And that servant who knew his master’s will, but did not make ready or act according to his will, shall receive a severe beating. But he who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, shall receive a light beating. Every one to whom much is given, of him will much be required; and of him to whom men commit much they will demand the more.”

Scriptural Analysis

Paul begins today’s reading in the middle of a sentence. He has just started to pray, “For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles” (Ephesians 3:1), and he breaks off to explain himself. Peter Williamson notes that many of Paul’s readers were new Gentile converts who would have had questions: why is the apostle in chains, and what exactly is his role? Paul answers with a word borrowed from running a household. He supposes they have heard of “the stewardship of God’s grace that was given to me for you.” The Greek is oikonomia (oy-koh-noh-MEE-ah), and Williamson explains that it “means management or administration.” The translation fits, he says, “since Paul refers to something that is not his but has been entrusted to him, namely, God’s grace.” What Paul manages is a “mystery,” mystērion (moos-TAY-ree-on), which Williamson defines as “God’s previously hidden plan of salvation that has now been revealed through the coming of Christ and the gospel.”¹

So what is the secret? “That the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” Williamson points out that in Greek all three terms begin with the same prefix, syn- (SOON), “with,” so the Gentiles are co-heirs, co-members and co-partners. Margaret MacDonald adds that the middle word, syssōmos (soos-SOH-mos), “co-member of the body,” appears nowhere else in ancient literature and seems to have been coined to name something new. Williamson reminds us how new it was. For the nineteen centuries between Abraham and Christ, only the Jewish people had been heirs of God’s promises, and those promises set them apart from every other nation (Deuteronomy 7:6-7).²

Then Paul describes his own part. “Of this gospel I was made a minister.” The word used here is diakonos (dee-AH-koh-nos), servant. Williamson notes that in the New Testament it can refer to the office of deacon or to other kinds of service, and that Paul calls his ministry both a gift of grace and an exercise of God’s power: “Genuine ministry in the Church is never an activity accomplished simply by human intelligence and effort; it requires God’s action if it is to do any lasting good.” Then comes a startling phrase: “To me, though I am the very least of all the saints.” The Greek elachistoteros (eh-lah-khis-TOH-teh-ros) is a comparative built on a superlative, something like “leaster than the least,” and MacDonald says the term “implies great emphasis.” The man entrusted with the mystery for the nations ranks himself below every believer in the pew. And what he hands out are “the unsearchable riches of Christ,” which Williamson reads as “a treasure without limits.”³

Paul’s stewardship has an audience beyond the human one. Through the Church, “the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places.” MacDonald notes that polypoikilos (po-lee-POY-kee-los), “manifold,” means literally “many-sided” or “many-colored.” Williamson thinks the powers here include the hostile spiritual forces Paul will tell us to stand against in chapter 6 (Ephesians 6:12), and he says they learn God’s plan “by counting their losses as they watch the Church grow through the preaching of the gospel.” Every Gentile baptized in Ephesus was one more loss for them.⁴

We turn now to the Gospel. Jesus has just told his disciples to keep their lamps burning and wait up for the master (Luke 12:35-38), and he adds a second picture: “if the householder had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would have been awake.” Pablo Gadenz points out the reversal hiding in it: the Son of Man himself is cast as the thief, and the owner of the house doesn’t know his hour.⁵

Peter asks, “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for all?” Luke Timothy Johnson notes that the question appears only in Luke’s Gospel, and that it turns the following parable toward the future leaders of God’s people. Jesus answers with a question of his own: “Who then is the faithful and wise steward?” Gadenz calls this “an indirect way of saying that he is especially addressing Peter and the Twelve.” Theophylact, in the Catena Aurea (kah-TAY-nah OW-ray-ah) of Saint Thomas, sees the same thing: Peter asks as the one “to whom the Church had already been committed.”⁶

The steward is an oikonomos (oy-KOH-noh-mos), the same family of words Paul used for his own commission. Johnson explains that this household manager was himself a slave, a doulos (DOO-los), like the servants he oversaw, and “equally subject to the authority of the master.” His job is to give the household “their portion of food at the proper time.” Gadenz notes that the Greek literally means a “measure of grain,” and he recalls Joseph, the wise servant Pharaoh set over Egypt, who stored up grain and handed out rations in the famine (Genesis 41:41, 49, 56). The steward stands in contrast to the rich fool of a few verses earlier, who kept his grain for himself (Luke 12:18). Spiritually, Gadenz says, the task means “nourishing the faithful in a fitting way with the word” and “with the Eucharist.” Theophylact says the steward feeds the household with “either the word of doctrine by which their souls are fed, or the example of works by which their life is fashioned.” And Isidore of Pelusium explains why the timing matters: “a benefit not conferred at its proper time is rendered vain.”⁷

Then the bad steward. He says in his heart, “My master is delayed in coming,” and starts to beat the menservants and maidservants and to “eat and drink and get drunk.” Gadenz and Johnson both notice that he eats and drinks like the rich fool (Luke 12:19), and Johnson observes that the beating comes before the drinking, “so there is no excuse for the arrogance and cruelty.” The penalty sounds brutal; the master will literally “cut him in two.” Johnson argues that the next phrase shows this is a picture of rejection, since the man’s portion is put “with the unfaithful,” and the unfaithful, apistos (AH-pis-tos), is the exact opposite of the “faithful,” pistos (pis-TOS), steward of verse 42. Saint Bede notices what Jesus counts as the bad servant’s vice: he “thought the coming of his Lord slow.” Then Bede adds, “it is not numbered among the virtues of the good that he hoped it would come quickly, but only that he ministered faithfully.”⁸

The last two verses set degrees of responsibility. The servant who knew his master’s will and ignored it is beaten severely, and the one who didn’t know is beaten lightly. Gadenz says the punishment fits the culpability (Numbers 15:27-30), and he applies the warning first to Church leaders, quoting Saint Augustine to his own congregation: “I’m terrified by what I am for you, [but] I am given comfort by what I am with you. For you I am a bishop, with you … I am a Christian.” Johnson notes that the steward answered to two parties at once, his master and his fellow slaves: “He could not be faithful to one while being abusive to the other.” And he sums up the parable in one line: “the greater the gift given, the greater the responsibility and the greater the judgment.”⁹

Put the readings side by side, and the shared word does the work. Paul received an oikonomia; Jesus describes an oikonomos. Paul is the faithful and wise steward of the parable in the flesh. He knows the grace was “given to me for you.” He ranks himself the least of all the saints. He hands out riches he could never exhaust, and when the bill comes due in chains, he tells the Gentiles that what he suffers for them “is your glory” (Ephesians 3:13). Gadenz points to the standard Paul set for himself and Apollos as “stewards of the mysteries of God”: “it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy” (1 Corinthians 4:1-2). Peter’s question gets its full answer in the Catechism, which teaches that God distributes his gifts unequally so that “those endowed with particular ‘talents’ share the benefits with those who need them,” and which quotes the Father speaking to Saint Catherine of Siena: “I have willed that one should need another and that all should be my ministers in distributing the graces and gifts they have received from me.”¹⁰

Daily Application

Peter’s question is our question as well. When we hear about stewards, we think first of bishops and pastors. The parable does weigh hardest on them, and Augustine trembled at that thought. However, the Catechism widens the circle and makes every one of us a minister of what God has given us. The interior movement these readings ask for is a change of title, from owner to steward.

An owner asks what he wants to do with what he has. A steward asks for whose benefit it was entrusted to him. Paul’s answer to that question is “for you.” So name the household you’ve been set over. It might be a spouse and children, aging parents, the people on your team at work, the confirmation student you sponsor, or the widowed neighbor who has no one else. Then ask Jesus’ question about each of them: am I giving them their portion of food at the proper time? Sometimes the portion is literal, dinner on the table or a gift to the parish food pantry. Sometimes it’s a word: the apology you owe, the encouragement a discouraged coworker needs this week. Isidore is blunt about timing. A kindness that arrives too late loses its worth.

Then listen for the sentence the bad steward says in his heart: “My master is delayed.” We say it when we postpone confession for another month, with a prayer we push off until things calm down, with a short temper toward the people in our care because we’re tired and nobody is watching. Johnson’s observation stings: the cruelty came first, and the drinking came after. Neglect of God and mistreatment of the people he entrusted to us travel together. Bede’s remedy is freeing. What Jesus praises in the good servant is faithful ministry, so keep faith with today’s work and leave the hour to him.

Saint Hilarion knew how heavy the gift can feel. Franciscan Media tells how people were drawn to him “as a source of spiritual wisdom and peace,” so many that he kept moving to escape them, until he settled on Cyprus. He had learned the desert life alongside Saint Anthony of Egypt, and he knew spiritual dryness and “temptations to despair.” Saint Jerome, who wrote his life, tells how he died at about 80, his body nearly cold, repeating, “Go forth, what do you fear? Go forth, my soul, why do you hesitate? You have served Christ nearly seventy years, and do you fear death?”¹¹ That is a servant his master found at work. After seventy years, he still had to talk his soul through the door, and seventy years of faithful service gave him the words to do it.

You are a steward of God’s grace, given to you for others. Feed the household he has set you over, today and at the proper time, and let him find you doing it when he comes.

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Notes

1. ↑ Peter S. Williamson, Ephesians, Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2009), 85-86.
2. ↑ Williamson, Ephesians, 88-89; Margaret Y. MacDonald, Colossians and Ephesians, Sacra Pagina 17 (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2000), 263-264.
3. ↑ Williamson, Ephesians, 91; MacDonald, Colossians and Ephesians, 264-265.
4. ↑ MacDonald, Colossians and Ephesians, 266; Williamson, Ephesians, 92-93.
5. ↑ Pablo T. Gadenz, The Gospel of Luke, Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2018), 244.
6. ↑ Luke Timothy Johnson, The Gospel of Luke, Sacra Pagina 3 (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1991), 204; Gadenz, Gospel of Luke, 245; Theophylact, quoted in Thomas Aquinas, Catena Aurea: Commentary on the Four Gospels, Collected out of the Works of the Fathers, vol. 3, St. Luke (Oxford: John Henry Parker, 1843), on Luke 12:41-46.
7. ↑ Johnson, Gospel of Luke, 204; Gadenz, Gospel of Luke, 245; Theophylact and Isidore of Pelusium, quoted in Aquinas, Catena Aurea, vol. 3, St. Luke, on Luke 12:41-46.
8. ↑ Gadenz, Gospel of Luke, 245; Johnson, Gospel of Luke, 204-205; Saint Bede, quoted in Aquinas, Catena Aurea, vol. 3, St. Luke, on Luke 12:41-46.
9. ↑ Gadenz, Gospel of Luke, 246, quoting Saint Augustine, Sermon 340.1, trans. Edmund Hill; Johnson, Gospel of Luke, 206.
10. ↑ Gadenz, Gospel of Luke, 245; Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1997), no. 1937.
11. ↑ “Saint Hilarion,” Saint of the Day, Franciscan Media, accessed October 17, 2026, franciscanmedia.org; Saint Jerome, Life of Saint Hilarion 45, in New Advent, newadvent.org.

Books Cited

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• Peter S. Williamson, Ephesians, Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture (Baker Academic, 2009)
• Pablo T. Gadenz, The Gospel of Luke, Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture (Baker Academic, 2018)
• Luke Timothy Johnson, The Gospel of Luke, Sacra Pagina 3 (Liturgical Press, 1991)
• Thomas Aquinas, Catena Aurea: Commentary on the Four Gospels, 4 vols. (Baronius Press)
• Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (Doubleday / Image)