Paying It Forward

Tomorrow's gospel lesson from Luke 16 is a challenge.
We're given the story of the property manager who is found to be not worthy of the job getting the ax and, as he's on the way out, he devises a plan to make good with those who owe his rich man boss jugs of olive oil and containers of wheat. He tells the debtors to reduce their bills by a certain amount and pay that lower bill. When the rich man finds out, he praises this guy for being shrewd.
I admit, it left me scratching my head. Searching various commentaries on the internet did nothing much to alleviate the confusion. Is Jesus saying the steward, the property manager, should be praised for figuring out how to make himself popular with those who owed a debt to the rich man by reducing their bills? Is Jesus saying cheating a rich man out of what is owed is OK? Am I being far too literal with this whole thing?
Time to put the brakes on. Take a breath. And remember what is true of all of Scripture: context, context, context. This story isn't happening in a vacuum. Preceding this parable are three others: the lost sheep, the lost coin, the lost son. In each case, the joy comes in the finding of the one that was not there as opposed to delighting over the ones that haven't gone missing. Jesus seems to be telling these stories in response to the criticisms of the Pharisees, who in Luke's gospel, are most concerned with money and sticking to the rules and not getting sullied by being around "those people."
This story of the unjust manager comes after the prodigal son and is directed to the disciples. At a critical place in the story, Jesus notes that the rich man praises the sacked manager for being shrewd by essentially deducting presumably his own wages from other people's bills... something that "the children of this age" are good at: acting shrewdly in their dealings with one another. That's something "the children of the light"(the followers of Christ) don't do well. The manager has done what he needed to do to preserve himself in this world. And I would say he did so in a way that, whether it occurred to him, gets him in the direction of eternal life. Rather than pocketing his commission, he has given it away, but not in wasteful or useless way: he has helped others by reducing their debt to the rich man. He evaluated his coming unemployment and made a choice to act in a way that would give him some friends to help him through this tough time ahead. Paying it forward. And, again, doing something that would irk the Pharisees of the Gospel of I Know What I'm Owed in the Here and Now.
For me, this ties back into the collect for Sunday:

Grant us, Lord, not to be anxious about earthly things, but to love things heavenly; and even now, while we are placed among things that are passing away, to hold fast to those that shall endure; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

I see in this lesson the call to us not to cling to money and make money the thing we worship as an idol. Money really is a tool, but is not "the thing" or should not be "the thing" of our lives. In many ways, I believe it is those of us who do not have a lot of money who perhaps have a closer understanding of this lesson. Seriously, if money was the Alpha and Omega then I'd be the one cast into the outer darkness!