“Who among you would say to your servant who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep in the field, ‘Come here immediately and take your place at table’? ⁸ Would he not rather say to him, ‘Prepare something for me to eat. Put on your apron and wait on me while I eat and drink. You may eat and drink when I am finished’? ⁹ Is he grateful to that servant because he did what was commanded? ¹⁰ So should it be with you. When you have done all you have been commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we were obliged to do.’” (Luke 17)

This parable presents an opposite picture of the master and slaves given in Luke 12:37. There the master has been out traveling and when he returns home, he has the slaves sit down to eat and he serves them. There one hears the theme of the great reversals so prevalent in that portion of Luke. Here, Alan Culpepper expresses the meaning of this parable very succinctly: “The disciples can do what God requires – through faith – but disciples never do more than is required” (324).