Steward

A steward in Scripture is a trusted household manager or servant entrusted with an owner’s property, authority, or task and accountable for managing it faithfully (Luke 12:42; 1 Corinthians 4:1–2; Titus 1:7). Linguistically, the Greek word behind “steward” in several of these texts is oikonomos, a term for a household administrator who manages what belongs to another. In these texts the steward is not the owner: the household, the mysteries, and the grace being managed are God’s or the lord’s (Luke 12:42; 1 Corinthians 4:1; Titus 1:7; 1 Peter 4:10).

Scripture states that faithfulness is the steward’s required virtue: “Here, moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful” (1 Corinthians 4:2). In the Gospels the pattern appears in parables of entrustment and return: the master says, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a few things, I will set you over many things” (Matthew 25:21,23), and the steward is the one “whom his lord will set over his household, to give them their portion of food at the right times” (Luke 12:42). Luke also places this service within watchfulness for the returning lord: “Blessed are those servants whom the lord will find watching when he comes” (Luke 12:37).

In the New Testament letters, stewardship names both apostolic and pastoral responsibility and the ordinary responsibility of every believer. Paul writes, “So let a man think of us as Christ’s servants and stewards of God’s mysteries” (1 Corinthians 4:1), and an overseer must be “blameless, as God’s steward” (Titus 1:7). Yet 1 Peter 4:10 addresses the whole community: “As each has received a gift, employ it in serving one another, as good managers of the grace of God in its various forms.” The Lukan teaching also sets stewardship under a contested lordship, where some say, “We don’t want this man to reign over us” (Luke 19:14), and the lord says, “But bring those enemies of mine who didn’t want me to reign over them here, and kill them before me” (Luke 19:27).

Christian traditions differ mainly in emphasis. Some read the steward texts primarily as a basis for ordained office and pastoral accountability, citing 1 Corinthians 4:1–2 and Titus 1:7; others emphasize the stewardship of every believer’s gifts and grace, citing 1 Peter 4:10. Both readings appeal to the same scriptural vocabulary, and the difference concerns ecclesial application and emphasis rather than the basic sense of the term.

AI-generated reference entry, grounded in the passages where this term appears — history and Scripture stated as such, interpretation labeled as interpretation. Not a substitute for the text itself.