Luke 15:1-3,11-32, 2 Corinthians 5:16-21, Psalm 32
In Chapter 15 of his gospel, Luke records three stories Jesus told of things lost and then found. Today we’re looking at the third story only, the one we know as the parable of ‘the Prodigal Son’. Helmut Thielicke renamed this one as the parable of ‘the Waiting Father’, which helps us to see it in a diferent light. The story is very simply told so we have to do the work of drawing meaning from it. Of course this means that we will get many meanings from it. We can identify with each of the characters and get a different message each time. But work we must for familiarity can dull our perceptions and cause us to miss the meaning. It’s a shocking story – at least it was for those Jesus told it to – completely counter-cultural and intentionally so.
Kenneth Bailey is an expert in Near East culture. He has pointed out that the father’s behaviour at the time would have seemed astounding. His son, by asking for his inheritance (Luke 15:12), was in effect saying, ‘I wish you were dead!’ Jesus’ hearers would have expected such gross disrespect to be severely punished, but instead the father agrees to his request.
When the son returns, smelly and ritually unclean from working with pigs (vs 15,16), he expects at best to be made a servant. Jesus’ hearers would expect the father to be terribly angry and punish the son most severely. But his behaviour is extraordinary! Every day, he is watching for his son’s return (v 20). On seeing him in the distance, he throws all dignity to the winds in a way quite inconceivable for a prosperous elderly man, and runs to embrace his smelly son. He interrupts his son’s words of repentance and quickly instructs the servants to bring the best robe, a ring (probably a signet ring, giving the son authority) and sandals (the mark of a son, not a servant). He tells the servants to prepare for a huge party!
What’s going on? Both Psalm 32 and 2 Corinthians 5 tell in more straighforward language of God’s bountiful love and grace. When we think of the cost of redemption we often think of Christ’s love. But the depth of God’s love includes the cost to God the Father when he ‘did not spare his own Son’ (Romans 8:32), but ‘made him who had no sin to be sin for us’ (2 Corinthians 5:21).
Jesus’ three stories tell of things that got lost and, after an intense search, were found. The first two both end with the news that there is more joy in heaven over one sinner that repents than over 99 people who don’t need to. Why does God seem to value the one ratbag over the 99 good guys?
Jesus’ answer to that was, ‘He was dead, and now he is alive. He was lost and is now found.’ Jesus told the story to explain why he ate “with sinners and tax collectors, with the despised, the grungy, and the uncouth. This is precisely where God’s heart is, with the lost and the dead.” Every person is precious to God even – or is it especially – those who are far from him.
“Does this mean that God is uninterested in the 99 who do the “right” thing? No, God cares for all of us deeply. God might say to us, “You are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this sister, this brother of yours was dead and has come to life!”
“But that’s the key. As long as the one is lost, the 99 are incomplete. As long as one of our sisters or brothers is broken by the world, cast aside as irrelevant, called a sinner by the rest of us, then we are at a loss, and God’s heart is broken. God will never stop reaching for the one because God’s love is too wide, God’s grace too rich to cease looking for the lost, for those whom we deem unredeemable.
“Jesus tells these parables in response to the righteous people’s offense at Jesus’ reaching out to the downtrodden. People of faith naturally don’t want to be lumped together with hypocrites whom Jesus rebukes; we would much rather see ourselves as the recipients of God’s ridiculous grace.
“However, we should recognize that more often than not we belong with the supposed righteous rather than the sinners of the world.” -Eric D. Baretto
We are so used to this story that we can fall to thinking that the father is obliged by his son’s repentance. While we are assured that God welcomes all who come to him he does so because he chooses too not because of anything we do.
Luke has seen to it that we get this. A little earlier – in chapter 12 – he recorded Jesus’ story of the rich fool (Luke 12:13-21) “This is a mirror image of the prodigal son. Here, too, a brother demands his share of the inheritance, but this time the answer is no. Here, too, there is an economic emergency, but this time the crisis is not famine but abundance. Again there is a festive party of eating and drinking, but this time the guest of honor is not a bankrupt son being embraced by a generous and joyful father but a rich fool who thinks he can throw a party for his own soul. In God’s economy you cannot throw your own party.
“When we treat the prodigal son as a comeback story, we miss the point. When we say, “Head home, God’s feast is waiting!” we misunderstand. It is not our remorse that forces God to set the banquet table; it is not our deep desire to start over again that leads God to roast the fatted calf. We cannot throw our own party. By all rights, this story ought to end with the younger son sweating in the furrows, eating in the slave quarters and spending his days serving his older brother. So if we prodigals see the father running in our direction with open arms, we should know in our souls that this as an event so unexpected, so undeserved, so out of joint with all that life should bring us, that we fall down in awe before this joyful mystery.
“A couple of men were out jogging together and talking as they ran. At the halfway point in their jog, they decided to phone ahead for a home-delivered pizza. As they headed for the pay phone, however, a homeless man approached them, asking for spare change. Each man reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of coins. “Here,” they said to the homeless man. “Take what you need.”
“The homeless man, hardly believing his good fortune, said, “I’ll take it all,” scooped the coins into his own hands, and went on his way.
“It only took a second for one of the men to realize that they now had no money for the pay phone. “Pardon me,” he beckoned to the homeless man. “I need to make a phone call. Can you spare some change?”
The homeless man turned and held out the two handfuls of coins. “Here,” he said. “Take what you need.”
“We are all homeless prodigals and beggars. So head home, but expect nothing. Be astonished beyond all measure when the dancing begins, the banquet table is set and the voice of God says, “Here. Take what you need.”” -Thomas G. Long, Candler School of Theology.
It should be clear that because of Jesus God is ready to love and welcome different and unexpected people as his friends. We can summarise 2 Corinthians 5:21 by saying that Jesus came to share fully in the life and death of ordinary people so that ordinary people (like us, like the tax collectors and drunkards and the Pharisees if they would accept him!) can become God’s friends by knowing and following Jesus.
A poem to go on with:
There was a time
long ago
when I made mistakes
with pencil and paper
and corrected them with an eraser
leaving grubby skid marks on the page.
Then there was white liquid
to paint over
to cover those mistakes
and start again.
Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven,
whose sin is covered
wrote the psalmist.
White-wash covered the blood-stains of sacrifice
in holy of holies
offered
for the sin of the people.
These days I have a Delete key.
One press
and those mistakes are gone –
as if they never were.
“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation:
everything old has passed away;
see, everything has become new.”
wrote Paul.
I still have need
of pencil and paper;
I still make mistakes
and there are still the tell-tale skid marks.
Occasionally
I need that white liquid
to cover my mistakes.
But I do like the Delete key:
a reminder
that God deals with our past
in a new way.
-Jeff Shrowder, 2013.