Pastor Ronald Wesemann
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32, 3-14-10
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ
The story of Prodigal Son, as it is known by most of us, is
not so much a story about a young and foolish son who wastes his father’s
wealth and comes home, humbled and disgraced, or even about a self righteous
brother who gets ticked off by his brother’s return, as it is a story about a
father whose love transcends the sins of both of his sons.
Sin and justice are not the focus of the story; forgiveness
and love are the focus of the story.
In the beginning of the story the youngest son approached
his father with a request that he receive his portion of his father’s wealth, in
reality his inheritance; he wanted it then and there; he didn’t want to wait
until his father died. There is so much wrong with this request; first off it diminished
his father value as a human being, suggesting that any life that the father
still had remaining meant nothing at least to that youngest son. But more the
son had no respect for the work that went into the accumulation of the father’s
wealth, as evidenced by the cavalier way that he asked for it and then (of
course) the way that he went out and squandered it. This son was concerned only
for his own pleasure and the fulfillment of his own purposes.
The most positive thing that we can say about the youngest
son is that, when he lost all of his money, he made an effort to live out the
consequences of his wasteful and wanton life, even to the feeding of pigs. And
when he finally decided that he could do better by returning home to his father
as a servant, he went home intending to ask to be hired on a servant and was
willing to accept this (again this being the deserved consequence of his
foolish actions).
The older brother in the story was guilty of his own kind of
foolishness, including an over estimation of his own goodness. Yes, he was a
dutiful son who remained with his father and did the work expected of him. And
yes he had reason to be upset with his brother; his brother had left him with all
the work and had diminished the value of his father’s holdings and he had hurt
his father by his behavior. But, he was wrong to stay outside of the house making
it necessary for his father to come out to him and beg him to join the celebration;
he was wrong to disown his brother; he was wrong in that he did not give his
brother a chance upon his return to set things right; he was wrong not to
forgive.
(Forgive) This is where I lose people.
Most of you probably feel that the son, who remained with
his father, was perfectly justified in his actions. And so when you put yourselves in the place of this
brother you readily understand his refusal to forgive his brother and you
consider his anger towards both his brother justly deserved. We understand his
being aggravated by his father’s throwing a welcome home party for his
good-for-nothing brother.
Still, the heart of this story is about forgiveness and love;
the forgiveness and love that was demonstrated by the father. The father puts
himself out for both sons, going to both of his sons to attain reconciliation. The
father was willing to forgive his youngest son even though he had caused the
father great pain; not only was he willing to forgive him, he was excited and
happy that he had returned. In the words of Scripture: “But while he was still
far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his
arms around him and kissed him.” The son responded saying to his father the
words he had practiced all the way home, “Father I have sinned against heaven
and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” But his father’s
love was such that he did not need an apology; the father’s love was such that
he was not even considering making him a servant; the father’s love was such
that he had already forgiven him; the father’s love was such that he began
immediately calling upon his slaves to restore his son to his place in the
family by having them bring out to him the symbols of a man of worth, a robe,
sandals and a ring. In addition the father began giving instructions for a
feast of celebration, honoring the return of his youngest son who had been lost
to him and was now found.
As an individual and as one who has a brother I find it
difficult to understand the father’s willingness to forgive so quickly. I
wonder whether the father was guilty of enabling the wrong behavior of both of
his sons.
But as a father, and in a way as a pastor, I can, kind of
understand at least a little, the father’s willingness to forgive so quickly. We,
most of us, forgive our children much more readily than we do our siblings and
others.
Even still, father or not, I am not so sure that I could
forgive as readily as did the father in the parable. I would most likely wait
for them to come to me and then stand there waiting as they offered their well
rehearsed apologies, and then set some minor conditions for my forgiveness
before granting them forgiveness.
But then what we have is a parable, not a real life story.
What Jesus was trying to show was not so much what we should
do, as what God the Father does with his children.
God the Father had tried to relate to his people from a
perspective of justice and righteousness and a generation had to die in the
wilderness before the People of God could enter the Promised Land. God the
Father had tried to relate to his people from a perspective of justice and
righteousness and Israel was found wanting and justice required their defeat at
the hands of the Babylonians, many were killed and many were carried off into
bondage.
Justice strips us bare and requires that we all be punished.
If the father were to seek justice in this story the youngest son would have
been declared dead and sent away wanting and the older son would have been
judged for his greed, his lack of love and his failure to honor his father; he
too would deserve his father’s punishment.
Through Jesus we have come to know God the Father as a loving and forgiving God who looks past our
many sins and sees us, not as we are, but as Jesus is. We do not worship a god
of justice and righteousness and we should all be thankful for this. Such a god
we would not survive.
As the father in the parable reached out to his sons, even
before they repented, so God the Father, through Jesus, reaches out to us all
even before we repent. For this we rejoice; for this we give thanks.
