Parable 11 - Parable of the Prodigal Son
Visit to Pasadena
• The year was 1973
• I had been accepted to college in England
• Decided to visit Bob in California on the way to England
• For 10 years I had been reading in a particular prophetic magazine about the imminent fall of the US
• The country was corrupt, crime was rampant, the threat of nuclear war hung over the nation, it’s farmlands were about to be overrun by locusts, it was about to be engulfed in racial wars – in short, it was under God’s curse
• Arrived in LA, got off the bus at the Pasadena Hilton about seven or eight blocks from the campus
• Bob was supposed to meet me, but he was a no-show
• Asked where the college was and started heading off loaded down with all my earthly goods and chattels in one of the old family suitcases, didn’t have wheels in those days
• Any moment I expected to be mugged even though it was about 2:00pm in the afternoon
• I heard what sounded like a gun shot and this only confirmed what I had read in the PT. I picked up the pace
• Fortunately I was saved as Bob showed up coming the other direction
• Later I spent 10 years living in the US and learnt to love the country and its people, even married one of them
• I also learnt that the impression I had been led to believe about the US were completely out of sync with reality
• The true reality was, its easy to be hoodwinked into believing a lie
Today we are going to look at another of Jesus’ parables – The Parable of the Prodigal Son
• And the question this parable poses to us is, “What is your impression of God the Father?”
• The Israelites had an impression of the Father – “Moses, you speak to Him, He too scary for us!”
• The Pharisees had there impression of God, they wanted Him to crush the occupying Romans – riding into Jerusalem on a white steed rather than a humble donkey
• The disciples too had their concept of the Father, “Should we call fire down from heaven and take care of this disrespectful Samaritan rabble”
• Even the theology that developed over the centuries after Jesus came to reveal the Father cast the Father in non flattering terms
• Augustine – forensic or legal concept of God - it was like a good cop, bad cop routine – Jesus was the good cop, the Father, the bad cop
• Thomas Aquinas – Enlightnment – get to know God through reason
• All of these approaches had one major flaw – each of them started with from the perspective of man
• and by so doing we created a God in OUR image
• It is only recently that theologians like Karl Barth have gone back to Jesus’ statement, “If you have seen me you have seen the Father”
• There is no “good cop, bad cop” routine, Jesus and the Father are One
• Jesus’ main point in telling this parable was to correct the Jews impression of the true nature of the Father
In reality this Parable tells us more about the Father than it does the son
• A better name for the parable would be, “The Parable of the Prodigal’s Loving Father”
• Part of Jesus’ mission was to correct the misconceptions of the true nature of God the Father
Couple of comments about this parable.
First, It is a microcosm of the greater story of the relationship between God and mankind
• The Father had created the perfect environment in Eden for mankind to relate to Him in love and communion, yet we rejected His overtures and His love
Yet this God we rejected welcomes us back with open arms
Second, this is just one of Jesus’ several parables of Grace that drives religious people crazy as it demonstrates just how unfair grace is
• The grace of God is indiscriminate and that’s what makes it so unfair as it is dispensed to both the good and the bad
• It drives religionists and those who have a “works” mentality crazy
• The reality is there is no good and bad, we are all bad and in need of God’s grace
Here is the preamble to the Story
Luke 15:1-32 (NLT)
• Tax collectors and other notorious sinners often came to listen to Jesus teach. 2 This made the Pharisees and teachers of religious law complain that he was associating with such despicable people—even eating with them!
• What was it that drove the religious people crazy? His preoccupation with the lost and sinners
• 3 So Jesus used this illustration: 4 “If you had one hundred sheep, and one of them strayed away and was lost in the wilderness, wouldn’t you leave the ninety-nine others to go and search for the lost one until you found it? 5 And then you would joyfully carry it home on your shoulders. 6 When you arrived, you would call together your friends and neighbors to rejoice with you because your lost sheep was found. 7 In the same way, heaven will be happier over one lost sinner who returns to God than over ninety-nine others who are righteous and haven’t strayed away!
Where was the good shepherds emphasis? On the 99 in church or the lost sinner?
Its as if the 99 are incidental to the story
The lesson of the this parable and the two that follow is the Shepherds attitude towards the “lost”
Story of the Lost Coin
• 8 “Or suppose a woman has ten valuable silver coins and loses one. Won’t she light a lamp and look in every corner of the house and sweep every nook and cranny until she finds it? 9 And when she finds it, she will call in her friends and neighbors to rejoice with her because she has found her lost coin. 10 In the same way, there is joy in the presence of God’s angels when even one sinner repents.”
Where was the emphasis? On the lost. The other nine coins are almost incidental
Again, the emphasis is on the attitude of the women towards what was lost
So we need to approach the parable the Prodigal the same way, with the emphasis on the attitude of the Father towards the “lost”
Story of the Lost Son
• 11 To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. 12 The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now, instead of waiting until you die.’
In other words, “Dad, I wish you were dead, that way I can party and do what I like”
Very similar to what Adam and Eve told God
• So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons. 13 “A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and took a trip to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money on wild living. 14 About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. 15 He persuaded a local farmer to hire him to feed his pigs. 16 The boy became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.
• Found out, life wasn’t all it was cracked up to be without the involvement of the Father
• Precisely the message the mankind has learned down through the ages – life without God is hell
• 17 “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired men have food enough to spare, and here I am, dying of hunger!
• Sin is painful, but that is the point. It is designed to bring us back into a relationship with the Father as in this case
• 18 I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, 19 and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired man.” ’20 “So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long distance away, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him.
• If the Father was the mean hombre the Israelites and the Pharisees envisioned Him to be, this would not have been the result
• In fact, this behaviour is totally foreign to human behaviour – this was a divine act
• A human reaction would have been more like, “What a nerve you have to come back here after all you’ve done to our family”
• 21 His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.*’ 22 “But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger, and sandals for his feet. 23 And kill the calf we have been fattening in the pen. We must celebrate with a feast, 24 for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began.
• Jesus is revealing the true nature of the Father. He is as gracious, compassionate and kind as Jesus is…in reality they are One
• The great heresy in the “Good cop, Bad Cop” routine is that it separates the unity of the Trinity
• The Father is just as involved in the redemption of mankind as Jesus is. The Father was right there in Jesus as part of the incarnation. All that Jesus experienced, the Father experienced
• ’The Son can do nothing of Himself, but only what He sees the Father doing; for whatever he does, that the Son does likewise.’ (John 5:19)
• Another irony of the story is that everything the Prodigal left home for, the music and dancing, feasting and laughter, friendship and happiness, wealth, security was right there at home all along
However, lurking in the shadows of this extravagant display of grace is a party pooper
• He’s been going to church every Sunday, he’s faithfully paid his tithes, he’s been the loyal son slaving around the farm
• 25 “Meanwhile, the older son was in the fields working. When he returned home, he heard music and dancing in the house, 26 and he asked one of the servants what was going on. 27 ‘Your brother is back,’ he was told, ‘and your father has killed the calf we were fattening and has prepared a great feast. We are celebrating because of his safe return.’ 28 “The older brother was angry and wouldn’t go in. His father came out and begged him, 29 but he replied,
• Oh, Oh, here comes the list of sacrifices I’ve made for you over the years
• ‘All these years I’ve worked hard for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to. And in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends. 30 Yet when this son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the finest calf we have.’
• The obscenity of grace is that it is so unfair
• But it is only unfair to those who are playing a game of keeping score
• Problem is, it’s not the game God is playing
• In fact, as we will see later on in some of Jesus’ other parables, those who play this game are the ones who risk losing everything
31 “His father said to him, ‘Look, dear son, you and I are very close, and everything I have is yours. 32 We had to celebrate this happy day. For your brother was dead and has come back to life! He was lost, but now he is found!’ ”
• The game God is playing is saving the lost, not keeping score of good and bad.
• The reality is, all of God’s children need saving from sin and we cannot contribute anything to the process
• And to think we can is delusional. It is really saying, Christ’s sacrifice was not enough
• So not only do we have a wrong concept of God and of His grace, we are also devaluating Christ’s sacrifice
So in closing, let’s draw some conclusions
1) The father and Jesus are One
• How Jesus thinks, What Jesus says, and How Jesus acts is identical to the Father
• There is no “good cop”, “bad cop” routine going on here
• If you have seen me you have seen the Father” John 14:9
• The game they are playing is saving the lost, not keeping score of good and bad deeds
2) The Father Jesus reveals is a loving compassionate God who goes to extraordinary lengths to save His disobedient children
• People misunderstand the anger of God
• They think it is directed at them
• Rather it is directed at the evil one, His anger is a defiant “No” to losing any of his children – “I am not going to allow this to happen to my children despite their rebellion!”
• It is going to cost me dearly, but I will not forsake my children and lose them to sin
• He doesn’t like it when we sin any more than we as parents like it when our children disobey us
• But He will not be distracted – “nothing, no nothing, shall separate us from the love of God” Rom 8
3) Grace will drive you crazy if you are in the game of keeping score
• Like the elder brother, we will completely miss the point of the true nature of God if we think our good behaviour can contribute anything to the process of salvation
• The reality is we are all lost and need the good shepherd to find us and clean us up
• And when he does, He welcomes us back with open arms and throws a big party
