Series: Lost
Message: Who’s Missing?
Texts: Luke 15:25-32
Date: August 14
Pastor: Dave McBeath
OFFERING/VIDEO
As the ushers come forward we are going to continue our time of worship with an offering. This is an opportunity for those of us who are Christ followers to show God our appreciation for everything he has provided for us, by giving a little back to him! If you are a guest, please don’t feel as though you have to participate. And while the ushers are facilitating this act of worship, take a look at this video. It is called “The Other Brother” and introduces my message this morning.
INTRODUCTION
Like this Older Brother, don’t most Christians ask the question, “Doesn’t It Matter?” Doesn’t it matter what “sinners” do? It’s a question asked especially by those of us who are 2nd generation Christians, who have grown up in the church doing everything we are supposed to do. It’s hard for most Christians, at least those who have been Christians for many years, not to have this question, isn’t it! It’s hard to encourage “sinners” to come home and not make them pay for what they’ve done. It’s especially hard if that “sinner” hurt us personally? I mean, doesn’t it matter that they hurt me? Shouldn’t they have to make it right? And if they’ve hurt God and/or the church, shouldn’t that matter? Shouldn’t we make them repent! Shouldn’t we be mad? Shouldn’t they pay something? Shouldn’t they make restitution?
Why is it so easy to feel this way? It’s hard to forgive someone and continue a relationship with them when we’ve been hurt by that person. Yeah, we say we forgive. But do we? How many times does our demeanor become cold toward the person that hurt us? How many times to we allow ourselves to drift away from that person and find someone else to spend our time with. Or, many times, do we harbor scornful, judgmental and belittling thoughts toward the person that wronged us?
Unlike the father who ran toward his “sinning” son, many times we just stand on the porch, so to speak, and disengage in our relationship with the person that hurt us. We stand there and stew on how we’ve been hurt. We stand there and allow our judgmental spirit to run the tape of how that person wronged us, …over and over again in our minds, …until we feel the need to make them pay for what they did. Anybody been there? Done that? Are you doing it now?
Like the Older Brother, we constantly ask the question, “Doesn’t it matter?” The Bible explains why we continually ask this question and it has to do with the fact that someone is missing! Let’s look at Luke 15:25-32 and see who is missing. If you are able would you stand in honor to God’s Word as I read?
"“Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing. So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. ‘Your brother has come,’ he replied, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’ “The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’ “‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’”"
A FREE RIDE
The older brother, like us, asks his Dad, “Why the party? Doesn’t it matter what your son did?” Why does the older brother do this? Why do we do this? Let’s consider the story the Jesus is telling. Remember, the younger son demanded his share of his Dad’s stuff. His demand meant he wants his Dad dead. He liquidated his Dad’s property at a bargain basement price and went off to a Gentile country to make a name for himself. He had a free ride while he is in this far country where he squandered his money with expensive living!
What did it cost the younger brother to come home after he did all of this? Nothing! It cost him absolutely nothing! There is no punishment! He is immediately let back into the family. His father runs to him, opens his arms and hugs the boy kissing him incessantly. Then, his Father clothes him in the finest robes, throws him and expensive party with paid musicians and the finest delicacies to eat! And it’s all fee! FREE!!! It’s grace! Because, he didn’t deserve it! This was good news for this sinful young boy!!! The boy has had a free ride and continues to receive a free ride! Yes!
It was Good News for the younger son, but what about the older brother, who stayed home and worked the family estate day in and day out doing everything he was supposed to do? What about those of us “Older Christians”, 2’nd generation Christians who have grown up in the church and attended week in and week out, who have volunteered on a regular basis, and who have regularly given our money to the church? We don’t get a free ride. We’ve done what were supposed to do….
I
sn’t there something about a free ride that irks most of us! Deep down, we don’t like it when people get handouts, do we? Especially, Us Older Brother types, we earn what we get! And we want to earn it!
This free ride business goes against everything we’ve learned! Good reputable members of society or Good reputable members of the church know there are no free rides! Somebody has to pay for the roof and the electricity? Somebody has to commit, stay around and do ministry, I mean our worship doesn’t just happen, does it Barb? There is a lot of hard work that goes into it, right? If you ask Alyssa Boyles, you’ll find out Camp Hope doesn’t just happen. So, why should there be a free ride?
You earn what you get, right? I mean you don’t get a raise unless you do good work! Your boss doesn’t say, “Dave, you’ve done an awful job! …But here’s a 5k raise for next year.” My parents didn’t say, “Dave, you got F on your report card.” Let me throw you a party! …Did yours? Virginia, when we go to TOPPS Supermarket the cashiers are not trained to say, “Money? Don’t worry about no stinking money.” Are they?
This free ride thing goes against everything we’ve learned in our society? Everything is based on the economic exchange model. I will do this if you do that! Or I will give you this if you give me that. Even our relationships are steeped in the cultural conditioning. Is it any wonder we ask, “Doesn’t it Matter What He or She Did?” It seems everything in our society is based on what we do! Isn’t this why we feel upset when people get a free ride? Don’t we learn early on there are no free rides?
But you know what? It wasn’t any different in Jesus’ day! Was it? The Older Brother is livid about the Father giving his brother a free ride! That’s why he refuses to go into the Feast! That is why he complains, “You never even gave me a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. But you killed the fattened calf for him!”
[
PAUSE] The older brother isn’t upset because his younger brother has received a free ride and been reconciled to the family. He is upset because of the cost of reconciliation. He is especially upset because of the cost to him! [REPEAT}
THE COST OF RECONCILIATION
It cost a lot to reconcile the prodigal to the father. I’ve talked about this in other sermons so I will just highlight it here. There was an economic cost and a social cost. Let’s start with the economic cost. The father lost 1/3 of his wealth. He just gave it to his younger son. Next, there is the social cost of reconciliation. The father loses face in his village. It was shameful for his young son to demand his share of the inheritance, and it brought shame on the whole family in this village.
Nonetheless, the father brings more shame on himself, the older son and the family when he runs after this sinful, disrespectful, younger son, like a little boy not the dignified patriarch he is. He exposes his legs and causes the whole village to look at him instead of his sinful younger son! We can’t begin to understand the extent of the social cost this act had on the family!
It cost a lot for the younger son to be reconciled to the Father, but the cost wasn’t just to the father. It cost the older son as well! It cost him socially and economically. Just think about it, the older son was from “THAT family! YOU KNOW THE ONE!! The one where the Dad let’s people walk all over him!” the townspeople would mutter under their breath. They wondered if his Dad had any self-respect. “No self-respecting Father would let his younger son do that to him,” they would say!
As a result of what the father and the prodigal did, the older son’s social standing in the village was in the toilet! I bet the older son had had enough of this! If his dad wasn’t going to respect himself or the family—he would! At least that is what the older son told himself.
It cost the older son financially as well. Legally everything that the Father had was his when his dad died! Everything! When the father kills the fattened calf—it was the older brothers. When the father gives the prodigal a fine robe and sandals, they were the older brothers. His dad even gives the younger son the family signet ring. In other words he gives this disrespectful, sinful, no good, brother the right to enter into contracts for the family. The older son has to be worried. If his brother would waste his 1/3 of the estate, what could he do with the 2/3 that is left! … Christians do you think we ever feel this way about “sinners” when they start to get involved in the church, God’s family?
The prodigal Son’s return costs his older brother dearly! Tim Keller states that the father cannot forgive the younger, sinful, brother, except at the expense of the older brother. It is the older brother that has to bear the cost of reconciliation!
So part of the reason we ask the question, “Doesn’t it matter what this or that sinful person did to us?” is because what they did to us costs us dearly as older brothers. …The father was willing to absorb the cost. Many times older brothers are not. But there is another reason we ask this question. And it has to do with who is missing from this story! So who’s missing? Let’s take a look!
WHO’S MISSING?
To answer this question we need to put the parable in context. Remember, the religious people (the Pharisees) were mumbling and complaining that Jesus hangs out and eats with sinners or younger brother types. In response to this complaint, Jesus told his listeners 3 parables—The Parable of the Lost Sheep, The Parable of the Lost Coin, and the Parable of the Lost Son. Let’s review the other two.
In each of the other two parables an object is lost and someone goes out, searches for it, finds it, and brings it home with joy or a celebration! The shepherd searches until he finds the lost sheep. The woman searches until she finds the lost coin. …Now when we get to the parable of the lost son, who is missing?....
After the first 2 parables we and Christ’s audience would have been surprised that no one is looking or searching for the lost son! No one! The searcher is missing! Jesus set up his audience to expect someone to look for the lost son and when his story doesn’t contain this someone, his audience is forced to ask the question, “Who’s missing.”
Who should have been searching for the lost son? Again we can answer this question by asking, “Who’s missing?” So let me ask, who is missing from the house and in the field? The Older Brother is missing. Who is missing from the feast? The Older brother is missing. Who is missing from the Father—far from him but close by? The Older Brother!
“Who’s missing?” The answer would have been crystal clear to 1st century ears. The Older Brother, he should have been the searcher in the story Jesus is telling! Tim Keller suggests the older son had a responsibility to the family to reconcile his young brother with their Father and the family and this is why the oldest son gets the lion’s share of the estate. It was his job to sustain the family unity and the family’s reputation in the community. New Testament scholar and missionary to the middle east Ken Bailey writes:
The older son refuses to be the mediator… In the villages when I come to this point in the sermon on this text, I always ask, “Who must be the reconciler?” The villagers always answer, “His Brother of course.” Everybody knows this. Furthermore, he must start immediately. It is up to him to step in at once and try to reconcile his brother to his father. The family and community demand it. But our man is silent. He refuses to fulfill the sacred responsibility that village custom places on his shoulders…If he hated his brother, he would still fulfill this task for the sake of the father.
Tim Keller writes:
“The older son should have said something like this: ‘Father, my younger brother has been a fool and now his life is in ruins. But I will go look for him and bring him home. And if the inheritance is gone—as I suspect—I will bring him back into the family at my expense.”’
Christians we are older brothers and this is our responsibility too!
A REAL OLDER BROTHER
Why is the searcher, the Older Brother missing from Jesus’ parable? Why doesn’t Jesus make the older brother the hero of the story like he’s supposed to be? Why does the father and younger son have to deal with an obstinate, headstrong, self-righteous older brother? There are two reasons: 1. To make us long for a real older brother and 2. To help us become true older brothers. {Repeat}
Don’t we long for people to be a true or real older brother to us? How many times do we mess up, go astray and hurt the people we love? When we do, don’t we want an older brother who won’t hold this against us? Don’t we want an older brother that will seek to bring us back at any risk and cost to him or herself? We don’t want them to give us a cold shoulder. We don’t want them to drift away from us. We don’t want them to run the tape of how we hurt them over and over again in their head until they feel as though they have to make us pay for what we did. We want a true, a real older brother!
When we long for this, we long for Jesus! He is the elder brother we need. He didn’t just go to a far off country but came all the way from heaven to earth to find us! He didn’t pay a finite cost. He paid an infinite cost. The infinite God, Jesus Christ, died for us to bring us back into God’s family! Look at verse 31, when the father says to the older son “Everything I have is yours” that is literally true of Jesus. Philippians 2:7-8 tells us that Jesus had all God’s glory but emptied himself to the point of death, even death on a cross. He paid it all for us!
How do we get the father’s robe? Because Jesus was stripped naked on the
cross. How do get the father’s feast? Because Jesus drank the vinegar for us! He took the cup of wrath so we could have the cup of joy! He is the real elder brother and he says so! Look at Hebrews 2:11. It says: "Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So, Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers."
Jesus says “You are my brother or my sister if you just accept being found by me!” That is all you have to do. You don’t have to pay or make restitution for your wrongs to be in my family! I did the paying for you. I made restitution for you when I died on the cross in your place! That’s what Jesus says. Isn’t this wonderful news! That is why we call it the gospel because its good news!
BECOMING TRUE OLDER BROTHERS
Jesus is the true older brother. Jesus does what the older brother in this story should have done. Jesus paid it all to return “sinful” younger brothers and sisters to God’s family. He paid it all so we don’t have to. He paid it all to return “sinful,” hard working, good, rule following, older brothers back to God’s family as well. It costs us nothing to return God’s family. Jesus paid it all so we wouldn’t have to pay a thing. It is free for us to return! Jesus absorbed the price! We have a free ride!! GOOD NEWS!
We have a free gift, ….but this gift is meant to change our hearts. And if we truly accept this gift, it does. We know Jesus paid a price we could not pay, and we are grateful! We are so grateful, in fact, that our heart, our inside changes. Our selfishness begins to fall away and we become like Jesus. We become willing to pay a high price to reconcile people to God the Father.
Jesus’ gift to us should turn us into true older brothers. Let’s face the fact as soon as someone else returns to God’s family after we do, we become the older brother or sister. So, God uses his grace, the high price Jesus paid, to turn us into true elder brothers, not elder brothers like the one in this story.
What do true elder brothers do? They do two things. First, they search for lost younger brothers. They seek the lost. They befriend “sinners” in order to return younger brothers to God the Father. It is the least they can do, after what Jesus did for them. Second, they pay the high price economic and social price to do so. They bear the cost of reconciliation!
WHO’S MISSING
If you ask the question, “Doesn’t it matter?” instead of searching for the lost and paying the high price to find them, maybe Jesus is missing from your life. Maybe you haven’t experienced his love and grace that paid it all for you.
Let’ end by asking this question, “Who’s missing from many churches in the United States?” I believe true elder brothers are missing? We don’t have enough people going out to reconcile “sinners” to God the Father. Too many Christians don’t want to pay the high price. They don’t want to pay the economic price or the social price.
It costs money to help those who need Jesus. It costs money to search for the lost. What is outreach? Look at my arm. It is our moving toward sinners like the father in this story. It costs money to welcome lost sinners into God’s family, the church and make them feel comfortable. If you reach out to sinners it will cost you money. When the church reaches out to sinners there is an economic cost. You or the church might have to kill the fattened calf, throw them a party! Provide a coffee bar or redo a children’s wing to make younger brothers, younger sister, and younger families feel welcome! The money is used for them, not you. But that isn’t a bad thing! It’s a good thing if you’re a true older brother or sister.
There is a social cost as well. “Good” people, hard workers, rule followers, people with prestige in the church and community will be little you. They will wonder why you go to such great lengths to forgive someone for what they did to you are the church. They will wonder why you pay such a high price to give a no good such and such a free ride! They will ask, “Doesn’t it matter what so and so did?”
Who’s missing? Are you sinner who is missing far from God’s family? Jesus paid the price to bring you back? All you have to do is accept the price Jesus paid on the cross. Will you do that today if you haven’t?
Who’s missing? Are you and elder brother? Are you missing from the search? Has the economic and social price to search for lost younger brothers and sisters been too high for you to pay? Will you remember the high price Jesus paid to find you and return you to the family? Will you let the price he paid turn you into a true older brother or sister like he is? Let’s pray.
