Grace-Full Relationships November 3, 2002
Luke 15:11-32
On the first week we looked at relationships where grace is not in place
We talked about how when we try to control those around us for our own purposes we are living in the curse that Adam and Eve received when they sinned. (And though you may desire to control your husband, he will be your master.” Gen. 3:16 NLT with footnote) And we are trying to take over God’s job – to shape and mold people according to his good purpose.
We talked about how we are born with a “Holy Spirit shaped hole” in our hearts, and in order to fill that emptiness, we often concentrate on the exterior, performance orientated areas of our life. After awhile, we realize that no amount of success or sin can fill that hole, so we go looking for someone else to fill the hole – usually a mate or family member. They look good on the outside, but because they are just as empty on the inside as we are, they can’t fill our emptiness, and we cannot fill theirs. So we start to try to shape them into the type of person that can fill our emptiness.
We talked about how this is idolatry. Whenever we go to another person or thing to do for us what only God can do for us, we are treating them as another god, and it is idolatry.
We looked at how, when we are filled with the Spirit, and living our lives by the power of the Spirit, we no longer need to look to others to fill our emptiness, and we do not have to manipulate and control them so that they will fill our emptiness!
So because we are strengthened in our inner being by the Holy Spirit, we have the strength to submit to one another!
It is one of those Christian paradoxes – God gives us strength, not so we can rule over, but so we can serve!
Today, as a final installment, I want to look at the difference between a Grace-based family or relationship, and a family or relationship that is based on shame.
Grace and Shame are polar opposites
Shame is this deep feeling of being worthless, unacceptable, of being a bad person. It is different than guilt – guilt is what we feel when we have done something wrong – shame is what we feel like when we think that we are a bad person, no matter what we have done.
I believe that all parents shame their children at some point or another.
Sometimes it is overt
- some children are constantly being told that they are no good, that they are a pain in the neck, that they are more trouble than they are worth, or that their worth relies on doing the right things.
Pam’s student who wasn’t allowed treats not because they would rot his teeth, but because he never deserved them.
Comparisons: why can’t you be more like...
Grace, on the other hand begins with the depth of worth of the person – no matter what their actions are they have worth because they are created in the image of God.
Brand new $20 bill – what can you buy with it?
Crumple it up, stomp on it…
What can you buy with it now?
Shame sees the crinkles, the rips, the dirt. Grace sees the worth.
This is how the band U2 sing about grace
Grace – U2
Grace, she takes the blame
She covers the shame
Removes the stain
It could be her name
…
Grace, she’s got the walk
Not on a ramp or on chalk
She’s got the time to talk
She travels outside of karma
She travels outside of karma
When she goes to work
You can hear her strings
Grace finds beauty in everything
…
What once was hurt
What once was friction
What left a mark
No longer stings
Because Grace makes beauty
Out of ugly things
Grace makes beauty out of ugly things
I love the line that says “she travels outside of karma.” Karma is an eastern religion concept that has gained a lot of popularity in the West. The basic concept is tied to reincarnation – the things that you do in this life either improve your karma or detract from it. If you create good Karma, you will return as something better ion the next life, if you create bad karma, you will return as something worse: a dung beetle, or a Baptist pastor. Karma is really all about just rewards – karma says, “you get what you deserve.” Grace travels outside of karma – grace gives us the good things we don’t deserve. While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us – that is grace.
Jesus gives us a powerful image of grace in the story of the Prodigal Son
Read Luke 15:11-32
What a great story!
We often concentrate on the Prodigal Son – we even name the story for him, and many of us relate to him – running from God to go and please our selves, and then realizing that all our misbehavior catches up to us sooner or later.
If we have been in the church longer, and we read deeper into the story, we might see ourselves in the older brother. The older brother is the one who stays home and serves the father, the one who becomes resentful and serves the father, not out of love, but out of a sense of duty.
I would say that the story is much more about the father than it is about the sons – it should be called the story of the waiting father. We may relate to either or both of the brothers, but we are called to be the father!
Let me say it again: We may relate to either or both of the brothers, but we are called to be the father!
Not just as parents, but in all our relationships
The Waiting Father
The picture of the father in the story gives us a corrected vision of who our Heavenly Father is - he is not like our imperfect parents.
If the father’s attitude had been more like that of the older brother’s, (or like many parents) He may have grudgingly accepted his son as a hired hand, and let him stay in the barn, and reminded him of his shame as often as he could.
But this is not God’s attitude to us.
The Father does not shame the son
The father ran to him and embraced him - shame says you are unacceptable, this picture of the father running and embracing him says anything but that.
He gave him a robe - sign of favor: Joseph’s robe of many colors
a ring - signet - sign of position
shoes - sign of freedom
a party - sign of joy
All this for a son that had just squandered his inheritance on riotous living!
Everything is a sign that he accepts his lost son fully as a son and re-establishes him in a position of honour.
We are never actually told whether or not it works – whether the son actually behaves himself ever after this. The assumption is that he does, out of great gratitude over the acceptance that the father has given him.
Being called to be the father does not mean that when our friends and loved ones go of the rails that we leave them alone to return to their senses without us. This is where living grace-fully requires a ear attuned to God, and to the person we love.
The story of the waiting father does not stand alone. Jesus tells three stories in a row about God and lost things.
The first is the story of the lost sheep. (verses 3-7)
The second is the story of the lost coin (verses 8-10)
In both stories the player who represents God goes out of their way to find the lost item, it is only in the story of the lost son that the father waits. When our loved ones go off the rails, sometimes it is the grace-full thing to go running after them, sometimes it is the grace-full thing to wait for them to return. This takes the wisdom of God to figure out which one.
The Father does not shame the older brother
The older brother is angry that the younger gets off so easily, and because of his own imperfection he reads into his father’s actions shame that was not there. For some reason he felt that he had to work for his fathers love, but the love was there long before the work started.
The father gently corrects him.
He doesn’t shame this brother either – it would be really easy to say “who do you thing you are? Mr. High and mighty!”
Instead he invites him to the party
"You have always been with me, and what is mine is yours" - "What you feel doesn’t match up with the facts"
"Your brother has had enough shame, its time to celebrate"
As a church that states as a value “freedom” it might be easy for us to be accepting of the prodigals, but very hard on the older brothers. We might see their sins of legalism, unforgiveness, and lack of grace as worse sins than the rebellion that the younger son got into. It might be tempting to shame the older brothers into appropriate accepting behavior. But the father doesn’t shame eith one. Instead he holds both of them up to the light of their intrinsic worth.
To the younger son he says “no matter what you have done, you are still my son.”
To the older son he says, “You are my son, and you don’t have to work to gain that acceptance,”
God is not like our parents - he does not shame us.
If we are like the younger brother, and have rebelled against him, he accepts us back - fully and completely as his children.
If we are like the older brother, the blessings are just as much ours - we don’t have to work for them, the work that we do is out of gratitude and love for our father.
We may relate to either, or both of the two sons, but we are called to be the father – we are called to be Godly, like God. This not just a message for parents – we are called to be the father in all our relationships – dispensing grace, not shame
Romans 15:7 says “accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you”
How does Christ accept you?
Grace based relationships – relationships where we hear the first command first – to love the Lord our God with our whole being. To accept his grace, to have Him as God alone. And then to love our neighbour, our loved ones as ourself, not to use them to fill us up, but to love them out of the fullness that God has given us.
