Well, Father, we are so grateful to be a part of this body, to be part of your body, the church. We were reminded this morning in the foundations class of your grace to us in ordaining this institution, this temple, this body, this people that we can belong to. And Lord, we thank you that you gather us together in community like this so that you can to feed us. And that is our heart's desire right now, Lord, that you would feed us with your words. Feed us by your word. So nourish us now in the scriptures. Fill us with your Spirit. We pray that you would do all this in the name of your Son Jesus. Amen.
Well, I don't know if you've ever had the experience of going back and watching a beloved movie that you hadn't seen in a while. Sometimes that can be a great experience. A few years ago for Christmas, I got gifted the movie Glory, which has always been one of my favorites, but I hadn't seen it in probably 10, 15 years. So I got to sit down and rewatch it, and it was this rich experience of realizing all the things I'd forgotten about it and how much better it actually was than I remembered. Sometimes it doesn't work out like that. Sometimes you go back to an old movie or to an old book And you think, 'What on earth was I thinking? This is like terrible.' I had that as well. We had a moment a couple years ago with Case. It's a really old terrible '80s movie, The NeverEnding Story, with like the weird flying dog. And in my head, like as a little kid, it was like this cool movie. And I thought, 'Here it is on Amazon Prime. It's for free this week. I'm gonna watch this with Case.' It was so weird. Like 30 minutes into it, Case was like, 'Can we just be done?' So you do that sometimes and you realize, like, man, these are just terrible. I say that to say sometimes we're disappointed, but sometimes old stories age really well. And especially sometimes when we come back to old stories and we've matured, we're surprised. There's elements that we've forgotten. In Gloria, I forgot how moved I was by the scene before the battle. Where they're singing and they're just emotionally engaged, right? I forgot how incredible that scene was as they go out onto the field to give their lives for each other.
Well, I hope that's our experience this morning, that we come back to an old story that most of us know incredibly well and that we're surprised that there's elements that we see this morning that maybe we didn't realize the significance of before but that most of all, God, through the preaching of His Word and the power of the Spirit, would make plain to us the significance of the parable of the prodigal son. Now this parable, this famous parable, happens as we conclude a series of parables. Seth preached last week on Jesus' parables about the lost things. This morning we're looking at the parable of the most famous lost thing. It's about a lost son. The title suggests that many of us, though, have probably failed to realize everything that's going on in the story. We call it the parable of the prodigal son, which makes you think it's a story primarily about the son who wanders off and gets lost and then restored again. But actually, this story, as we read it, as we look at it this morning, we'll see is about much more than that. It's not just about the young rebellious son who flees from home and then has to return with his tail tucked between his legs. It's about an older brother who never leaves and does everything that he's supposed to do. And it's especially about a father and how a father interacts with his sons.
Now our outline this morning is really basic and straightforward. We're going to look at the younger son. We're going to look at the older son. And then we're going to look at the father. It's pretty simple. You should be able to remember that outline even on Monday morning. Right? One of the rare times. The thing we see though is that each of the main characters is teaching us something in this parable. And both the brothers especially show us mistaken notions of who they understand their father to be. And their father is representative of who God is. And so these brothers substitute in for us. These brothers are lost in different ways and they have misunderstandings of who their father is and who God is. So we're going to look at that this morning and then finally we're going to conclude with understanding who is this father? How does he respond to his sons? How does God respond to us?
So look with me now at Luke 15. We're going to start with the first 2 verses and then we'll drop down. Hear God's holy and authoritative Word. Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to Him, Jesus. And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, the man receives sinners and eats with them. So He told them a parable. Verse 11, and He said, there was a man who had two sons. And the younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.' And he divided his property between them. Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. And so he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. And when he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything, but when he came to himself, he said, 'How many of my father's hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you, and I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.' And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion and ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.' 'But the father said to his servants, 'Bring quickly the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate, for my son was dead and is alive again. He was lost and is found.' And they began to celebrate. Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. He called one of the servants and asked, 'What do these things mean?' And he said to him, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has received him back safe and sound.' But he, the older son, was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, but he answered his father, 'Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him.' And he said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead and is alive. He was lost and is found. The Word of the Lord. May He write its truth upon our hearts.
It's an old story that we're familiar with. We're familiar especially with the younger brother.
6 · The pastor expounds the cultural and relational context of the younger son's demand for his inheritance, establishing the son's motive and the inheritance distribution customs of the time
Now the younger brother at the beginning of the story is essentially living at home, and we learn really quickly for the sole purpose of just mooching off of his father. He lives at home. He's mooching off of him, but he realizes he's sick of living in his father's house, the implication being in his father's house he has to follow his father's rules. And so he decides it's time to break off on his own, to set out on his own. And so he demands his inheritance. Now, in that time, it was customary that the eldest son, regardless of the size of the family, would receive 2/3 of the inheritance. So the eldest son gets 2/3. The rest of the sons gets what's left over. So this son gets the third that's remaining to him. The younger son wants his third of the father's estate.
7 · The pastor expounds the cultural gravity of the son's request and the audience's expectation that the father would refuse
And this is a sign of massive disrespect. We get a sense of that anyway. All cultures have a sense, right, that children are to respect adults, but especially to show respect to their parents. But in that day in particular, in a patriarchal culture like this, The call for respect, the need and demand for respect was paramount. So the listeners that are hearing Jesus tell this story, they're already sensing things are broken in this family. They're probably expecting Jesus to explain that the next thing out of the father's mouth is that he's not giving the inheritance. Instead, he's cutting the son off and he's expelling him from the family. That would be an expected and even appropriate cultural response to a son talking like this to his father. Instead, Jesus just tells us simply the father complies. Without any argument, he gives the younger son his request.
8 · The pastor unpacks the deeper meaning of the son's request: it is tantamount to wishing the father dead and declaring that the son values only the father's possessions, not the father himself
Now, if we were to sentimentalize the parable, the one that you grew up with, You get this sense of there's going to be this special thing that happens and you're starting to already get the sense that this is going to be a special story. But for the crowds, they're not swallowing Jesus' tale like this. This is a shocking, scandalizing thing. There weren't categories for a son making this kind of request. When he asks for the inheritance, it's the son essentially telling his father, listen, I kind of wish you were already dead so I could just get this stuff. You're not dead, but let's pretend you're dead and then you give it all to me. It's a brutal thing to say to your father. Another way of thinking of it is the son coming to the father and saying, I really just care about your stuff. I care nothing about you. I really just care about what I'm going to get from you. I don't care about our relationship continuing. Beyond this point. And then that the Father would agree. That He would comply. That's a stunning thing.
9 · The pastor contrasts modern inheritance practices (liquid assets, bank transfers) with ancient inheritance to set up the cultural gap the audience must cross
It's especially remarkable when we realize we're not talking about inheritance in modern categories. Now I had a friend a few years ago up in Minnesota, and her grandma, before she died, decided she wanted to actually give out her inheritance. She wanted to see all of her grandkids enjoying the inheritance before she died. Which I'm like, that's kind of a neat idea. I guess if you've got enough money that you've got so much set aside that you're not going to go broke, you can give out portions of it to see your grandchildren enjoying it. So this friend got to receive her inheritance, and with that distribution of cash, she and her husband paid cash for a house. Really neat way to get the inheritance. But it was essentially her grandma cashing out some stock options. right? Doing a money transfer from the bank. That's not the way it works in this society.
10 · The pastor expounds the economic and social cost of the father's compliance: in an agrarian society, inheritance means land and livestock, not cash
In the society of this story. We live in a currency-rich culture. This is not a currency-rich culture. A person's wealth isn't measured in their bank account. A person's wealth is measured in land and in livestock. Maybe, maybe they have a business. The point being, the father isn't going to the bank to request the releasing of funds. He's not writing a check to his son and telling him to get lost. He's selling his land. He's selling his animals. He's selling the way he makes a living. In a lot of ways in that culture, he's selling his standing within the community. Your significance is measured by the the amount of land that you own. So the father is literally taking a third of his standing and selling it. There's no quiet way to do this, right? You can't go to the bank when it's not busy and ask for the withdrawal and send your son off. And then when the neighbors ask, you say, well, he's on an extended vacation. He wanted to tour Europe for a while. No, you have to go to the other patriarchs in town and explain to them that you're selling a huge section of your property. Why are you selling this? Isn't that John's inheritance? It is John's inheritance. John wants it now. And so the whole community sees this man's honor being just spit upon by a rebellious son.
11 · The pastor traces the younger son's trajectory from departure to destitution, emphasizing his pursuit of freedom from rules and his rapid descent from wealth to poverty
Most of us have a little bit of a soft spot in our hearts for the younger son. At this point in the story, though, Jesus' audience, the tax collectors and sinners and the scribes and Pharisees, probably can't stand the young man. He's insulting everything their society holds dear. He goes off to a far country, Jesus says. So basically, he's not just leaving home, he's getting as far away as possible, and he views this as a flight to freedom. He's finally unshackled from all the rules and regulations and perceived expectations and restrictions of home. And he's having the time of his life, right? He's got all this capital and he hits the ground running. He probably has an initial just splurge of spending and then he gets a taste for fine things and then he starts to run out of money, so he's gotta scale back a little bit. And then all of a sudden everything's gone. The bankroll that had led to all the women and the friends and the fun is stripped away. To make everything worse, right when he loses everything in this ridiculously fast fashion, a famine hits. So all of his friends are gone, and now he has no way to feed himself.
12 · The pastor expounds the deeper significance of the pig lot: not merely filth, but a symbol of total estrangement from Jewish identity, family, and covenant community
Long story short, he ends up in a pig lot. Both my grandpas owned pig farms. I know what a pig lot is all about. It can be fun for a little bit if you get the pig shockers and you chase them around. That's fun as a kid. But when you're actually working in the pig lot, it is nasty, stinky, smelly stuff. No sweat glands, so these pigs spend all day in the mud, and they are gross. But that's not the point Jesus is making. Not that everyone's going to be grossed out that He's living with the pigs and wants to eat the pigs' food. The point He's making is He's gone to a far-off country. His situation has gotten so bad, He's now rented Himself out to a Gentile to work with unclean animals. It's gotten to the point that the son has fallen so far, he's taken an unkosher job with an unbelieving Gentile. He is completely and utterly estranged from his family and his people and his culture and his past at this point. He's totally cut off. He's basically an indentured servant to a godless person.
13 · The pastor expounds the nature of the younger son's repentance: driven by starvation rather than genuine contrition, he rehearses a confession designed to secure a servant's position in his father's household
And here at the point of starvation, longing to eat out of the pig trough, he finally comes to the point of repentance. His belly basically leads him home. There's nothing glorious about this repentance. He's just hungry. And homeless and poor. And he remembers how good his servants had it in his father's house. Food and clean clothes and a place to sleep at night. But to go home, he recognizes he'll have to face his father. And so he starts playing in his head, like, what's that conversation going to be like? What do I say to him? How do I fix it? So he starts to construct in his head what he's going to say, how he's going to confess, I've sinned against I've sinned against heaven and I've sinned against You. Just make me a servant.
14 · The pastor makes a theological claim about the younger brother's lostness: he represents the openly godless, immoral sinner whose rebellion against God and Scripture is visible and undeniable
Now what we're seeing in this parable is Jesus showing us a way that we understand sin to operate. The son is sort of this classic bohemian, anti-religious, anti-conformity soul. More essential than that though, this son, this younger son, is obviously, clearly, lost. He is lost in his sin. He's had this flight into immorality; this flight into lawlessness, rejecting all of the Scriptures and rejecting all of what his father holds dear. And he's tasted the sweetness for a fleeting second, and then he's found himself at the pig trough of sin. He's openly godless. He's indulging in prostitutes. He's getting drunk and partying. As the tax collectors and the sinners listen, they can relate to this younger brother. They understand what he's saying. His lostness is evident to everyone hearing the story.
15 · The pastor signals a structural shift in the sermon, noting that Jesus does not end the parable with the younger son's reconciliation but instead introduces the older brother
The remarkable thing about the story though is that it doesn't end with the reconciliation between the younger brother and the father. We hear about the homecoming, and we'll look at that more later. We know the story and the embrace. That's really the climax, right? That's the heart of the drama. If Hollywood ever turned this into a movie, that would be the dramatic music playing, the tears are flowing. That's the moment. That's the significance. The father embracing and forgiving his long-lost son, and then the feast that happens after. And then you slowly fade to black. Beautiful story of reconciliation. Well, Jesus blows right past the good ending. He goes right past it and starts telling about the older brother's reaction. All the feel-goodiness of the story just— just died right there. It's gone. It's almost like Jesus stinks at telling a good tale. Of course, that's not it at all. Jesus doesn't stop with the prodigal because the story isn't really about that son at all. The most important brother in the story isn't the younger brother, it's the older brother.
16 · The pastor re-establishes the narrative context of Luke 15:1-2, identifying the audience for the parable: the tax collectors and sinners are drawn to Jesus, while the Pharisees and scribes grumble
Recall how chapter 15 starts: Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. The younger brothers, the broken people, are sensing their need for Jesus. They're coming around Him. And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, 'This Man receives sinners and eats with them.' So, in response to this, He told a story. He tells a story about lost sheep. He tells a story about a lost coin. And then He tells this story about a lost son. Jesus has already drawn in the sinners. They're already attracted to this message of the Gospel. The religious people, though, the religious people have no stomach for Jesus or His good news. They're grumbling. They're aggravated. That Jesus is hanging out with these kind of people. In that culture, to eat with someone is to associate with them. They assume that it means Jesus approves of their profligate lifestyles. Are you approving of what these people do and how they live, Jesus? Now obviously, Jesus isn't approving of how they live any more than He's approved of how the younger son lived in the story. What He is doing is extending grace. He's extending grace to broken people, and they sense it, and they are drawn to Him. He's extending grace, and the religious people see it, and they have no stomach for it. They can't handle it.
17 · The pastor makes a theological claim about the older brother: though outwardly righteous and obedient, he is just as lost as the younger brother
Jesus is holding the older brother up like a mirror for the scribes and Pharisees. He's holding him up like a mirror for the religious people to see themselves and their own need for grace. The older brother has done everything right his entire life. By his own declarations, right? He's followed every rule. He's done everything his father, everything the community, everything society has expected of him. He's been moral. He's been respectful. He's been upright. When his fool of a younger brother returns, he's out in the field trying to rebuild the inheritance that got smashed by a third. He's working to restore his father's reputation. But Jesus sees his heart. And He sees in his heart a brother just as lost as his younger sibling.
18 · The pastor expounds the older brother's disrespect: refusing to enter the house and forcing the father to come to him, he shows the same contempt for his father that the younger brother did, though in a different form
His moralism, his self-righteousness has blinded him. He's enraged with his father throwing a feast. And he's actually just as disrespectful as his younger brother was earlier. He refuses to enter the house, right? So his father has to come all the way out, taking the job of a servant. Meeting him at the door. And he's got no respect for him. You greet someone in this culture, a patriarch, an elder in the community, especially your father, with titles and tokens and words of respect. His father, 'Come into the party. Your brother's back.' 'Look, I've worked my whole life for you, and this is what you're doing?' The disrespect is just flagrant.
19 · The pastor expounds Luke 15:29 as the key to understanding the older brother's theology: he views his relationship with his father as a transaction where love and inheritance must be earned through obedience
The key line is verse 29. He literally declares, 'These many years I've slaved for you. I've never disobeyed your commands, and yet you never gave me a young goat that I might celebrate with my friends.' I've slaved for you. I've done everything right. In his view, his father has never been anything more than a taskmaster. Love, according to the older brother, has to be earned. Inheritance is purchased through obedience. Affection is the result of some sort of karmic transaction. If you do the right things, you'll get a hug. It's a careful equation of tit for tat with a declaration that he has done plenty to deserve love, but an unspoken insecurity that deep down his suspicion that he'll never measure up is suddenly being confirmed.
20 · The pastor makes a theological claim about the older brother's religion: it is the religion of the Pharisees and of many moral, religious people today
This is the religion of the Pharisees. Of many religious, moral people. Many of us have more in common, if we're honest, with the elder brother than with the younger brother.
21 · The pastor addresses the congregation directly, acknowledging that the parable's call to the moralistic, rule-following religious insider is harder to perceive than the call to the openly sinful prodigal
What we fail to realize is this is calling us. We recognize the parable calling people who are lost and blinded in sin and who have gone off into immorality. We see the Gospel call to the prodigal. There's grace for you. Come back. The Father longs for you. It's harder to see the call for the moralistic, for the good, for the rule follower.
22 · The pastor uses a personal anecdote about a conversation with his mother-in-law's friend to illustrate the older-brother mentality: always following the rules with the expectation of reward
We were on vacation and we were sitting with one of my mother-in-law's good friends. And it was such a fitting comment as I was starting to turn my head towards coming back and this passage. And she said, I was always an oldest child. I was always following the rules. It's so very true of how that birth order often works, right? I was always doing what I was supposed to do with the expectations that come from doing what you're supposed to do.
23 · The pastor makes a theological claim: God's favor cannot be earned through obedience
The thing is, there's no working our way into God's favor. More than this, the father isn't asking the son to earn his favor. Both sons have it. But there's no putting God in your debt because you've done enough good stuff. Just because he's been a good son, now he seems to present to the father, 'You owe me things.' Now most of us would never be so crass in describing our own self-righteousness. I know I certainly try not to be. But this is precisely what the elder brother in us seeks to do. His categories for how he has gone through life, the decisions he's made, are shattered by his father's response to the younger brother.
24 · The pastor identifies the parable's primary audience and purpose: it is addressed to the religious insiders who do not recognize their own lostness, and its climax is a refutation of their performance-based religious calculus
This is the heart of the parable. This is the heart of what Jesus is telling us. It's not so much for the tax collectors and the sinners. They've already heard two parables about a lost coin and a lost sheep. And going and searching and celebrating. They get it. They're the lost thing. This parable is more about the brother who thinks he's not lost. It's much more for the Pharisees and the devout, the Bible-believing, church-attending, merit-accumulating members of the body then and members of the body now. The climax of the story is a shocking refutation of the religious calculus of the pious insiders.
25 · The pastor cites Tim Keller to make a theological claim about the parable's purpose: Jesus is shattering categories, not warming hearts
There's an awesome book on this. I read it the first time probably 5 or 6 years ago. Tim Keller's book, 'The Prodigal God.' The title says it all. Prodigal means reckless, a spendthrift. And it's talking about God who is reckless in His grace. But Keller says this: No, the original listeners were not melted into tears by this story, but rather they were understruck, offended, and infuriated. Jesus's purpose is not to warm our hearts, but to shatter our categories. Through this parable, Jesus challenges what nearly everyone has ever thought about God, sin, and salvation. His story reveals the destructive self-centeredness of the younger brother. Yes, he's lost, but it also condemns the elder brother's moralistic life in the strongest terms. Jesus is saying that both the irreligious and the religious are spiritually lost. Both life paths are dead ends, and that every thought the human race has had about how to connect to God has been wrong. That's a sobering quote. The calculus you've been doing doesn't actually work out.
26 · The pastor applies the parable to concrete relational patterns: withholding affection from a spouse or child based on their failure to meet expectations reveals the older brother's transactional, performance-based mentality lurking in our hearts
Now, maybe this doesn't seem as surprising to us as it does to Jesus' audience. We've heard the parable before. Maybe you've read a book like 'Prodigal God' or you've really given thought to the older brother. Maybe you've spent time like I have looking at Rembrandt's painting of the prodigal son and the way he paints the father's hands and the gracious, tender embrace. Maybe you've thought of all those things before, but I think most of us, as much as we know these things to be true, we still have a hard time believing they're true. Cognitively knowing I can't do enough to get into God's good grace, and yet how does that operate in our lives? How do we relate to a spouse? I come home and I've worked hard all day and why isn't this ready and this set aside and everything prepared for me? How do you relate to a child? Right? Frustration because you're not doing what I'm asking you to do. And so withholding of affection. In relationship, we see how we fall into these broken patterns. And when we fall into those patterns, It reveals that what we think we know hasn't actually made its way down to transform our hearts quite as much as this parable is calling it to. We're quick to overlook our own minor missteps and even quicker to highlight another person's failings. All of those things, and there's so many others we could think of, all those things reveal A subtle, latent, under-the-surface older brother mentality. The slave outlook. I've served and slaved for you all these years. And it's lurking in a lot of hearts.
27 · The pastor transitions to the final major section of the sermon by focusing on the father's character
Of course, the great contrast to all of this is the father. The gracious father. As much as this is a parable about two brothers, the common thread is the father's incredibly gracious disposition to both sons in their different forms of lostness. He's welcoming them home. Sinclair Ferguson titles a sermon on this passage, 'The Welcoming Father.' He calls it the parable of the welcoming father. One he welcomes home who he knew was lost, and this son doesn't think he deserves a second chance. Another who has no idea he's lost and yet is refusing to enter into his father's home and into his embrace. Both of them receive radically self-effacingly gracious responses from their father.
28 · The pastor expounds the younger son's misunderstanding of his father: he assumes the father is a record-keeping magistrate who may forgive but will never forget, and thus he expects only the status of a hired hand, not sonship
Now both sons have been terrible at understanding who their father is, haven't they? Both of them don't know the character of this man who's raised them. The younger son, in his starvation-induced repentance, imagines telling his father, listen, I'll work as a hired hand. A hired hand in this culture, that's the kind of servant that doesn't get to live in the household. They don't even get to live in the premises in the community. They're hired and they live on their own. They just come in. They're the lowest of the lowest servants. I'll just ask if I can have that position. In his estimation, the father has always been a record-keeping magistrate. He's been keeping a record my whole life, and now I've gone off and done this. He will forgive, I think, I hope, But only so far, and he doesn't forget. The younger son has no expectation of ever being a son again. He's just hit rock bottom, so he's willing to become an indentured servant so he doesn't starve to death.
29 · The pastor expounds the father's heart: not cold or calculating but waiting, longing, and hoping every day for his son's return
But that's not the father's heart at all. What we see is sheer, awesome grace. The Father, Jesus says, is waiting for His Son's return. The sense behind that is He's been waiting and longing for it. While the Son is still a long ways off, the Father sees Him. The Father sees— it's not a servant. The Father is on the porch as He's been doing every day. And He's looking, and He's longing, and He's hoping, and He's praying, 'Come back to Me. I love you. Return to Me.' That's the image. It's not the image of a father who's written off a rebellious kid. It's not a father whose heart has grown cold as he mulls over, 'How could He do that to me?' How could he shame me in front of my peers like that? We can imagine fathers responding like that, right? The drug addict returns home. Over coffee the next day, 'Hey, Bill, I heard John's back.' 'Oh yeah, he's just in town for a couple days.' justifying it to the friends? We can see fathers responding like that, struggling to know, how do I talk to him? What do I say? But not this father. He's been waiting for this moment. His heart is so large that it longs for the opportunity to forgive.
30 · The pastor expounds the father's response to the returning son: he runs shamefully in public, embraces him, covers him with kisses, and refuses to entertain the son's speech about becoming a servant
And when he sees the figure of his son from a long ways off, he can wait no more. He drops all pretense of dignity in a society filled with the importance of dignity. He grabs his robes, pulls them up, knobby old knees exposed, and takes off running down the path. Shamefully running. The servants are looking up. What is he doing? And then he gets there and he embraces his son. And the Greek implies he covers him with kisses. I mean, this is embarrassing. It's embarrassing. The guy's like sloppy sobbing and kissing his son. There's no reserved affection. It's exploding from him. And then he refuses to even respond. His son: I've sinned against heaven. And he starts going into the rehearsed thing, right? I've sinned against heaven and against you. Just make me a servant. And it's like he doesn't even hear it. The reconciliation is total. And it's radical. Everything's forgiven. Everything's forgotten. Everything's put aside. He's not chiding. I'm glad to have you back. I'm glad you finally came to your senses. There's no, I told you so-ing. He's not hesitant. His son was lost and now he's returned. His heart is all celebration and all love.
31 · The pastor expounds the symbols of restoration: the robe, ring, shoes, and fattened calf signify not just forgiveness but full readoption as a son and public celebration
It's not just complete forgiveness. The son doesn't even get a chance to get to the part of saying, 'I don't need to be a son, just a servant.' He can't even get there. 'Bring me my robe! Bring me the ring! Bring me shoes! The fattened calf we've been saving, bring it!' He's back. He's my son again. Not just forgiveness, it's readoption. Throw a party! What was lost has been found!
32 · The pastor expounds the father's response to the older son: he goes out to him, refuses to be provoked by his insults, and pleads with him to enter the celebration
And the older brother is flabbergasted by this grace. He has always assumed his father would extend affection once it was earned. And now he throws it in his father's face. And now what do we see? I mean, again, if you're a human father, not an easy thing to embrace your son like that and wipe it all clean. And now in the midst of celebrating, you've got this other knucklehead. It's like, 'What are you doing, man?' But what do we see? The father goes down the path again. He refuses to be baited by his son's indiscretion. He will not lose another son. He's got two stupid sons, but he will not lose them. For every insult and every dishonor, he matches it with remarkable grace. Come home, son. Celebrate with us. Open your heart to your brother. That's the fattened calf! His inheritance is gone. That's my fattened calf! Open your heart to me.
33 · The pastor makes a Christological claim: Jesus is the true older brother who does what the parable's older brother refused to do
The depths of the father's love and grace towards these two totally unworthy sons is astounding. And it's a reflection of God's heart towards us. Whether we are a younger brother or an older brother, or more likely some convoluted mix of both, God in this parable is graciously welcoming us home. And no matter who you are, this is the only way you approach God. Not a beggar mentality. Just give me some scraps of heaven. It doesn't have to be much. I earned my way in here. I was good my whole life. No, just sheer grace. You are a merciful, generous Father. But notice in conclusion what's missing from the parable. Look at the context. With both the lost coin and the lost sheep, someone goes out in search of what's been lost. And here in this parable, a son has been lost, something much more important than a sheep or a coin, and no one goes out searching. Remember, these parables are being told in response to accusations against Jesus. This guy hangs out with the wrong people. He hangs out with tax collectors and sinners. If he's hanging out with those kind of people, what kind of person is he? Answer: Jesus is a true older brother. Jesus fulfills every failing of the elder brother in this parable. Jesus is the true older brother. A true older brother in this culture would never allow his father to be dishonored the way the younger brother has. He would fight with every fiber of his being for his father's honor and his name and his glory. And he would never be complicit when things go against him of then dishonoring his father. At the same time, Jesus refuses to allow lost sons and lost daughters to remain lost. He seeks them. There's no distance too far. Philippians 2. In humility, He's given up all the glory of the Father's home, all of that inheritance, to come down to the proverbial pigpen and to seek us in our uncleanliness and to find us and to reclaim us. He's doing what the elder brother refuses to do. And the entire purpose of it is to restore us to relationship with the Father. To reconcile us. To bring us into adoption as sons and daughters.