Lent 4C
Grace Lutheran Church
Lakeland, FL
March 27, 2022
Joshua 5:9-12
Psalm 32
2 Corinthians 5:16-21
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-30
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our brother, Jesus the Christ. Please pray with me….
Today’s Gospel reading is one of the all-time favorites for many of us. Ralph Waldo Emerson and Charles Dickens both called it one of the greatest stories in the Bible. Many of us have heard it read or told time after time. Along perhaps with The Good Samaritan, it has special meaning for many of us. And, as we discussed last week, we have an opportunity today to turn the end of the kaleidoscope to see if something new may appear.
When I first started preparation to preach on this text, I pulled out a pad of paper and wrote down “Prodigal Son” at the top of the page and next to that I wrote “repentance” as a possible theme. Seemed appropriate during Lent.
Then I got to work – and things really changed on that pad of paper. Despite how familiar this parable is, you know, I never even thought to consider what the word “prodigal” meant – I “knew” that it referred to a returning or a repentant person. Like the younger son in today’s gospel.
Well, that is wrong – Merriam-Webster gives these definitions of the word “prodigal”
1 : recklessly extravagant
2 : characterized by wasteful expenditure : LAVISH
3 : yielding abundantly : LUXURIANT
synonym see PROFUSE or extravagant.
Click the kaleidoscope a turn -- I suggest to you that this parable is less about a reckless son and much more about an extravagant father loving his sons profusely, extravagantly, abundantly.
Yes, there was a man and he had two sons. As a slight aside, permit me to call to your mind, with thanks to Amy-Jill Levine, the many families in Scripture where there was a father who had two sons – well, there would be Adam who was father to Cain and Abel – and we know how that ended up. – one of them dead and the other marked for life. And Abraham who was father to Ishmael and Isaac – half-brothers who never really knew each other because of Dad’s decision to turn one away. Isaac was father to Esau and Jacob – and things weren’t so very good between those brothers either, one scheming and conniving to gain the blessing of good ol’ Dad. All of this would have been front and center in the minds of the Jewish crowds who gathered around Jesus, the Rabbi, to listen to his teaching about a father who had two sons.
One day, the younger son came to his father and said, “Dad, I want my inheritance now,” an affront then as it would be now. “Your money is more important to me. And, by the way, I’m heading to Vegas for a time.” And the wealth was squandered and he hits bottom and things get even worse as a famine hits. He ends up feeding slop to the pigs. And the scripture tells us that he was longing to be fed – a hunger of body as well as spirit as well as heart. And this hunger drove him to another plan.
He thought back to his days at his father’s business, how even the lowliest of servants has plenty to eat every day. And this son carefully crafted a speech he would give to his father, hoping to gain his father’s favor after the wrong he had done. “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.”
What is missing from this speech is a word of repentance, a word of turning to a new way. It is conspicuous by its absence -- because in the previous two parables that are part of this set of three, repentance is the last word in the story. But not here. We don’t know what was in the son’s heart or mind. We do know that he carefully planned this speech with the goal that his father would take him back on as a paid servant – not as a son in a restored relationship with the family, but as a hired hand. He had this all figured out – the timing, the location, the script. He sought so hard to be in control of this plan.
And the Good News is that -- – “while the boy was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion and ran and embraced him and kissed him.” Before the speech could be uttered, the Father was there abounding in steadfast love. And as the words of the speech began to tumble out, the Father cut them short with commands to his servants to make ready a party – no expense would be spared. And a ring would be placed on the son’s hand – a sign of being in the family not unlike a signet ring today.
The son may have felt uncomfortable that things hadn't gone the way he planned, just like you may have been a few minutes ago when I interrupted the scripted confession of our liturgy to declare that God forgives you and welcomes you home, NOW"
During this season of Lent, we are invited into a time of self-reflection. A time of considering our relationship with God and with one another and even with those who may be foreign to us. A time of prayer and fasting and giving. And because we may be a bit like one of these two sons, we may wonder if what we’re doing is enough or we may murmur at the lack of appreciation or recognition of the many things we HAVE done. This reflection and evaluation is a gift – not an indictment. It is a gift in that we can look at our lives – individually and as a community of faith – and see how we are doing in our discipleship walk with Jesus. And as we do this, we can have every confidence that God is running to meet us with compassion, a warm embrace, a welcome back home and a party that beats all others – before a word is scarcely out of our mouth.
Yes, there was a father who had two sons. Cain killed his brother Able, and yet he was still protected by God. Jacob cheated his brother Esau out of his birthright, but he lived to wrestle with an angel. Jesus doesn't tell us whether or not these two brothers went on to live happily ever after, but we do know this: that their father never stops trying to find his sons and be reconciled with them. In the same way, our heavenly Father seeks reconciliation with us too, and so he sent his Son who became one of us to show us the way of love. The Son who sets a feast for us – a sumptuous feast of the finest bread and the best wine. A feast at which the Son is fully present to grace us with all that he is so that we can bear that presence into our everyday worlds and our everyday lives where this love and forgiveness and new beginnings is so desperately needed.
Welcome home! Says Jesus. Come and eat and rejoice!
Then go and serve.
To God be the glory! Amen.
