I received a number of email solicitations from charitable organizations during the final few days of the calendar year encouraging me to make a year-end financial gift to their organization. As I looked them over, I noticed something. Most of them didn’t try to persuade me by providing an array of facts and figures they hoped would prove convincing. They appealed to me by highlighting someone whose life had been changed by their ministry or cause—someone who’d been personally impacted, or experienced a breakthrough, or whose life had been altered because they exist. Ny guess is each organization was guided by a consultant or somebody with a marketing background—someone who’s studied what captures our imaginations and motivates us to voluntarily give of our resources—in putting that appeal together. They know we’re typically more impacted by stories than statistics … that our brains are wired to respond to stories much more than facts and figures. They know stories have a way of moving us. A well-crafted story can cause us to think and feel differently and we tend to act based on these thoughts and feelings. Not that data and statistical analysis aren’t important—it has its place, particularly when it comes to making strategic decisions. But for the most part, stories have a way of capturing our attention and taking hold of our hearts in a way statistics can’t.
If you read the gospels, one of the things about Jesus is that He used the power of story to His advantage. He had an amazing ability to take everyday life incidents—things from nature … social events … celebrations … people interactions—and make them the occasion for a story that would help his hearers grasp a key truth. The majority of his stories are very brief and to the point. He told them without much embellishment so the hearer could make quick application. But one story is much more complex and involved than all the others—a story that’s captured in Luke 15 and is centered around a father with two sons. The relevant insights and points of application are so numerous—the number of threads woven through the plot line are so abundant—we dare not rush through it quickly. While it’s a single story with a single point it’s trying to make, there are so many lessons there for the taking that we need to pump the brakes and slow down.
Most of us think we know the story quite well. But my guess is we really don’t—in fact, we can get off track before it really begins. The name “Prodigal Son” is a bit misleading, as it’s not the son that’s ‘prodigal’—it’s God. Most of us think the word ‘prodigal’ means wayward or rebellious. I’ve been in a number of prayer meetings where we’ve been encouraged to pray for our “prodigals”—our children who are estranged from the family and away from the Lord. But ‘prodigal’ actually means wastefully extravagant. In other words, while the younger son is incredibly reckless and irresponsible with how the spends his inheritance, it’s the father, who’s the representative of God, that’s the real prodigal—killing the fatted calf, adorning his son with the fine robe, and throwing the lavish feast when he returns home. He’s wastefully extravagant and outrageously prodigal in how he responds to his son’s return.
To fully understand this story, we need to recognize this is the last of three stories found back-to-back-to-back in Luke 15—stories dealing with the same basic theme that address complaints rising from the Pharisees about Jesus hanging out with sinners. Jesus didn’t respond by saying, “You know guys, ‘sinner’ is such a harsh, mean-spirited word. You really ought to be careful about the labels you attach to people.” He responded by telling them a series of stories about three lost items—a lost sheep, a lost coin, and lost sons—that not only conveyed God’s heart for lost people, but that also turned their thinking on its ear by challenging them to see things from a vastly different perspective. The story of the prodigal son is the culmination of this series of stories. And lets look at how Jesus begins—how he draws his listeners in.
Jesus continued: “There was a man who had two sons. The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them. “Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. (Luke 15:11-13)
Jesus does a couple of things off the bat that are powerful ingredients that make for an effective story. First—he sets up a potential conflict with his very first phrase, “A man had two sons.” If you know anything about boys, you know there’s potential for conflict. We see it quite often in the Bible—Cain and Abel … Jacob and Esau. It existed in the home I grew up in between John and Jeff Whitsett. My brother and I are a year and a half apart … close enough in age to where there was a fair amount of tension built into our relationship. While we’re close and get along great now, it wasn’t always that way. To add intrigue and interest, a contrast is introduced from the get-go.
Second—the first words out of the younger son’s mouth are shocking and scandalous. We can’t detect it because of cultural distance but, according to the customs and practices of the ancient Hebrews, there was no provision that allowed a father to pass on his inheritance before he died. In a very patriarchal and paternal society, the very request was outrageous. For a son to make this request was in essence to say, “Dad—I want nothing to do with this family and can’t wait for you to die.” In a society where honor, respect, and esteem for your elders was a really big deal, this was scandalous and shocking. The hearers couldn’t imagine a son would actually make such a request—much less that a father would grant it! They’d have been stunned at his callousness and insensitivity. This was a request that would have burned a bridge and irreparably severed the relationship. It would have brought a great deal of shame and disgrace to the dad as well as the family, creating a stigma and casting a shadow over the entire household.
The motives of the younger son are very clear: He wants to get as far away from home as fast as he can. Some of us can undoubtedly identify with this. Perhaps home was suffocating—we couldn’t measure up as long as our sibling was around. I’ve known a number of people who had a sibling that was All-Everything—straight A student, varsity athlete, King of the Homecoming Court, class president, or Eagle Scout—and they felt like being the brown paper bag next to a brother or sister who was elaborately gift-wrapped created a stifling presence from which they had to escape.
For others, home is filled with hurtful and painful memories. It’s the place where we watched our siblings or mom be mistreated, or the place where love was offered conditionally and always had strings attached. We’re scared that as long as we’re anywhere nearby, it will have power over us, stunt our development, and mar our personal growth. So we can’t wait to get away. We want is to escape to a distant country where we can be removed from the pain and decide for ourselves who we’ll be. For others, home is a lid. It offers limited opportunities. We want something in life home can’t provide. So, when we head off for college or enlist in the military, we think, “I’m never going back!”
While creating that new identity involved relocating and leaving home for the younger son, the fact is you don’t necessarily have to pull up stakes and resettle elsewhere in order to enter a distant country. All that’s required is a deep sense inside that “I want something more than what this place can provide. I’m going to be my own person. I’m going to go my own way in life. I’m going to answer only to myself”. That very mindset can create estrangement and land us in a faraway place.
As we read on, we realize this story is about two sons that are lost—one that left and one that stayed put. It doesn’t matter if you’ve packed your bags and departed or if you’ve never left. The parable is concerned about how distant we’ve all become from home with our Heavenly Father—the home we were created to enjoy … the home where we’re known, valued, and loved … the home where our true mission is found and where our highest calling is realized.
But the problem some of us have is that home feels boring. It’s not exciting. While being at home is where we’re deeply loved, it can also feel remarkably ordinary at times. It doesn’t have the excitement or adventure. It lacks the buzz. It feels kind of predictable, humdrum, and monotonous.
When he was home, the younger son undoubtedly had a number of chores to do and responsibilities to fulfill. Worst of all, he had to live with his older brother … a guy who, as we learn more about him, realize probably wasn’t all that delightful to be around. He tried to come off as compliant and obedient, but there were some things going on inside him where he’d have probably been pretty miserable to be around. Like the younger brother, we must fight feelings of tedium for, as children of God, there are some expectations that come with the territory. We’re expected to love our neighbor … do good to those who do evil to us … care for the poor … worship … faithfully steward our resources. And we’re asked to do it in the company of at least a few folks who periodically irritate us and aren’t always fun to be around. If we’re not careful, we can eventually arrive at a place where we’re tempted to wonder if there isn’t something better to do or someplace better to be.
So, we listen to the voices that rise up from that dark place within that says we can be something other than what we can become in connection with God—voices that judge our lives as mundane, boring, and uninteresting … voices that make us doubt if the life God has for us is exciting and fulfilling enough. Like the younger son, we head toward that faraway land where we’ll be free of all the baggage that comes from our connection to home and free of all the expectations as to how we should live our lives. Armed with a boatload of dreams, we strive to create for ourselves a life of our own making and choosing. But like the younger son, we soon discover our attempts to do that leads us to places we don’t particularly want to go.
The younger son used his freedom to squander his inheritance. And that’s the problem with life in the distant country—it will use us up and exhaust us in the process. For you and I weren’t made to live life distant from our Heavenly Father. We were made to be at home with him. But once we run away, we’re left with no choice but to find something to fill that gap in us that God was meant to occupy. And that doesn’t work very well—never has, never will. History has proven over and over that when we try to serve as our own god—when we try to substitute something into that place God is meant to go—we typically end up hurting ourselves as well as those around us. When we see what our flight to the distant country has done to us as well as those we love, we don’t feel special anymore. What we feel, more than anything, is regret and remorse. The results aren’t just disappointing—they’re disastrous! The only lasting satisfaction and enduring fulfillment is found when we embrace the One in whose home we were meant to live … whose home is filled with an assortment of good things and blessings … whose home contains everything we need to experience true and lasting joy.
So—where do you find yourself in this story? Some of us are more like the younger brother and some are more like the older brother. Some of us have wandered away from God in an attempt to create a life of our own making, only to find that we’ve made a mistake and created hurt, not only for us but those closest to us as well. We’re like this son who said to his father, “I really don’t want anything to do with you” only to discover that, when we tried to manage life independent of his influence, we made a colossal mess of things and ended up someplace we didn’t plan or want to be. Others of us are like the older brother—outwardly compliant but manifesting a joyless, mechanical obedience that in no way reflects the spirit and nature of the father’s heart.
Too often the older brother in this story is overlooked and in many ways he’s just as lost and off-track as the younger brother—the only difference being the younger brother knows he’s messed up and ultimately retraces his steps, but the older brother lives with the illusion he’s OK because he never left to begin with. But I want to wrap up this initial incursion into this story by asking God to communicate with us so that, whether we think we more closely identify with the younger brother or the older brother, he will break through in us so we can more fully embrace His priorities and manifest His heart in the days, weeks, months, and years to come.