Lost 2: A Lost Son

Luke 15:11-32

In last week’s message, the religious leaders of Jesus’ time were grumbling because Jesus “Welcomes sinners and eats with them” (Luke 15:2). To them, Jesus told three lost and found stories: the lost sheep, in which a wealthy land owner lost one of his one hundred sheep and dutifully sought it out, bringing it home to great celebration; the lost coin, in which a poor woman lost one of her ten coins and turned her home upside-down to find it, at which point she celebrated with her friends and neighbors. Today, the stakes are elevated even higher. It is not merely a sheep that is lost, nor a coin. Now it is a son.

Jesus puts a face on “the lost.” There was a man with two sons, and things go all wrong. The scene that Jesus presents is as horrible as it gets for a parent. An inheritance is meant to be something given to the children after their parents’ death, but by demanding it now, the younger son is in essence telling his father, “I wish you were dead.” The younger son shames his father, takes his money, and skips town.

You heard the story, and it’s a familiar one; flush with his new-found wealth, the son leaves the country, where he gets the double-whammy. Not only does he waste all his money, but a famine hits, and he finds himself hiring himself out to a pig farmer.

He finally comes to his senses and returns home, hoping to be hired on as one of his father’s servants.  But when he returns, his father runs to him and embraces him and throws a party. This is the back story. In fact, this is the story of what had already happened. God’s plan was for all people to enjoy close relationship with Him. He created us all to be His beloved sons and daughters, to be in community with Him.

But unfortunately that’s not what happens.

The younger son’s rebellion is obvious. He demands his inheritance and leaves. This is the human condition. So much of our sin is selfishness – I’ve even heard theologians who describe sin as all stemming from selfishness. In our selfish condition, we take everything that our Father has given us and claim it as our own for our use. We decide that we can make all our own rules, and in so doing, we brazenly defy our heavenly Father. We set ourselves up as little gods, asserting that we are capable of ruling ourselves. This, friends, is sin. When someone tells you that their sin is not hurting anyone, even their attempts at justification serve to spit in God’s face. Jesus shows us God’s character in his story; God is the Father, out by the gate, watching the horizon, seeing a cloud of dust and hoping it is his son, returning home. But it is our sin that keeps us in a foreign land, feeding pigs, starving. It is our sin that provides that distance. It is our sin that keeps us from enjoying what our Father has for us and keeps our Father from enjoying us as well.

I love the moment when the son comes to his senses. The picture of the father here is beautiful, and, at the same time, startling. A father in Jesus’ time wasn’t usually seen as a “Daddy.” Fathers were the authority in their home. They were the last word. What they said – went. We live in a culture where families generally have a lot of say in what they do. This wasn’t the case in the Ancient Near East. It was the father who had ultimate authority. When his son shamed him and left the country with his money, to his father, he would have been dead. When someone asked him about his sons, he would have responded, “I have only one son.”

Not so this father. He is characterized by care and compassion. He does what is unheard of; not only is he waiting endlessly for the son who shamed him, but he runs, hiking his robe up, so undignified and unfitting a move for a man of his station, and he embraces his son, the one for whose return he had been waiting all these days, weeks, and months.

Some of you can relate to the younger son. You’ve felt alienated, alone, unloved, even unlovable. When you look back to everything you’ve ever done, you can’t see how God could accept you. You’re looking for love and acceptance and connection. To you, Jesus says, “You have a Father who is waiting for your return because He loves you. No matter what you did, no matter how you treated Him, He loves you. Come back to Him.” And when you do, God throws a party.

But others among us aren’t the younger brother. We’ve been serving God faithfully for years. In fact, those “younger brothers” really tend to tick us off. How dare they treat our Father like that? How dare “that son of yours” do all that and then expect to just waltz back in and have a party? After all, where’s my party? Where’s my recognition? As a Christian, it can be easy to slip into the older brother role. We have been serving God faithfully for years, and we never got a party…

Listen to the words of the older brother: 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.’ (Luke 15:29-30)

We always think of the younger son as having left the love and care of his father, but if you look more closely, the older son has left, too. Did you notice that he is so distant from his father that he doesn’t even notice when his brother returns? He doesn’t notice the party that is going on. He was never looking for his brother and he has lost touch with his father. When the younger son came to his senses, he wondered how many of his father’s hired men had extra food while he was starving. His plan was to go back home, admit that he’d sinned against his father, and ask him to hire him as a servant.

Meanwhile, the older brother had willingly put himself into a position where he saw himself as “slaving” for his father. While the younger brother was gone, wishing he was back home, even living as a servant at home, the older brother’s complaint is that is exactly what he already is. All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders, but I never got anything.

The father responds to his son: ‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours.’

Remember the scenario; the younger son demanded his inheritance, so the father divided up his estate. It doesn’t say that only the younger son got his share; he divided the inheritance between the two and gave them each their share. We always focus on the younger brother, who got his share and squandered it, but remember that everything else legally belonged to the older brother. Everything the father has belongs to the older son.

The older son is not enjoying any of it. He is working dutifully, yet he is not enjoying anything that his father has for him. I believe that there are many Christians who have been living a dutiful life, slaving away, day in and day out, doing everything you can to keep yourself pure and spotless before God, which is a good thing, but you’re missing out on something huge. You’re missing out on the joy that God has for you. You’re missing out on the fact that everything God has is yours for you to enjoy. In John 8, Jesus tells the religious leaders: Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. John 8:35-36.

There are some among us who question whether they are saved. You’re living your life in fear, wondering if you belong or not, wondering if you’ll make it to heaven. Listen to me: if you have accepted Jesus’ gift of forgiveness, if you have accepted what Jesus did for you on the cross, then God has made you one of His children. Other religions are based on a slavery model – they have to work their way to acceptance. Even Jesus affirms that a slave has no permanent place in the family. But a son or daughter is permanently in the family.

So I ask you, what are you counting on for your salvation? Are you counting on your works? If so, you’re behaving as a slave. You’re not living life like one of God’s beloved children. And if you’re living like that, you’ve got to keep it up forever. You can’t let up, and if you do, you’re toast. But if the Son sets you free, you are free indeed.

The saddest moment of Jesus’ story is seeing the older brother, who should be living enjoying his father’s presence, grumbling, toiling endlessly… He is miserable. I see that a lot from Christians. You work really hard, but you’ve got no joy whatsoever. You have no peace. You’re not exhibiting the Fruit of the Spirit. And you’re not living out the fullness of being a child of God. You have chosen to be a slave instead.

If you are someone who isn’t experiencing the joy of being a child of God, I want you to pause a moment. Slow down. Spend some serious time with your Father. Allow Him to love you. Receive the gifts He has for you. Enjoy him. This is the privilege of God’s children – to enjoy His presence. To be with Him all the time. And when you spend time in His presence, you begin to look like him.  You begin to have a broken heart for things that break His heart. You begin to find meaning and significance in Him instead of the things of this world.  You begin to have joy unspeakable even in difficult situations. And you celebrate when a brother or sister who was lost comes home.