What Is It That You Treasure?

 March 7 2021

Luke 15

         I have to say that I probably like football way too much because February has felt like a month long withdrawal period for me. I mean, now that there isn’t football to watch what I am supposed to let grab my attention? It doesn’t help that I am at the age where I have no patience for a lot of what is being promoted by all the streaming services. There is nothing fun about realizing that you have wasted two precious hours of your life because you took the bait and watched what was supposed to be a really great show. So, after much searching I’ve settled for watching murder mystery shows from the BBC of all things. One of the things I enjoy about them is that for the most part the characters all have a high degree of civility which is kind of refreshing these days. But really draws me in is how the detectives have to sort through all the various clues and subjects to figure out just who really is the guilty party. I wondered just why I found this so appealing and then one day it hit me that this searching through clues to figure out the mystery of the truth is really what I do any time I encounter the stories of the scriptures.

         Nowhere is this searching and being patient in trying to determine the truth more needed than in stories like our story for today, the story of the Prodigal Son. We have to be so grateful for Luke because he alone has given us such great stories such as this one and the story of the Good Samaritan because these stories stir in the hearts of people in such a way that they have become well known stories in the general public where those who know them may not even realize where these stories have come from. That stories such as the Prodigal Son are so well known can be thought of as being a good thing but this universal knowledge could also be a two-edged sword, in that being so well known people may think they know what this story is about but in all reality they may very well not have a clue as to the story’s true intent. I mean think about it, as the title implies, the story is about a son but in fact the story is actually about two sons and in the context in which the story is told it is actually the other son, the older one that the story is all about. The story has also been labeled with this adjective, prodigal, which is a word that few people even know what it means. What prodigal means is someone who spends lavishly and wastefully. In our every day language we might say that prodigal is a person who spends money like its going out of style.That being said it seems like the whole focus is on this one son who is a big spender yet we have to ask ourselves is this what the story is all about? Is this the truth of the story which Jesus told or perhaps is the real truth of this story found by looking at the clues that may have been missed in our haste of believing that we already know exactly what this story is all about. I have seen from watching murder mystery shows that this is a very dangerous thing to do.

         Another important part of the story that cannot be forgotten is its context. Jesus told this story on his way to Jerusalem where as he told his disciples he was to suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed and on the third day, be raised. And further, Jesus tells us that all who follow him must deny themselves take up their cross daily and follow him. In other words, not only is there a cross for Jesus there is a cross for us as well. This is the reason for this Lenten season that we are in, a time to examine ourselves to see if, as we have spoken of earlier, our roots go deep in our faith of God so that when tribulation and suffering come that we do not wither away in the heat of the moment. This is what Jesus teaches us in his parable of the sower. After we receive his word with joy we must then put our roots deep in our trust of God so that by faith we can endure all the way to the end and not stumble when called to suffer on account of the word. We have to keep this in mind as we read the story of what we call the Prodigal Son.

         With all that in mind, let’s try and listen to the story of the Prodigal Son as if for the first time. The story begins with Luke telling us that the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to Jesus. Now, we can read this rather matter-of-factly, oh, yes, those tax collectors, those sinners, but doesn’t everyone have a list of people who are in that category? I mean for us it is not tax collectors but drawing near to tax season we may want to put the IRS in this category. But if you stop and think about just who is the worst person you can think this is who you should put in the story here in order to understand just what the big deal was with the Pharisees and the scribes, the upright, uptight so called good people who were absolutely not one of the sinners.A few weeks ago we read from the eighth chapter of Isaiah of how skandalon was a stone that stuck up out of the ground that a person tripped on and how Isaiah described God as being such a stone for some people. This is what we are seeing with these Pharisees and scribes who thought they had God all figured out. If God was with Jesus and if God really didn’t mind hanging out with those kinds of people, then this was something about God that was going to make them get tripped up and do a header into the pavement. Jesus, of course, knew this that is why he stops his journey for a little storytelling.

         The stories Jesus begins with all center on the theme of lost and found. The first story is about a lost coin. Now, most of us wouldn’t get too excited about finding any coins which got lost in the couch cushions except if we had a sudden craving for something off the dollar menu but if instead, we had lost a twenty dollar bill or a check someone had paid us with, yes, we might get seriously our search for it. 

         The second story Jesus tells is about a lost sheep which most of us can’t relate to because most of us don’t have any sheep that could get lost. But if we remember that sheep in those days were very much like pets to their owners again we instantly understand what the search is all about. Our dog, Mazy, who rules our house came up missing a while back and it was a horrible experience. I had been out working on our driveway and had gone to the shed to get a shovel and of course she tagged along and then I finished up my work, put the shovel away and went into the house and it dawned on me that Mazy was no longer shadowing me about. So, I waited a couple of hours because she sometimes goes on extended travels, but when it was going on four hours since her appearance, I knew something was wrong. So, yes, much like the lost sheep, I searched everywhere, walking more than I have in a long time but having no luck finding her whereabouts. Exhausted, I returned home and laid down for a bit, pretty upset having no clue what might have happened to her. Our son, Matt came and continued the search and he searched around the house, and in doing so he heard a very faint cry coming from the shed. Apparently Mazy had gone in there to hunt for the critter eating my grass seed and I shut the door on her not realizing she had gone in there. So, yes there was much rejoicing when what was lost was finally found.

         So, after these two stories for a warm up to the main event, Jesus finally gets to the grand finally, a story of a father with two, not one, sons.As we listen to this story with fresh ears we must ask ourselves just what has been lost and subsequently, what has been found? Let’s not just jump to conclusions but in the fashion of the best of all murder mysteries let’s let all the clues be found and then and only then should we render a verdict. The story begins with the younger son, going to his father, and asking his father for the share of the property that is coming to him. This sounds simple enough until we realize that what he is asking for is his inheritance, something that would only be given to him upon the death of his father. Are you beginning to see what is being implied here? The son is in essence telling his father, I wish you were dead so that I might receive what is going to be mine. To put it in our language, he was telling his Dad to “drop dead”. I can only imagine the collective gasp of the crowd as they heard the son’s request. Now, if the son’s request was not shocking enough the father’s response was perhaps even more shocking because instead of giving the son a smack upside the head, the father gives in to the son’s request. The father divides up the property and then sells the property in order to give the son his share. This would a great travesty in that day because a person’s property was a sacred trust given to one’s family when they had entered into the Promised Land.Yet, even so the father went ahead and fulfilled the wish of his younger son. So, this son has this pretty big wad of cash and so he heads off to spend it like there was no tomorrow, what we might say was spending it in a prodigal manner. We are not shocked then to hear Jesus tell us that soon the money was gone. Those in the crowd must have cheered when they had heard of this son’s demise. If it wasn’t bad enough that the son was broke, we are also told that a famine came across the country he was in so it wasn’t like he could find a job anywhere. Finally, he took a job tending pigs, which to a Jewish boy was about as low as you could go. And not only that, he was so hungry that the pig food was looking pretty good. Well, at this point he begins to come to his senses and he thinks, why am I here starving when I know that my Dad’s servants have got plenty to eat. Why don’t I just go home and ask my Dad to hire me on so that I can begin to pay him back what I owe him. Now, he knows this is a long shot because he had treated his Dad pretty badly when he had left.

         At this point I imagine the crowd is thinking that this story is a pretty good tale, the young arrogant kid gets what he deserves and what they hope is that after he travels home his Father will at last do what he should have done and kick his son to the curb, or worse. But yet again, the story takes a dramatic unexpected twist. Jesus tells them that when the son is a long way off that the father sees him and he is jumping off the porch and he is sprinting down the road, his long robe hiked up so he doesn’t trip, his bare legs exposed for all to see. You see, the elders, such as the father never ran; they moved with poise and the weight of their position. So, why in the world is the father doing such a thing? Well, what isn’t obvious to us was probably evident to those first listeners to this story of Jesus. What Jesus doesn’t speak of that everyone would have known about is the community in which this father and his sons were a part of. The community, this village, knew that they were the ones who had a responsibility to keep order. They would have no trouble remembering that in the twenty first chapter of Deuteronomy that if a family had a son who was stubborn and rebellious, someone who was obviously a glutton and a drunkard that they could bring that son before the community and the community would stone them to death. Yes, it seems harsh, but it was a way for a community to keep order, to keep son’s from becoming a disgrace not only to their parents but also their community. So, the father has to run and meet the son before he gets to the village gates or there was a good chance that they would take care of the son as they had wanted to do so for a long time. The father does not want harm to come to his son so he reaches his son while on the road. As Jesus tells us, the father felt compassion, the word in Greek meaning to hurt in your guts, this is depths of this father’s love for his son. The son at this moment reaches in his pocket with his little speech all prepared, and begins, “Father…”, but surprisingly the father could care less. The father instead calls for his servants to bring the best robe, bring a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. This is the father’s way of telling the community, through which they must pass to go back home, that they are not to lay a hand upon the son as the son has been accepted back by the father and the fathers mark is upon the son.

         Now it is right here that I believe we should hit the pause button on our story to think about what just happened. Have you figured out what was lost but now is found? Most of the time people will just go, duh, this is a no brainer, it’s the father who has lost his son and now has found him. But, in the other stories, the one who has lost a coin or a sheep, they are the ones who got up and went searching for it. The father never went in search of his son, though; isn’t that interesting. No, I believe that it was the son who realized that he had lost something, that he had lost the most precious thing that he had ever had, his relationship with his father. When the son realized his loss, he decided to go and see if he could find this relationship even if upon finding that relationship he would be a servant because a relationship with his father meant that at least he would have enough to eat. There is the tension of not knowing if he would find this relationship because of the mess he had made when he had left but even so he had to go and search for it because it was what he valued most. Now, another thing which becomes evident is that the son’s confession of wrong doesn’t even play a part in the story. No, we might say that forgiveness actually comes before any acknowledgement on the son’s part. We might say that the father, portraying God, offers forgiveness even before there is sin to be forgiven. In other words, forgiveness has always been a possibility because of God being a God of steadfast love and faithfulness. Because God is responsible for our care he loves us whether we love him or we don’t. This is what we see when the rebellious son returns home and his father wraps his arms around his son and kisses his son’s neck. The father does so because this is who he is not because of anything on the part of the son. One more thing we learn from the story so far is that the father protects the son, at a cost of shame to himself, in order that the son might live. The community represents the law; the father represents mercy and grace. The community represents what the son deserved; the father represents the unexpected gift that saves his son. When the father states that the son was dead but is now alive this was more than just a metaphorical statement. The reality is that the son was in grave danger had the father not intervened.

         Well, all is well, the story ends with a party and an abundance of roast beef sandwiches for all. Or is there more. If we stop here it would be like telling a joke without the punchline.  It is this last part that is the reason for the whole story. Jesus tells us that while the fathers party for his son was going on the older son was out in the field. When the older son found out about the party, the older son was angry and refused to go in. Right here we must again pause the story. Do you see that now it is the older son who is being the rebellious disobedient son? In response to this flagrant anger at his father, the father does the unexpected. Instead of telling his servants to grab his older son by the scruff of the neck and drag him to the party, the father himself goes to the son and pleads for him to come and celebrate. When the older son responds he tells his father what a fine son he has been, how little he has ever asked for from his father, a certain dig against his brother who had asked for his full inheritance. Not only that but the older brother also slanders his younger brother accusing him of spending his money on prostitutes. What becomes clear is that what bothers this older brother is that the younger brother had not received what was demanded by the law, a certain death. Yet what the older son does not realize is that ironically enough, that because of his rebellion at his fathers orders to come to the party, it is now he, the older son who stands under the same judgment as his brother. The only difference is that through his actions, the older son proves that he treasures the law and judgment more than he treasures the relationship with his father.In refusing his father’s pleading, the older brother remains under judgment while the younger son who had found the treasure he had lost stands forgiven. The older son who had always been with the father never knew what a treasure he had so it was never apparent that he had ever lost this most precious gift. 

         So, what is the message we need as we prepare for the cross? The message is that the treasure we should always seek for is the treasure of a relationship with our Heavenly Father; this is the treasure worth giving our very life for. And secondly, the only thing that can keep us from experiencing the joy of our fathers forgiveness is our own refusal to forgive those we feel are unworthy of being forgiven and in doing so we will find ourselves standing out side the joy of eternal life. Amen!