Today’s world may seem a lot different than the one in which the Bible was written. For that reason many people discard the scriptures as irrelevant. I have found in my life that they are as current as today’s headlines.
Reading the scriptures properly opens up a whole world of understanding to us. Part of reading them properly is to seek for all the meanings found in them.
One passage struck me a few days ago. It was Jesus’ story of a father and two sons. I will let him tell it to you:
Luke 15:11-35
New Living Translation (NLT)
Parable of the Lost Son
11 To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. 12 The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.
13 “A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. 14 About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. 15 He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. 16 The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.
17 “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! 18 I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, 19 and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.”’
20 “So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. 21 His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.[a]’
22 “But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. 23 And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, 24 for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began.
25 “Meanwhile, the older son was in the fields working. When he returned home, he heard music and dancing in the house, 26 and he asked one of the servants what was going on. 27 ‘Your brother is back,’ he was told, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf. We are celebrating because of his safe return.’
28 “The older brother was angry and wouldn’t go in. His father came out and begged him, 29 but he replied, ‘All these years I’ve slaved for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to. And in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends. 30 Yet when this son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the fattened calf!’
31 “His father said to him, ‘Look, dear son, you have always stayed by me, and everything I have is yours. 32 We had to celebrate this happy day. For your brother was dead and has come back to life! He was lost, but now he is found!’”
One obvious meaning in the parable is about the father’s love for his son who was lost.
For many of us this story has a deep emotional connection to us because we, like the prodigal, went out and wasted all our heavenly father provided for us. We spent it in reckless abandon as if there was no tomorrow.
As well, many of us came to the realization of what we had done only after seeing pigs having a better life than ours. We came to ourselves and realized those who stayed in our father’s house were still taken care of. In a deep moment of regret we returned to our home and were welcomed back with open arms -- even if some of our near kin were not so happy with us coming back.
We also had in the story a reason to feel a measure of animosity against those who were not so quick to overlook our offenses. God Loves us! God does not condemn us. How dare you not join our party?
But a second look at the whole story gives me a bit different insight. Not that those meanings I have mentioned are not valid.
Biblical interpretation correctly done looks at all the messages of a text. To say that once we have a clear meaning it is the only intended meaning leaves us missing many wonderful things God wants to say to us.
The father does not berate the elder brother for not wanting to join the party. He knows what his son said was true. He appeals for him to realize what has happened. His brother, who his father loved as much as him, had come home. One who was dead to the father and to the family was now alive.
The father also pointed out that all along the brother enjoyed his father’s full provision:
31 “His father said to him, ‘Look, dear son . . . everything I have is yours.
I suppose many of us have thought that there was a full restoration of the father’s remaining estate to the prodigal. There wasn’t. The estate had already been divided. The son would never regain his father’s wealth that had been lost. The elder brother continued to own what was given to him at the division that happened before the prodigal left.
12 The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.
The prodigal had said he was willing to return to his father’s house and become a hired slave and that in fact was what he would be concerning his provision. Anything he would gain would be due to his work for his father and his elder brother.
Any of us who look critically at those who never went astray and who today let us know that we are not worthy of the party the father gives us and that they certainly will not join it need to reconsider our stance. We are recipients of grace. We do not rightfully have a place in our father’s home. But we are given it just the same. Why? Because our father wants us to be in relationship with him.
In this last sentence lies what I believe is a wonderful other understanding of the parable.
The father did not actually have one prodigal son. He had two. Both misunderstood the purpose of their father’s provision. They thought it was to be for the meeting of their selfish desires.
We can see this easily in the prodigal who left but not so clearly in the prodigal who stayed. But it is there just as clearly.
28 “The older brother was angry and wouldn’t go in. His father came out and begged him, 29 but he replied, ‘All these years I’ve slaved for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to. And in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends. 30 Yet when this son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the fattened calf!’
There it is.... Slaving for the father.... the father not giving him a single party....
Somehow in a moment of failed understanding the elder brother forgot he owned everything that was given to him at the time the younger brother left home. The father no doubt went on to make a good living but told the son everything that he had was his. The son was not slaving for the father he was working for himself. The father had already given everything up for both his sons.
How sad when we do not understand this. Our father has given EVERYTHING he can or ever will give. He is not the one who holds back. He would have a party for us every day. And those who have understood his extravagant love have a continual feast with him. It is us who determines if we will have the party. But the issue is not really about parties. It was about a glaring lack in both sons.
Both children valued the father for his provision and nothing else.
You see if the elder brother valued him for his love he would have remembered seeing his father grieving daily after the lost brother. He would have known that all the money in the world meant nothing to his dad as long as his little brother was living as he did.
Far from being angry with his father he would have been so grateful that this man who had loved him and provided for him so generously throughout his life was now happy. He was happy because his son was back from the dead.
The elder brother saw the pain of his father’s heart but thought nothing of it. In the place of compassion for his father was a deep seated bitterness that blinded him not only to all that his father had given him but also to the prodigal state of his own heart.
He had obeyed. He had worked hard. But he had not loved his father. If he had of he would have welcomed his brother with the same joy as his dad if for no other reason than knowing what a relief it would have been to his father.
As I have pondered these things over the last few weeks I have come to see that many of us never understand the deeper place to which God is continually calling us.
The father in the story valued the relationship he had with his sons. His wealth was only to demonstrate that value. What was important to him about his wealth was using it to build a relationship. He gave it all to build it with both.
To the younger brother he gave it so that when it ran out he would still know that he was loved even if he threw it all away.
I think the younger brother might have understood that but I am not sure. We are not told the rest of the story. Unfortunately I have seen the rest of the story many times where after the wandering one was helped he turned around and manifested the same bitterness that took him so far away in the first place. Usually the same root is involved. They fail to understand that it is about a relationship and not getting things from God they want.
If the younger brother thought coming back to dad was only a great way to improve his financial situation he would have never worked diligently. Nor would he have been forever in gratitude for the man who saved him from a life with the pigs. Generally those who are not grateful in this way sooner or later end up back with them.
For the prodigal to ever truly recover he would have needed to value his father for him alone. Not out of what he could get from him.
But we see the same issue in the elder brother. He presented his father as a slave labourer who was stingy and cheap. Yet his father had already given him everything he had.
The father gently pointed out the terrible flaw in both the sons as he pleaded with his eldest:
31 “His father said to him, ‘Look, dear son, you have always stayed by me. . . .
The elder son did not value the relationship he had with the father. He had always had the wonderful opportunity to be loved and to love his father. The younger brother lost that for years.
For both of sons their greatest loss was not material. They both had wasted precious years in blindness to what the most wonderful aspect of their lives was – the relationship they could have had with their father.
God help us not to do the same.
Mark 12:28-31
New American Standard Bible (NASB)
28 One of the scribes came and heard them arguing, and recognizing that He had answered them well, asked Him, “What commandment is the [a]foremost of all?” 29 Jesus answered, “The foremost is, ‘HEAR, O ISRAEL! THE LORD OUR GOD IS ONE LORD; 30 AND YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.’
2 comments:
Thanks Leonard for the new insight on this oh so familiar parable. :)
like you said, it's so easy to judge the prodigal son; and think that the older son was living right all along. He was in better standing, and never in any lack of provision...it's neat to think that when we have everything we need, there is still an attitude that can be improved. The flaws were not only in the prodigal's actions. Thanks for sharing.
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