+Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
I would like for you to do a little exercise with me this morning. So if you would, please close your eyes for me. Tell me, how often in your house have you heard these words: “Mom, Dad, I really messed up.” Or “Hey, that’s not fair!” As a fairly recent teenager –give or take 13, 15 or even 17 years—I was moody as I was petulant and easily offended by any affront to my intelligence or my perceived maturity, I very often found myself on both sides of the fence; alternately blaming myself and blaming my parents. I am positive that in several of my far-distant memories I was both the recalcitrant, returning prodigal as well as the pious, obedient, and indignant child who stayed at home all in the same event! I am fully aware that with the coming of our baby boy in June, I too will eventually be subjected to the very same gripes and apologies as my parents were. Our lives are full of scenarios like our Gospel lesson, what’s traditionally called the Story of the Prodigal son. Our lives are chock-full of scenarios like today’s lesson where we find ourselves in triangulated conflicts whether they are within our families, workplaces or classrooms.
I confess that I may be revealing my ignorance by admitting this, but for years I took for granted the definition of the word prodigal. In my mind when I heard ‘Prodigal Son’ I assumed that it meant the repentant or penitential or confessing son. But no, here is the definition of the word prodigal according the Oxford American Dictionary:
1 spending money or resources freely and recklessly; wastefully extravagant
2 having or giving something on a lavish scale
All these years I had incorrectly assumed this word had good and pleasant connotations—you know, the type of connotations fitfully appropriate for Lent!
So, with this definition in mind, who is the prodigal in this story? A. Katherine Grieb, professor of New Testament at Virginia Theological Seminary, challenges our assumptions by her proposition that the true prodigal in our story of the Prodigal Son isn’t the son at all. The true person acting recklessly or extravagant, the one who gives on such a lavish scale is the Father of these two sons.
But think about that: Who else but the Father would be so reckless as to be willing to stand firm in the maelstrom, the uncomfortable situation of divisive family issues and having the ability to love and forgive both sons. The Father is the one willing to live lovingly faithful with both the repentant son as well as the self-righteous son who chose to stay at home. Not to worry the older son, the one who stayed wasn’t missing out on a single thing. He was still going to receive the remaining 2/3 of the fathers’ estate. He was still benefiting from his birthright as well as living into his fathers’ admiration. The father in great joy welcomed back his younger son. He was over-flowing with the most reckless of all virtues: unconditional love for the sake of reconciliation.
Professor Grieb is on the money here. Look at all our other readings appointed for today. Our Story of faith doesn’t end at repentance, like the son who returned home, nor does our faith end in self-assured piety and slavish loyalty for the sake of loyalty, like the son who stayed. The truest essence, the distillation, the crux of our faith lies with the path of the Prodigal Father.
Look at our Story from the Old Testament. Joshua and the second and third generations of Israel’s children in the wilderness have had their last taste of manna. Remember that things had not been all rosy-posey and nicey-nice during their forty years in the Wilderness. They were in the wilderness because they were being punished; yet Yahweh out of reckless and abundant love showered down food from heaven throughout the entirety of their punishment. Yet even as they ate the manna the Israelites still complained, and God went further and gave them birds to eat. And when they complained about the birds and the manna, Yahweh went abundantly further and gave them water from stones. Time and time again, throughout the duration of the Israelite’s incarceration in the Wilderness, God continued to provide food for them; despite their complaints and their erring ways.
Look also at our epistle appointed for today. It doesn’t get much clearer than what St. Paul states to the Church in Corinth:
“If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us…. be reconciled to God.”
2nd Corinthians. 5:17-20, emphasis by Walters
The father of these sons in our Gospel lesson counted neither the trespasses of the returning son, nor did he count the complaints of his faithful son. Instead he sought reconciliation, peace in his household, love at any cost.
Professor Grieb states that Jesus tells a parable with a formula that intends fully to “blow [black and white, good and evil] thinking right out of the water” or what she calls this ‘binary thinking’—for you non-computer people binary programming is a simplistic series of zeroes and ones. Jesus intends fully to shake up the system and expectations of the faithful by showing that there is a reckless third way to go, a new way to live and a new way to love. And in that ‘third route’ the only conformity called for in our faith of Jesus Christ is the wide-cut parameter to seek God in all people. We are instructed to forgive others with the abundance that we have been forgiven. We are called as Christ’s apostles to rain mercy and forgiveness with the manna-like abundance that we were given in our wildernesses. We are commanded to give back the prodigious mercy that we have been given. And when we have given back, forgiven, and shown mercy we are to give thanks and to celebrate in this life.
For centuries this Sunday, the fourth Sunday in Lent, went by the Latin name of laetare. It is actually a command to you and me. Laetare means Rejoice! Rejoice because we have been recklessly gifted by our original Prodigal, Jesus. Rejoice because we have been lavishly equipped to carry-on Christ’s mission to love. Rejoice because in a world of perceived binary rights and wrongs; our Saviour Christ the prodigious Prodigal has shown us that in the eyes of God many of our perceptions are turned upside-down. After all in Christ the first shall be last, the last shall be first, and the meek shall inherit the Earth. “Be glad, you righteous, and rejoice in the LORD, shout for joy, all who are true of heart” (Psalm. 32:12).
Laetare! Rejoice!
A. Katherine Grieb, ‘The Real Prodigal,’ The Christian Century, March 9, 2004, p. 21.
