Week 12 (The Teaching Of Jesus) – Day 5: Lost & Found

Day 60 – Lost & Found – Luke 15:1-32

The son rolls in from college.  “Hey dad, you may live another forty years, but I want my inheritance now!  I have a number here I calculated based on your financial and real estate holdings.  Fork over half.  The father goes to his financial advisor and splits all of his holdings between his two sons. He hands over both halves.  The son who initially asked his father for the money, takes off to Amsterdam where he loses hundreds of thousands of dollars in the infamous red light district.  His situation becomes so bad that he even pays off some debts by working for a heroin import gang.  Then he remembers home.  Maybe I should go home…. How do you think the father will respond?

Listeners hearing Jesus tell this story know how it will end.  Middle Eastern society then and to a great extent today, is based on family honor.  The son has dishonored the father.  When he comes home, the father has every right to kill the son.  End of story.

But that is not what the father does!  In this story we see God’s loves played out for each one of us.  Grace and mercy will abound with no end.  If you don’t understand how to tell someone about Jesus and how he reveals the Father to all, read this story to them.  The entire gospel is here in a few verses.  Not how the father runs (a very dishonorable action) and embraces his son, before the son says anything.  His rehearsed words have no effect on the father’s loving actions.

We call this parable the Prodigal Son but the center of action lies around the father.  God is much more interested in reconciliation than punishment.  We all wonder off to our land of sin.  But God through Jesus will bring us home to the celebration.  We can never do many bad things or too few good things to miss basking in the steadfast love of God.

In Christ,

Randy