Luke 15, mostly the last one

Luke 15:11 - 32

The younger son "came to his senses". We would say say he lost his mind. He is going to give up his pride. He is going to grovel before his father. How many of us would continue to resist? We would seek another job before we groveled before our fathers. Or we take the anonymous way and apply for a government handout.

We are quick to think of this as God the Father, the all knowing God. But in this story Jesus never refers to him as God the father. All three of these parables are about the excitement of finding precious things. In this last one it is a precious person. The father knows him as precious. All of us know our children as precious. But many fathers may not be as willing to show it quite as openly or as extravagantly as this father does. I don't think I would. It would be there in my heart I think mixed with other emotions.

But in this story Jesus is using the example of an earthy father. So in this story how much does the father know? How much does he know of his mental state? He does not let him finish his speech. Is he simply very glad to see his son and no more? At least on the surface this is not about salvation. We quickly jump to that. Let us get back to the original story. It is about getting back a son that is lost.

The son went away and has not been heard from. The father has to be afraid he is dead. He has been worrying, perhaps praying. I think about parents who saw their children go off to the New World 200 to 300 years ago. They would be saying goodbye never expecting to see them again. There was no regular mail, communication would be at best slow, taking months. The parents would never know how they got on. How hard that would be!

We think of sibling rivalry to explain the younger son's urge to leave. Did he not really understand how much his father loved him? Did he think he father favored the eldest?

Yes we do see this as Jesus showing us the attitude of God the Father through this small family tragedy. This is about a loving heavenly Father. Perhaps we can never imagine our earthly father doing such things, being so overjoyed to see us, hugging us, giving us a welcome home party. But our heavenly Father is like that. Jesus is telling us so.

Let us keep that in mind and remind one another of it.

Blue Bible version of Luke 15 (NIV)