Hi First Presbyterian,
It's time for our Mid-Week Meet-Up! I love the Parable of the Prodigal Son from Luke 15:11-32. However, I’m not really sure the focus of the parable is on the prodigal son, as much as it is on the son’s father. I think the parable should, instead, be called the Parable of the Magnanimous Father. With Father’s Day approaching, I think this is a wonderful parable on which to reflect.

If you look closely, you’ll notice that in Luke chapter 15, Luke puts three parables together that each have to do with losing something and then finding it. Luke compiles for us the Parable of the Lost Sheep (vv. 3-7), the Parable of the Lost Coin (vv. 8-10), and then the Parable of the Prodigal Son (vv. 11-32). In each parable, something is lost and found (a sheep, a coin, and a son - respectively), and then we’re told about the reaction of the one who had lost it (a shepherd, a woman, and a father – respectively). I think (generally speaking) these parables are supposed to be stories about our relationship with God, to the extent that, in each parable, the thing that is lost represents us and the one who lost it represents God. However, I don’t believe the point of the parable is about us – per se – but about God. I believe Jesus told these parables in order to teach us something about God, and what he teaches is actually kind of radical.

Consider the Parable of the Lost Sheep. A shepherd has one hundred sheep and loses one. In the parable, the shepherd then leaves the ninety-nine sheep in the desert and goes to find the one lost sheep. This parable is so familiar to most of us that we simply nod our head along as the story is told, without realizing that Jesus is actually saying something very ridiculous! The Judean desert is a very unforgiving place. It’s blazing hot. You or your sheep could easily, in a day, die of exhaustion. You or your sheep could fall to your death off the side of any number of steep rock faces. You or your sheep could be bitten by a poisonous desert reptile and die. And then there are the jackals, who would gladly eat you or your sheep. Shepherds were working to make a living, and their livelihood was invested in their sheep’s health. As a business owner, a shepherd had to do a cost-benefit analysis of his entire flock if he lost any of them. In the Parable of the Lost Sheep, the cost-benefit analysis leads to a very clear solution: Do not go after that one lost sheep! The shepherd should just cut his losses and leave well-enough alone. He would not only be risking his own life but also the lives of the ninety-nine sheep by leaving them unattended in the desert to go after the one lost sheep. Ancient listeners to the parable probably would have thought, “Jesus, it’s ridiculous to suggest that a shepherd would go after the one lost sheep!” And that’s exactly the reaction Jesus wanted to evoke from his listeners! Here’s the point that Jesus wants to make: God pursues with reckless abandon even those that the rest of us have written off as “too far gone” or as “not worth” saving! God’s love is radical and effusive.

The point is the same in the Parable of the Prodigal Son. After the son returns from wasting away his father’s inheritance, his father welcomes him with a lavish party. In ancient Israel, no father would have been expected to do such a thing for a child who treated him with such humiliation, disregard, and disrespect. The father in this parable is magnanimous and even recklessly loving.

As Father’s Day approaches, let me encourage those of you who are fathers to believe that our own children need to know that God’s love is like this, and the best way to teach them that lesson is to love them that way ourselves. Let’s be merciful, bighearted, accepting, and kind.

As Father’s Day approaches, I know that many of you are missing your fathers, your husbands, or your children. What Jesus tells us in these parables is that grief cannot push us beyond God’s attention. God sees you, feels your emptiness, and is pursuing you relentlessly. You are loved and not alone.

Peace to you,

Pastor Aaron