Submitted by admin on Mon, 07/18/2011 - 9:04am
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Jesus' story of the two sons (Luke 15:11-32) tells us how each went his own way—though they were very different from each other, even opposite.
The younger brother went to a distant country; the older brother went to work at home in his father's fields. In the end they both faced disappointment:
- The younger brother was disappointed when his rebellion caused such devastating consequences and he ended up broken and ruined, living in a pig pen.
- The older brother was disappointed his slaving in the fields didn't produce the rewards he expected and he ended up angry and frustrated, unable to enjoy his father's love and grace.
Both sons belonged back home with their father. Both sons needed a new perspective—a radical new understanding of their father. And both sons needed the love their father wanted to give; they needed a relationship with their father.
We all need what they needed! Whether we've wandered to a distant country or slaved in the fields, we need to come home. We need to return to a relationship with our Father!
The human condition, Timothy Keller says, is that "We are all exiles, always longing for home. We are always traveling, never arriving." [Timothy Keller, The Prodigal God, p 95]
We say there is "no place like home"; it is, after all, "home, sweet home." Have you ever felt homesick? You've been away, traveling in distant places, perhaps living in another state or country. You've been too long in an unfamiliar place, with strange people, dealing with unusual customs. If we feel this way in the natural, you can be sure it also happens in the spiritual.
The desire for "home"—this spiritual homesickness is an intense yearning that draws us back to where we belong. It is God's way of working in our hearts. "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him" (John 6:44). God "woos" us! He pulls on our heart strings to bring us back home.
Why do we sense this spiritual longing? Why do we feel spiritually homesick? For several reasons:
1. We are made in the image of God. There is within every human heart a deep longing to return home to the Father. Even if it's unrecognized, even if it is misguided as we try to satisfy the longing in wrong ways, it is a desire that is hard-wired within us.
One of the early church leaders, Augustine, wrote: "You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are rest-less till they find their rest in you." [Confessions and Enchiridion]
You've heard of the God-shaped vacuum within each person? Seventeenth-century philosopher Blaise Pascal wrote: "What else does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace? This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words by God himself." [Pensees, 10.148]
In other words, we are hard-wired with a need and a desire to escape the clutches of the world and return to the divine image in which we were created.
A few years ago I read about some scientists [Rockefeller University in Manhattan] who discovered they could teach false songs to young male canaries. Incubated and raised in a laboratory, isolated from adult canaries, the young birds never heard their real song. Instead, they learned a computer-generated song with no resemblance to the song their father normally would have taught them.
One morning, however, the scientists were amazed to arrive at the lab and discover that the birds, on the brink of adulthood, were chirping like canaries! They were singing the song they were supposed to sing—even though they had never heard it before.
One scientist [Timothy Gardner, now at MIT] said that though they had succeeded in leading the birds astray, "...the innate learning system must be so strong that the real song breaks through anyway." After that the canaries sang like canaries—though occasionally they also dabbled with one of the false songs the scientists gave them.
The same is true for us! It doesn't matter how far from home we go. It doesn't matter how distant we are from the Father. And it doesn't matter what false songs the world may force upon us. We are made in the image of God! We were destined to sing his song!
"[God] has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men..." (Eccl 3:11).
We may wander and follow the world. We may be influenced by our surroundings. We may sing the wrong song and drift from the melody God intended for us. But deep down inside, there is an innate longing, an inner yearning to return to the Father and sing his song. God draws us home because we are made in his image. ["Birds know mating songs by instinct, study finds" by Jamie Talan (Newsday) in the Duluth News Tribune (May 15, 2005).]
You may have experienced this for yourself—an instinctive longing for the higher purposes for which God made you! You were made in the image of God!
2. We were created to be in fellowship with God. God's plan for us was that we would enjoy an intimate relationship with him. No wonder we cannot shake this inner spiritual longing for home! From the time God placed Adam in the Garden, his intention was to have relationship with us.
But humanity rebelled against the Father's authority (even though his "rules" were for our protection—not our frustration). Because we rebelled we were banished from the Garden. Our sins cut us off from the Father.
Adam was expelled from the Garden, cut off from fellowship with the Father, and as Timothy Keller says, we've wandered as spiritual exiles ever since.
In this fallen world we strive to survive. We work hard, trying to succeed. We fight against the consequences of sin, but no matter what we learn, no matter what advances we make, the problems and consequences of sin remain with us: disease, brokenness, death, and decay.
Perhaps you know these consequences all too well! You've experienced them.
3. We live in a broken world. This world suffers from the consequences of the Fall. Romans tells us: "...everything on earth was subjected to God's curse. All creation anticipates the day when it will join God's children in glorious freedom from death and decay." (Romans 8:20-21, NLT)
We desperately long to put things right. Spiritually, we desire to return home, but in this world we are thwarted in our efforts to fix this world's problems. Our hopes and dreams for something better are never realized in the natural.
The story of spiritual exile began with Adam and Eve, but the theme reverberates through history:
Cain murdered his brother and was forced to wander the earth; Jacob cheated his brother and had to flee to another country; famine forced Jacob's family to live in Egypt where they became slaves; Israel proved unfaithful to God and was taken captive to Babylon.
Jesus' story of the younger brother in a distant land, wallowing in the consequences of his own rebellion, desperately wanting to return home, is the story of the human race. It's the story of each one of us who live in a broken world.
Timothy Keller writes, "It is no coincidence that story after story contains the pattern of exile. The message of the Bible is that the human race is a band of exiles trying to come home." [Timothy Keller, The Prodigal God, p 97-98]
God's Word says: "...they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth...looking for a country of their own... longing for a better country—a heavenly one" (Heb 11:13-16).
So what can we do? Keller says this spiritual longing will never be fulfilled in this life by our human effort because this brokenness is both in us and around us:
(1) The brokenness within us. Both brothers were broken on the inside, in their character! The younger brother was selfish and rebellious; the older brother was proud and self-righteous. We all have internal spiritual conflict where our human nature fights against God's Spirit (see Gal 5:13-18, 24-26). But there is more to deal with...
(2) The brokenness around us. Sin has devastated God's creation! Disasters, disease, death, and decay are not what we were made for—and until we are released from the natural order of things, until we are emancipated from the power of sin, we can only yearn for God's supernatural order. We can never escape on our own.
But there is Good News! Jesus left his home in heaven to be with us in our spiritual wanderings (with "no place to lay his head" [Matt 8:20]); to be forsaken "My God...why have you forsaken me?" [Matt 27:46]), so he could bring us home to the Father.
Jesus came to rescue younger brothers, caught in the pig pens of their own addictions and wasted lives. He also came to plead with older brothers, trapped in their self-righteous slavery and offense, begging them to put aside their judgmental ways and come home.
Both brothers need to come home, to be healed of the brokenness within their souls, to understand the father, to receive his lavish, extravagant love and escape the brokenness around them.
In Jesus' story both brothers were surprised—shocked—at their father's response!
- The younger brother was overwhelmed by his father's love and grace. The older brother was frustrated by his father's love and grace.
- The younger brother was forgiven by his father and welcomed home. The older brother was hurt—he felt cheated—by his father's disregard for justice; he felt rejected when his brother was welcomed; he felt offended when the sinner was shown grace.
Look at what overwhelmed the younger brother—and offended the older brother:
1.
The
Father's compassion. "Loving pity" (LB) in original Gr is
a word [splagchnizomai] literally
meaning "to be moved in the inward parts." One version (NET) says: "his heart
went out to him." We speak today of a "gut-wrenching" experience or a
"gut-feeling" about something.
The father saw something in his son
that caused a physical visceral response within him. He son had swaggered away;
but now he staggered home. He had left with a fortune; he returned with nothing.
The father saw his son—broken, dejected, humbled—and his heart went out to
him in compassion.
Our
Father in heaven sees what you've gone through—and his heart goes out to you
as well.
2.
The
Father runs. It was considered undignified for a
community leader or an older man to act like a child—to gather up his robes, to
bare his legs, and run with abandon. But this father ran!
It was undignified for Jesus to go to the
cross, to take its shame, to pay for our sin. Yet God's love
is so strong that he runs! His heart
of love yearns for us—and he is unashamed about it.
3.
The
Father embraces. The father hugged his wayward son, even
with the filth and smell of the barnyard still upon him. Some think they need to
clean up their act before they return—but they can't! Sin contaminates
completely.
But when we turn our hearts toward home, God
longs to pull us close into his arms! Jesus
cleanses us from all sin. "God made him who
had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might
become the righteousness of God" (2 Cor 5:21).
Song: "Just as I am without one plea..."
4.
The
Father clothes. He called the servants to bring the "best"
robe (not just any robe)—either the father's own robe or one reserved for
honor guests.
We
are "clothed with Christ" (Gal 3:27). When the Father sees the repentant
sinner, he sees the
righteousness of God in Christ. Sinners
who come to God for forgiveness are covered in God's
righteousness. He removes the filthy rags of
sin and shame. He covers us with a robe of
righteousness.
5.
The
Father empowers. Some think the "ring on his finger"
was very possibly the signet ring used to seal transactions and business deals,
as if to say the family resources were placed again at his disposal. As if to
say, "I give you back your position and status. You represent the family." But
even if not, the ring represented his status as a son and not a servant. That's
also seen in the call for sandals for his feet—servants were barefoot; sons
had shoes.
Undeserving though we are, God gives
his children the keys to the kingdom (Matt 16:19). "He has
given us his very great and precious
promises...[that] you may participate in the divine nature..."
(2 Peter 1:4).
6.
The
Father feeds. "Kill the fatted calf!" Bring out the best
food and let's celebrate!
God
nourishes our famished souls with the most succulent, the finest of foods! (Luke
13:29; Rev
19:9) At a wedding feast, you don't
just open a bag of chips and pass it around. First the Father
gives
us the Bread of Life, but then he invites us to a great feast, to a blow-out
celebration to end
all celebrations!
7.
The
Father rejoices. The older brother knew something was
up because he heard music and dancing! There was rejoicing in the house!
The
Bible says, "The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take
great delight in
you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice* over you with singing" (Zeph
3:17). [*Hebrew
word could mean "to spin around (in a display
of great emotion)." Have you seen the commercials
for PCH? What do the winners do? They
celebrate! God rejoices and dances over you!] In fact, Jesus
says, the angels and all of heaven rejoice
more over one sinner who repents than over all those who
are doing just fine.
8. The Father pleads.
Everything up to now pertains to what overwhelmed younger brother and offended
the older brother. But this last act of the father pertains to the older
brother. The word "pleaded" is parakaléō
: "to call to...to exhort, to encourage." It comes from para (from, beside, by the side of—as in "parallel") and kaléō (to call). Imagine the father
coming alongside his son,
putting his arm around his shoulder, gently drawing him towards home, calling him—speaking urgently
and in his ear, begging him to "come on inside." The picture isn't just what
he said—it's how he said it.
God
pleads with us to understand his heart of love, to accept the infinite
measure of his grace.
The father loved his oldest son, and he wanted his son to understand his love. "My son" (you are mine...you belong in the family); "you are always with me" (you didn't wander off); "everything I have is yours" (joy and blessings you haven't yet tapped); "but we had to celebrate" (if you're with me, rejoice with me—love, accept, and forgive your brother).
Judgmental, critical older brothers are at risk because "...if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins" (Matt 6:15-16).
Notice that Jesus' story is open-ended! We don't hear what the older brother decided to do. Why? Because each one of us need to write the ending to the story. Jesus left it unfinished intentionally so the righteous, religious people could decide for themselves how they would finish it.
When our lives fall apart and we land in the pig pen, the younger brother side of our nature may quickly decide to turn to the Father and return home to feast at his table. We feel the pain and we want relief.
But our older brother side may have more difficulty in coming into the feast! It's hard to admit to pride over a righteousness life. We feel justified by our good behavior; we feel smug about "slaving away," being good, earning God's favor. Since we've been so obedient, we feel justified in wanting our "rights."
Jesus left the story unfinished so the older brothers listening to his story would have to choose between religion and relationship. Jesus begs us to come home; he pleads with us to come into the feast—to draw closer to God, to let love and grace fuel a deep relationship with the Father.
If we decide to come home to the Father and feast at the table, what happens? What changes for the younger brother? For the older brother? What does grace accomplish within our homesick hearts?
1. Our sins are forgiven.
2. Our past is forgotten.
3. Our brokenness is forfeited.
4. Our slavery is forbidden—we are no longer enslaved to doing good works for approval.
5. Our service is foretold. (Eph 2:8-10; 1 Cor 15:10; John 14:15,23; 15:4-5,9-10) Augustine said: "Love God...and do as you please."
6. Our destiny is for certain.
Do you need sins forgiven? Past forgotten? Slavery of good works forbidden?
Come home to the Father! Repent. Turn from your ways. Come sing his song and celebrate!