|
6-03-07: Love So Amazing: The Prodigal Son |
|
|
|
This week's sermon is entitled "Love so Amazing" taken from the 15th chapter of Luke. We're continuing our series on the New Testament passages that teach us about God's love for us.
Today we come to Jesus' parable of the Prodigal Son. I love the parable of the Lost Son or the Prodigal Son. It really speaks to us because each one of us is that son. This parable addresses God's love and the desire of God to have us in the family, but it also talks about the freedom we have to go out looking and exploring and trying out what's out there. Theologians talk about free will but it's dawning on me how important it is for us to know that we can check it out, test our wings, screw up and get mired in sin, so to speak. If we're not allowed that latitude, how will we ever come to know the difference between God's way and the temptations of the world.
God gives us free will and it really is free. We get to go as far as we need to go and God has to know that some will never make it back before it's too late. But if we have a leash on us, even a really long one, we're not really free. And if we're not free, the ultimate desire to conform to God's image is not a free choice at all. The desire to get right with God, like the desire of the Lost Son to return home, is only meaningful if it comes from the choice born of other experiences.
Luke writes Jesus' words that the younger son 'squandered his wealth in wild living.' We can only imagine what the son did but it landed him in the middle of a famine slopping hogs, kind of a double downer for a Jewish kid. When he realized how far down he'd gone, 'he came to his senses' and went back to dad, tail between his legs, and expected to be treated like a servant or slave. Instead the dad saw him, rejoiced and poured out his love on the one who'd come home.
Again, God loves us and respects us enough to let us explore, to test the waters, so to speak. God wants us to be part of the family but most of us have had to get some education on the streets. God wants to put us back together the way we're supposed to be but He only wants to do it when we're ready for it. God's plan for our redemption (the theological term), meaning bringing us back to Him, includes our participation in the decision. This son had to test himself out in the world before he could know how good he had it back at dad's. And that's okay. He learned and he returned and dad celebrated. I can only imagine how much that dad wanted his son to come back. I think I get a picture of how much 'Abba' Father wants us to come back. But we have to want to and choose to.
The gates of the estate are open. One of the ways that we express that we choose to enter those gates is to share Communion together it's a proclamation that we are part of the family. By the way, there are some really good folks in our little family, come and check us out and maybe be one of us! |
