Lost At Home

Dinner tables in Armenia are incredibly welcoming!

Scripture:

Luke 15:11   Then Jesus^a said, “There was a man who had two sons. ¹² The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.’ So he divided his property between them. ¹³ A few days later the younger son gathered all he had and traveled to a distant country, and there he squandered his property in dissolute living. ¹⁴ When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need. ¹⁵ So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs. ¹⁶ He would gladly have filled himself with^a the pods that the pigs were eating; and no one gave him anything. ¹⁷ But when he came to himself he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! ¹⁸ I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; ¹⁹ I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.” ’ ²⁰ So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him. ²¹ Then the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’^{a  22} But the father said to his slaves, ‘Quickly, bring out a robe—the best one—and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. ²³ And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; ²⁴ for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!’ And they began to celebrate.

Luke 15:25   “Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. ²⁶ He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. ²⁷ He replied, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.’ ²⁸ Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out and began to plead with him. ²⁹ But he answered his father, ‘Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. ³⁰ But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!’ ³¹ Then the father^a said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. ³² But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.’”

Observation:

This parable, the third in Luke’s series on lostness, reveals the character of God. When the chapter began, Jesus was addressing the Pharisees and it’s in this parable that we find the response of the brother echoing that of the Pharisees. We call this the parable of the lost son, but ultimately, who is lost? The one whom we knew to be lost, comes home. The one who stayed home appears to be lost. 

Joel Green puts it this way:

The vital question remains unanswered: Did the elder brother eventually join in the welcome to his brother? The absence of the answer to the question is surely deliberate. For the elder brother represents the Pharisees and all like them, and the parable is an appeal to them to change their mind about the outcasts (NICNT).

The father has responded to the prodigal with love and and compassion. Sadly, the brother responds with anger. It is in these two responses that the Pharisees are to find themselves. 

Will they identify with God’s will and, having done so, join repentant sinners at the table? Putting aside their own concerns with status and recognition (cf 14:7–14), will they accept as members of the family of God those whom God accepts? Or, refusing to embrace God’s gracious calculus, which works to include those who (re)turn to him, will they exclude themselves from the family of God? The parable is open-ended, and so is the invitation (Green, NICNT).

John Wesley commented on the way the Father graciously interacted with the boy returning home. “Interrupting him before he had finished what he intended to say. So does God frequently cut an earnest confession short by a display of his pardoning love” (Wesley’s Notes). All of this simply seemed to anger the brother. 

Application:

This is such a sad commentary on the brother. The truth is that we can find ourselves right there, not only lost at home, but lost in the church. 

I was recently at a gathering from a sister tribe where people would mention how many generations of their family have served. It was a beautiful thing. I began to ponder my own family and how many generations we have been “Nazarenes.” On my mother’s side of the family, I’m only the second generation. My mother came to the Lord after beginning to attend a Nazarene church as a teenager. On my father’s side, it was my grandparents who chose to join the Church of the Nazarene after attending the camps on Holiness Island in Nebraska. However, on my husband’s side of the family, he can go back to a great-grandfather who wholeheartedly gave his life to the Lord, and sacrificially gave to plant a Nazarene church in Pennsylvania. 

While this is good, we need to be careful that we do not become prideful. The church is not ours, but belongs to the Lord. There is great danger in continually spreading the Sunday Dinner table for family and close friends, but never inviting the new person. 

But what if the new person is the one who has really found Christ, and the rest of us are so stuck in our routines, and we are lost? Cultural Christianity is no substitute for knowing Christ. Sometimes we become so overly concerned with protecting the past that we fail to see the future. Compassion seems to fail us as we worry about what we might lose, rather than what the lost might gain. In the end, we are the ones who become lost at home, and in the church, because we fail to grow spiritually and reflect the character of God. Spiritual stagnation will lead to death, and ultimately, we will discover that we are lost. 

Prayer:

Lord, search my heart and motivations. May my love for you spill over into love for others. May your heart of compassion infuse me with your holy love. Amen.