Luke 15 1-3; 11b-32
Imagine the crowd; look at the faces; hear the voices; smell the poverty.
Tax collectors, apparently always bad in those days, and nearly always bad in the Gospels. People who had bought the right to exploit others. Who had done a deal with the government to avoid paying too much themselves but be able to overcharge those beneath them in the social strata. Misfits, disabled, immigrants, women – people who did not fit in with the ruling classes.
And then, maybe around the edges or standing back a little in self-righteous judgement, were the Pharisees and the scribes. Those concerned with purity of behaviour and word, yet who did not blanch at exploitation or condemnation.
The despised and the different wanted to hear what Jesus had to say. The religious wanted to condemn him for his lack of religious purity.
And to this mass of disparate humanity, those who are desperate for hope and those who think themselves above all this, Jesus tells a story.
It’s a story about two boys, two sons.
One demands “Give me.”
In the culture of the time that meant “I wish you were dead.”
He demands,
the Father gives,
he goes off to a different land.
To his friends he probably seemed a great guy – he spent his money on partying, and you can’t party alone. But when you buy your friends, they aren’t real, and when the money is gone so are your friends.
Abject, crushing poverty makes him come to himself. He realises with absolute clarity what he has done, and what the just consequences should be and what he needs to do next. He realises that his Father, the one he had wished dead, the one of whom he demanded “give me” was a compassionate man, and would give him the means to earn his own keep and perhaps repay some debts. Given time to think, he realises a lot – about himself and his father. And so he returns.
The other son accuses “You have never given me”.
This son too is separated from his father. He is wrapped up in self-righteousness. Confident of what he deserves. Resentful that the father apparently does not recognise his efforts. He nurses an acrimonious, corrosive resentment.
The separation of one is obvious. The separation of the other is hidden. Both are estranged from their father.
This is a healing parable.
The scribes and Pharisees stood in judgement on Jesus and the others in the crowd. It was they who decided who was a sinner, and what sacrifice they must make, and how much they would have to pay for it. The tax collectors and sinners seethed with resentment – the poor could not afford the price of religious purity; the tax collectors could not meet the standard anyway, because of their work.
And Jesus says, both are separated from the Father. No one is better than the other.
We don’t know the end of the story of course, but where Jesus leaves it seems to be here. The older brother remains resentful – “you never gave me”. Why on earth would the father celebrate the return of this demanding, exploitative wretch who has not followed the rules? And “why has he not appreciated me, who has followed the rules to the letter for years?” “I have been worthy, he has not.”
It’s an image that reflects not only the group of people listening to Jesus, but also our own society. Almost every item on the news, article in the paper or discussion in the pub or coffee shop or kitchen table seems to identify who does the right thing and who does not. Who is the bad apple who spoils things for the rest of us.
Bad apple theology has two disturbing, divisive effects. It allows us to think well of ourselves – we wouldn’t do the things that the bad apples do, and even if we did it would be because the bad apple in the barrel has made us bad too. And it condemns those we see failing. They are simply “bad” – they are not like us. They are different.
The invitation in Jesus’ parable is not to decide which son is better than the other; which son is the equivalent of what Christians might call “saved”; which son is like non-Christians we know.
The invitation is to “come to ourselves”, to come to a realisation of who we really are. To accept that we have made unloving demands, we have partied irresponsibly, we deserve to endure the consequences of our own actions. Nobody made us do it; there is no bad apple who passed on failure to us; we have no one to blame. We are all alike.
New Testament scholar Ken Bailey took this parable to a tribe in Yemen whose culture is as close as we have now to that of the time of Jesus. He wanted to know how the hearers standing around Jesus as he told the story might have responded.
The thing that shocked them was not that a younger son might wish his father dead; nor that an older son might work away in seething resentment for years.
The most shocking thing about this story was not even that the father looked out for his estranged younger son.
It was that the father, obviously a wealthy man, and at that time head of the household, this important, dignified man – ran. He set aside decorum and respectability. He hitched up the flowing robes that indicated his significance, and he ran to the son, put his arms around him and kissed him.
He took the younger son to his heart.
As he contemplated his return the boy planned what to say – I am no longer worthy, make me one of your hired servants. He abandoned all pretence, he accepted who he was, he was willing to bow. And the father raised him up, and accepted him as his own child.
We don’t know from the story how Jesus’ listeners responded. There are stories in the Gospels of sinners and tax collectors coming to themselves, realising their fault, accepting the blame and turning to Jesus for forgiveness. And there are stories of the religious folk turning against him and arranging for him to be killed.
Seething resentment really does destroy, even if we appear to be doing the right things. Blaming others does not make us any better.
As I said last time we were together, Lent is a time when we are invited to reflect on our own attitudes, behaviours and character. To assess ourselves honestly and to turn to God uprightly as the prayer book says.
It isn’t about deciding which of the two brothers we might be – each of us is both. It is about determining how we then live.
Imagine the crowd; look at the faces; hear the voices; smell the poverty.
Tax collectors, apparently always bad in those days, and nearly always bad in the Gospels. People who had bought the right to exploit others. Who had done a deal with the government to avoid paying too much themselves but be able to overcharge those beneath them in the social strata. Misfits, disabled, immigrants, women – people who did not fit in with the ruling classes.
And then, maybe around the edges or standing back a little in self-righteous judgement, were the Pharisees and the scribes. Those concerned with purity of behaviour and word, yet who did not blanch at exploitation or condemnation.
The despised and the different wanted to hear what Jesus had to say. The religious wanted to condemn him for his lack of religious purity.
And to this mass of disparate humanity, those who are desperate for hope and those who think themselves above all this, Jesus tells a story.
It’s a story about two boys, two sons.
One demands “Give me.”
In the culture of the time that meant “I wish you were dead.”
He demands,
the Father gives,
he goes off to a different land.
To his friends he probably seemed a great guy – he spent his money on partying, and you can’t party alone. But when you buy your friends, they aren’t real, and when the money is gone so are your friends.
Abject, crushing poverty makes him come to himself. He realises with absolute clarity what he has done, and what the just consequences should be and what he needs to do next. He realises that his Father, the one he had wished dead, the one of whom he demanded “give me” was a compassionate man, and would give him the means to earn his own keep and perhaps repay some debts. Given time to think, he realises a lot – about himself and his father. And so he returns.
The other son accuses “You have never given me”.
This son too is separated from his father. He is wrapped up in self-righteousness. Confident of what he deserves. Resentful that the father apparently does not recognise his efforts. He nurses an acrimonious, corrosive resentment.
The separation of one is obvious. The separation of the other is hidden. Both are estranged from their father.
This is a healing parable.
The scribes and Pharisees stood in judgement on Jesus and the others in the crowd. It was they who decided who was a sinner, and what sacrifice they must make, and how much they would have to pay for it. The tax collectors and sinners seethed with resentment – the poor could not afford the price of religious purity; the tax collectors could not meet the standard anyway, because of their work.
And Jesus says, both are separated from the Father. No one is better than the other.
We don’t know the end of the story of course, but where Jesus leaves it seems to be here. The older brother remains resentful – “you never gave me”. Why on earth would the father celebrate the return of this demanding, exploitative wretch who has not followed the rules? And “why has he not appreciated me, who has followed the rules to the letter for years?” “I have been worthy, he has not.”
It’s an image that reflects not only the group of people listening to Jesus, but also our own society. Almost every item on the news, article in the paper or discussion in the pub or coffee shop or kitchen table seems to identify who does the right thing and who does not. Who is the bad apple who spoils things for the rest of us.
Bad apple theology has two disturbing, divisive effects. It allows us to think well of ourselves – we wouldn’t do the things that the bad apples do, and even if we did it would be because the bad apple in the barrel has made us bad too. And it condemns those we see failing. They are simply “bad” – they are not like us. They are different.
The invitation in Jesus’ parable is not to decide which son is better than the other; which son is the equivalent of what Christians might call “saved”; which son is like non-Christians we know.
The invitation is to “come to ourselves”, to come to a realisation of who we really are. To accept that we have made unloving demands, we have partied irresponsibly, we deserve to endure the consequences of our own actions. Nobody made us do it; there is no bad apple who passed on failure to us; we have no one to blame. We are all alike.
New Testament scholar Ken Bailey took this parable to a tribe in Yemen whose culture is as close as we have now to that of the time of Jesus. He wanted to know how the hearers standing around Jesus as he told the story might have responded.
The thing that shocked them was not that a younger son might wish his father dead; nor that an older son might work away in seething resentment for years.
The most shocking thing about this story was not even that the father looked out for his estranged younger son.
It was that the father, obviously a wealthy man, and at that time head of the household, this important, dignified man – ran. He set aside decorum and respectability. He hitched up the flowing robes that indicated his significance, and he ran to the son, put his arms around him and kissed him.
He took the younger son to his heart.
As he contemplated his return the boy planned what to say – I am no longer worthy, make me one of your hired servants. He abandoned all pretence, he accepted who he was, he was willing to bow. And the father raised him up, and accepted him as his own child.
We don’t know from the story how Jesus’ listeners responded. There are stories in the Gospels of sinners and tax collectors coming to themselves, realising their fault, accepting the blame and turning to Jesus for forgiveness. And there are stories of the religious folk turning against him and arranging for him to be killed.
Seething resentment really does destroy, even if we appear to be doing the right things. Blaming others does not make us any better.
As I said last time we were together, Lent is a time when we are invited to reflect on our own attitudes, behaviours and character. To assess ourselves honestly and to turn to God uprightly as the prayer book says.
It isn’t about deciding which of the two brothers we might be – each of us is both. It is about determining how we then live.