A twist on a familiar parable.
Back from Labor Day Retreat, managing to keep from being sunburned and bowled over by Hurricane Gustav, I am enjoying a quiet evening relaxing and mulling over some of the happenings and ways that God had been speaking to me over the weekend. This weekend has been great in that regard... God has used Brennan Manning (our speaker, author of The Ragamuffin Gospel) to really speak into my life and has obviously left me with a lot to noodle over.
I'll share with you one of those things... something that I thought was really interesting.
In one of his talks, Brennan turned around and talked about Jesus's famous parable of the prodigal son as if when He was talking about the character of the prodigal, think about it as if Jesus was characterizing himself as the "prodigal." This is, in my mind, very scandalous... considering that Jesus IS the perfect Son of God and I'm not really thinking at all that the parable's character was necessarily intended to be Jesus... but my abstract mind got thinking about it because in a way the twist may make sense... so here's a little of my thinking here.
The whole exchange of parables with the Pharisees and teachers of the law came when they were complaining among themselves about Jesus hanging out with tax collectors and "sinners" (people with bad reputations... probably in a way earned).
On an aside... In a fun/humorous way this past weekend, I got to experience the reasons for "why" tax collectors were put in this class too. One of our small group exercises in Upstreet was to have the kids make "coins" out of aluminum foil and then for me, the small group leader, to somewhat rudely demand that they give me all of their money in taxes (most tax collectors were really greedy and took more than was required to line their pockets... never mind also that they were collecting taxes for people that Jews considered to be the enemy)... after that exercise I was thinking to myself and out loud with my kids that you probably wouldn't like this tax collector person too much. A very, very bad man. True.
Jesus spent time with them... I mean, a noticeable amount of time with them. He loved them. He reached out the arm of friendship to them. And religious people didn't like it so much.
Now, thinking about the twist that Brennan presented during the retreat... how could it be that Jesus "could" actually be "the prodigal?" That doesn't seem logical at all (I mean, the prodigal wasn't such a noble figure in this story)... unless, that's how the religious leaders viewed him? Obviously in this case they'd be the "older brother" because they look at him with disdain.
But then again, is it a stretch? Maybe it is... but...
On the cross, Jesus himself identified with "prodigal" sinners like you and me by taking on my own prodigal-ness on the cross and allowing himself to take on what my sin deserves... judgement (2 Corinthians 5:21). I thought about it some more... the younger son lived in the Father's house and asked for the inheritance... took it out into the cest pool world of "sinners and tax collectors" and "squandered" the riches of his father's kingdom on "wild living." He squandered it on sinners and tax collectors (and in a stretch... the Pharisees and teachers of the law did accuse Jesus of being a "drunkard and a glutton" (Luke 7:34). He did not "become" the sinner in need, but He identified with them (us/me) and met us at our point of need rather than require that we "clean up our act" for us to actually become acceptable. He loves us as we are, not as we should be - a great quote that Brennan gave throughout the weekend :-).
So, in this analogy, Jesus steps out of His father's house taking with him His righteousness and the riches of the Kingdom , and He lavishly "squanders" them on people who do not deserve it. He identifies and becomes friends with sinners... and then does something unspeakable... in a cosmic act that we won't comprehend on this side of eternity, Jesus becomes completely "spent" for us on the cross... an instrument of Gentile use for torture and death (perhaps if we're using the analogy this may be the "pigs"), utterly humiliated and separated from intimacy with the Father. He returns, in this analogy, to the Father with the stench and filth of the world he visited... previously lost/dead to the Father and is then is welcomed and absolutely GLORIFIED in the Father's presence upon his return. Notice the symbolism... the gold ring of the royal family, the best robe (also a royal symbol), sandals for his feet, and a massive party.
All the while, the older brother is looking at this with disdain because he knows "where his younger brother has been."
Okay, this is some interesting crack smoking Chris... what does this mean and do you have any more of what you're smoking? Why bother the brain cells to think about this? What kind of kool-aid was Brennan Manning passing out down in Sandestin anyways?
The point is this... Jesus is God, perfect, etc... I am not. I didn't leave my Abba's house to waste my life... I was kind of born into this condition, you know. Thanks Adam.
However, there was a point where Jesus invited me into relationship with Him... He poured out the riches of God's mercy, love, healing, and grace to me when I was dirty... I mean, really dirty. In an act where He ate and drank with me, he took my filth and presented it as paid for to the Father who glorified Him on that day on Calvary.
In that sense, I am new... I am recreated... I am clean.... I am Abba's child, no longer the outsider to righteousness that I was before being captured by Christ's love. So when I come to the Father, I may have my speech prepared (you know that one that the prodigal son had in the story), but instead of facing judgement I am also welcomed by the One that came for me, paid for my sin, and stands now glorified and ready to welcome all of the lost people that He gave out his riches to!!! The angels are partying and amazed... grace is like that... crazy, amazing, and in a way scandalous (it's crazy that sinners could be welcomed into the presence of a Holy God).
And the ones that don't "get" grace because they've got God all figured out and are working for Him, they continue to judge... and are missing out on the party.
When I think about it that way, how can you not be grateful for such amazing grace? Jesus reaches out into the darkest parts of our souls when we let Him in... and when we do He takes the dirt, the filth, the shame... and He replaces it with the treasure of intimacy with God and the testimony of the great lover that rescued and made that soul which was once dead... alive.
Crazy thoughts. Likely. But they are my thoughts from the bottom of the Diet Coke with Lime can, which I will now finish :-)
Amazed by grace! :-)
chris <><
Comments
But, some of the parables have a little scandal in them... for example that one about prayer being described as a man bothering his neighbor (supposed to be representing God) who gets up and helps him to get him to go away. Obviously God loves the fact that we keep coming to Him with our needs, but the analogy of a tired and bothered neighbor gets the point of persistence in prayer across... even though we know that this isn't the character of our loving Heavenly Father.
Some of the "shock value" that Jesus used in his parables interests me... the pious people not helping the man on the street but the *gasp* Samaritan *double-gasp* took care of him.... the lazy, no good workers that worked for only an hour got the same amount that the people that had been out there all day long, the lost son feeding pigs and then being embraced and kissed by his good Jewish father.... I'm sure I could go on and on.
I don't think that when I wrote this post that I was aiming for complete theological accuracy here :)... actually I think I made fun of that as I was writing in my stream of consciousness there. In a sense, on the cross Jesus represented and took the place of that lost son that squandered his wealth on "wild living" and ate pig food and rejected his Father... but perhaps going into the details of the parable was a little much, but again I was writing in stream of consciousness thinking about how richly God has blessed me with an inheritence in His kingdom that I do not deserve.
In a sense, is the story about the Prodigal son really about the son at all? Actually, thinking about it... probably not. Jesus told this story as a climax in a series of three "lost" parables which all included the following elements: 1.) Something of great value was lost while something was remained found, 2.) The person that lost the thing of value searched for it vigorously, 3.) When the thing of value was found, there was a party. In the story of the lost son, perhaps Jesus went into great detail to describe the depravity of the lost son to make a point about "sinners and tax collectors" and to add a little shock value... the story, if read like the others, is about the Father who from a "long way off" saw his son coming and ran to him, embraced him, and kissed him... The older brother's reaction was the addition to the story to perhaps illustrate that some who were close in proximity, religious standing were not necessarily close to the Father's heart because the Father was vigorously looking for the lost son and was overcome with joy when he was found. There was nothing that the younger son did to earn the father's affections (in fact, you could say that he did everything he could to forfeit it), but it didn't change the father's love or the magnitude of grace and lavish love poured out on that lost son that was now found.
In a sense, on the cross Jesus represented that lost son (me and you) to the Father so that we could be treated as sons and daughters, reborn into a right relationship with God, rather than as slaves to sin. That's pretty cool.
Write on brother..I'll watch my tone from now on.
Write on brother.