Luke 15:1-3, 11-32
March 30, 2025
A favorite book of mine is A Tree
Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith. The story is about a young girl named
Francie Nolan, who is growing up dirt poor in a brownstone tenement in
Williamsburg, Brooklyn in the early years of the last century. One of the
details you learn from the first pages is that being poor in a tenement in
Brooklyn meant that nothing was wasted. Francie’s mother could take stale
loaves of bread and turn them into a week of meals. Francie and her little
brother, Neely, gathered rags and paper and bits of metal and sold them to a
junk man for much needed pennies. The family had a longstanding tradition that
whatever money came into the home, at least a few cents of it went into the tin
can which was nailed into the corner of a dark cupboard. Francie’s mother,
Katie, worked hard to save, scrimp, scrounge and she made sure that nothing was
ever wasted.
Except for coffee. Every day Katie
brewed a large potful of coffee with a lump of chicory. She reheated it at
midday, and in the evening, and the coffee would get stronger and stronger.
Everyone was allowed three cups. Neely and Francie were both given cups too,
with a little bit of condensed milk in them. They both loved the coffee for its
smell and its warmth, but neither one of them cared much for the taste. While
they weren’t allowed to waste anything else in their lives, they could throw
whatever coffee they didn’t drink down the sink. Their aunts, their mama’s
sisters, thought this was terrible. How could Katie let her children be so
wasteful, throwing perfectly good coffee down the drain?! They would lecture
her about it, but Katie replied,
“Francie is entitled to one cup each
meal like the rest. If it makes her feel better to throw it away rather than to
drink it, all right. I think it’s good that people like us can waste
something once in a while and get the feeling of how it would be to have lots
of money and not have to worry about scrounging.”
In Francie’s world, nothing could be
taken for granted. Just keeping body and soul together from one day to the next
took all their effort. But Francie’s mother knew that being allowed one small
bit of wastefulness was a bright spot amid poverty and deprivation. They
weren’t rich, not even close to it, but they could feel rich even for just a
tiny moment, when that coffee got poured down the drain.
Wasting coffee was a luxury for
Francie and her family in a life that was devoid of luxury, and that puts into
sharp relief the wastefulness of the younger brother in this parable of Jesus.
As so often happened when
Jesus came calling, tax collectors and sinners were coming to be near to Jesus
and to listen to him. The Pharisees and the scribes who were also near Jesus
weren't happy about that. They were grumbling and grousing.
"This fellow welcomes sinners
and eats with them."
Jesus responded to their grumbling
with three parables. We only read one of them this morning, but here’s a quick
recap. The first was about a lost sheep. There were 100 sheep, but one had
wandered away and was lost. The shepherd left the other 99, not in the safety
of the fold but in the wilderness, to go looking for the one. When the shepherd
found the lost sheep, he laid it across his shoulders and rejoiced. When he had
gotten the sheep safely home, he called together his friends and his neighbors,
and they rejoiced with him.
Jesus rounded off this first parable
by saying,
“Just so, I tell you, there will be
more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous
persons who need no repentance.”
The second thing to be lost was a
thing: a coin. A woman had ten coins, but she lost one. We might not fret over
one coin, but we are not this woman. She did not shrug her shoulders and say,
"Oh well. It's just a coin." No, she lit the lamp and swept the
house. She searched every corner until she found the coin. Then she called
together her friends and neighbors and said,
"Rejoice
with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost."
The third parable, our parable, was
about a father and two sons. The younger son went to his father and asked him
for his share of the inheritance. Now. This was far more disrespectful than we
may realize. An inheritance should only come after death. The younger son
essentially said, “Why should I wait till you're dead, Dad? I’d like my money
now, please.” So, the father divided his property between his two sons and gave
the youngest his share. The minute the money was his, the son took off. He went
to a far country and proceeded to have a very, very good time.
But
as so often happens, the money ran out. And when the money ran out, the good
times ran out as well. Now what would the younger son do? He had
wasted his fortune, and now there was a terrible famine. He could only survive by
becoming a hired hand, feeding pigs in the fields. This observant Jew had not
only wasted his fortune and his life to that point on dissolute living, and now
he was forced to feed animals that were considered unclean. This was a
comeuppance indeed.
This
younger son was so hungry and desperate that even the pig food looked good. But
something happened. He came to himself. Maybe that means he realized what a
fool he’d been, how he had squandered everything he’d been given. Maybe he woke
up from something like a dream and came face-to-face with reality. Perhaps,
like someone struggling with an addiction, he had reached rock bottom and knew
it. Whatever realization took hold of him, he came to himself. And he thought
about his father’s hired hands who had plenty of bread and more to eat. So, this
younger son decided to go home. Yet he knew what a mess he had made of everything
and wondered if he would be welcome. He rehearsed what he would say to his dad
when he saw him.
"Father, I have sinned against
heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me
like one of your hired hands."
Ready with these words of contrition
and remorse, the son got up and went home. But he never got to give the full
speech he had prepared. While he was still far off, his father saw him. His
father ran to him. His father pulled him into his arms and hugged him.
His
father, who must have spent hours, days, weeks, staring into the distance
looking for his son, did not need to hear his youngest child’s words of
contrition. Instead, the father called for the best robe and a ring to be
brought. Put sandals on his feet, his father commanded. Kill the fatted calf. Let’s
eat and celebrate! My son was dead, but he is alive! My son was lost, but he is
found.
If Jesus had stuck with the formula
of the first two parables, this would have been the ending. But this third
parable takes a different and unexpected twist. Remember, this was a father
with two sons. The younger was home again, no longer dead but alive; no
longer lost but found. But there was an elder brother. The elder brother came
in from working in the fields, and he heard the music and dancing. He asked about
the celebration. When he was told the reason, the older brother was furious. He
refused to go inside and join the party. His father came out to him and begged
him to come inside. But the son answered his father's pleas with bitterness.
"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. But when this son
of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you
killed the fatted calf for him!"
But his father would not be
deterred.
"Son,
you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 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."
By all accounts, the eldest son has
a valid point. The youngest son was selfish, a bad son, and not a nice person
in general. And the father was foolish. When his youngest son came demanding
his inheritance, which was as good as saying, "Drop dead, Dad,” the father
gave it to him anyway. When the youngest son wasted everything, and returned,
tail between his legs, he should have been greeted with anger and
disappointment. The father should have at least demanded that the son pay back
all that he owed him. But that foolish father threw a party instead. Well of
course the older son was angry. What reward did he receive for being the good
kid? What parties were thrown in his honor because he did what was expected of
him? Had I been sitting with the others around Jesus, I imagine I would have
shaken my head at this father with two sons.
But remember how Jesus ended the
first two parables? When a sheep was found, they all rejoiced. When a coin was
reclaimed, they all rejoiced. But when this son, this father's child, was
found, there was only anger and bitterness. The eldest son could hear the music
and celebration, but he wouldn't, he couldn’t join the party. To him,
celebrating the younger brother’s return, throwing a lavish party for him, was
not just wasteful but foolish.
I titled this sermon “Which
Brother?” because I thought I would ask the question, which brother are we? I
know that there are times when I have been the younger brother, when I have
messed up and dug myself into a pretty deep hole. But more often than not, I
think I’ve been the older brother. I’ve resented grace shown to others I didn’t
think deserved it. I’ve been unforgiving and unrelenting and wanted to see my
own form of punitive justice served. I have chafed at the foolishness of this
kind of extravagant, wasteful love.
Yet, maybe, that’s the point. It
could be argued that in all three parables, foolishness reigned. Why would a
shepherd leave 99 sheep unprotected to look for one lost sheep? Foolishness!
Why would a woman sweep the entire house just to find one small coin?
Foolishness! Why would a father welcome a wasteful son with extravagant grace,
forgiveness, and love? Foolishness! But what about the gospel isn’t foolish, at
least in the world’s eyes?
Isn’t it foolish that we are
repeatedly encouraged not to be afraid, when there seems to be so much to be
afraid of in this world? Isn’t it foolishness that God forgives us even though
we can barely forgive others? Isn’t it foolishness that God showers us with extravagant
grace, even though we have very little grace for others? Isn’t it foolishness that
God should love us so much, love this whole world so much, long for
relationship with us so much, that God became like us, lived like us, suffered
like us, and died like us, so that we could have life? Foolishness! If we can
only see the gospel through the eyes of the world, than it is nothing but
foolishness. But when we see it through the eyes of those who have experienced
grace and forgiveness and love, then there is nothing foolish about it at all.
So, which brother are we? Are we forgiven? Are we resentful? Are we lost or are
we found? Thanks be to God for God’s foolish love and grace, and may we be
foolish too.
Let all God’s children say, “Amen.”
