Daily Lesson for May 27, 2015

Today's daily lesson comes from Luke chapter 15 verses 25 through 32:

25 “Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. 26 And he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. 27 And he said to him, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.’ 28 But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, 29 but he answered his father, ‘Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might ecelebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!’ 31 And he said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32 It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.’”

There are those who are at home with the Father in body but who make it known that there spirit is elsewhere and when given the chance their body will be also.  There are others who are in the far country -- a long way off from the Father's home in both body and spirit. These are what we think of as the Prodigal sons and daughters -- the truly lost.  Parents worry themselves sick over these. But there is another child, usually good and moral and often the first born, who though home in body and pretending to be home in heart is actually in spirit far far away from the Father.

Though I myself mostly masquerade as a Prodigal Son, I am actually much more an older brother. And so let me tell you from experience what an older brother has to come to terms with before he will enter the banquet -- his own shadow side. It's there in the story with the older brother's reference to the prostitutes he says his younger brother wasted all his money on. That sounds about right, until you go back and reread the story and realize the younger son lost his money on a lot of things but prostitutes were not one of them. The prostitutes weren't part of the prodigal son's story, they were figments in the older son's imagination -- his own shadow side seeping out. It's not until the older son can see that -- see his own distance from the Father in heart and need for grace -- that he will ever be willing to come into the banquet for his brother. 

I love Jesus' telling of the Prodigal Son story because the story is unfinished, the conclusion open-ended.  It's up to the older son whether or not he will come to the banquet. But I always imagine that he does; and I imagine that when he enters his own eyes are opened and he realizes that the banquet the Father has given is not only for his little brother but also for him.