Sermon Tone Analysis

Tale of Two Sons

“He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

This is a call on the part of our Lord to those who are willing to listen to His message, His message of Kingdom salvation.

And just who was listening?

Chapter 15:1 “Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him.”

It was the outcast; it was the scum, the low lives who listened, believingly, upon what Jesus had to say.

These are two categories that are used sort of in a general way to describe the worst of the worst.

Tax collectors were the lowest people socially and religiously in the life of Israel.

Rome occupied Israel and Rome sold tax franchises.

Greedy Jews who didn’t care at all about their own people, who had no religious passions bought those tax franchises and strong-armed people out of their money, taking what Rome required and everything else they could get.

It became a way to operate a criminal operation.

They were sort of the Mafia.

They were surrounded by thugs, people who could extract the money out of people to fill their bank account.

They were disassociated from society.

They were put out of families.

They were considered to be outside the purposes of God.

They were the traitors of all traitors, hated by the people.

“Sinners,” Referred to the thugs that went along with the tax collectors, as well as all the lowlife criminals and prostitutes that occupied the base level of immoral activity in Israel.

These are the kind of people of whom the rabbis said, “Let not anyone associate with such people, not even to bring them near to the Law of God.”

But they were the ones who came to Jesus.

They were the ones who heard and listened.

Verse 2 says, “And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them.”

These are the self-appointed elite.

These are the religious leaders of Israel.

They were self-righteous, they believed that you earned your way into God’s kingdom by being moral on the outside, fulfilling all the ceremonies that were required of you.

They were the “in” people.

They were the pure and the holy, far too pure and too holy to be polluted by any association with sinners.

And when they saw Jesus associating with sinners, they drew one single conclusion: He is satanic because He hangs around Satan’s people.

Jesus is doing the work of God, which is the redemption of sinners.

They see it as the work of Satan.

That’s how far from God they were.

His response to their self-righteous anti-evangelism was to unmask them as very far from God, very distant from God, knowing nothing of His glory and nothing of His joy.

He explains what He’s doing in three stories.

· Vs. 3-7 “Parable of Lost Sheep” ~ A man goes, he finds the sheep, he rejoices with his friends because a sheep has value; verse 7, “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.”

Heaven rejoices over one sinner’s repentance.

· Vs. 8-10 “Parable of Lost Coin”~ A woman who lost a coin.

Again, that has value; she finds the coin; she calls her lady friends together: “Rejoice with me,” verse 9; I found the coin.

The application, verse 10 “I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

Point~ Pharisee’s are so far from God; they don’t get it.

God’s joy is found in the salvation of one sinner.

(Point of chapter 15)

PRODIGAL SON

Background~ this culture was dominated by a shame-honor paradigm.

Everything related back to what was honorable and what was shameful.

And they had a very clear, almost subconscious understanding of shame and honor.

This truth is particularly true among the Pharisees and the scribes.

The story Jesus tells is bizarre, unbelievable, incomprehensible, a ridiculous story of non-stop shame that nobody could understand.

Everything Jesus talks about in this story is counter to their instinctive thinking.

It is against the grain of their society.

They do not function this way; they do not think this way.

The level of outrage just continues to escalate.

This is a head shaker and an eye roller.

1.

A SHAMEFUL REQUEST

“There was a man who had two sons.

12 And the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.’”

The younger son is asking the father for his share of an inheritance; he’s out of rank.

There’s a pecking order.

If he’s younger, somebody’s older.

This is not only out of rank, this is disrespectful, and this is selfish.

You get the estate when the father dies.

This is like saying, “Father, I wish you were dead.

You’re in the way.

I want what’s mine and I want it now and I’m tired of waiting.”

He sees the father as an obstacle, as an unwelcome point of accountability.

He doesn’t want the father around; he doesn’t want accountability; he wants freedom, independence; he wants his money, and he wants it now.

This is totally disrespectful.

He wants nothing to do with an on-going relationship to the family.

He says, “Give me the share of the estate” --give me the property and the goods.

He didn’t want to take over his inheritance and to begin to develop it and use it for the good of the family in the future.

He wanted the cash.

I want the goods.

I want the property.

I want it now.

I want no future with this family.

The listeners would expect one thing: the father would raise his right hand and slap that young man right across the face.

And then he would punish him as severely as it could happen--a beating publicly because the father must protect his honor at all costs.

2. SHAMEFUL RESPONSE

“And he divided his property between them.”

He does exactly what this rebellious, hateful son asks.

This is absurd.

You’re supposed to wait till he’s dead and then the younger gets one-third, the older gets two-thirds, but not until the father dies.

You might assume that a father would do this for a good purpose, but to fund the rebellion of a hateful, disrespectful son?

The father should do everything to protect his own honor.

He’s been publicly embarrassed by this son, and he needs to take the high ground and preserve his brother.

Footnote: The older had the son, had the job in the family of protecting the father’s honor, and protecting the younger siblings from doing foolish things.

But the older son never appears here, he never shows up in this story.

Pharisees, would be saying, “Well, where was the older brother here?”

His duty is to preserve the father’s honor if the father doesn’t protect himself.

Where is he?

His duty is to protect the younger brother from doing foolish things.

Where is he?

The estate is split, and that means the older son got his two-thirds.

The younger son got the one-third that was coming to him, and that launches a shameful rebellion.

3. SHAMEFUL REBELLION

“Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living.

14 And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need.”

“Not many days later,” this is to indicate how fast this young man acts.

He is driven by lust and passion and evil desire, and there’s no delay possible.

He wants to move as fast as he can.

And what he does, it says, the younger son gathered everything together.