Finding the Heart of God II

The Parable of Two Sons

Introduction: Last week I introduced the start of this series on Jesus’ parables as told in . The third of Jesus’ three parables is the longest and most famous. It is a story about

a family—a father, an older son, and a younger son. Here is the cliff notes version of the story Jesus told: The story begins when the younger son comes to

the father and says, “Give me my share of the estate.” In ancient times, when the father died, the

oldest son always got “a double portion” of what any other child got. If there are two sons, the

older would get two-thirds of the estate and so the younger would get one-third. So the story opens

with the younger son asking for his one-third share of the inheritance.

Today we’re going to look at:

1) the meaning of the request,

of the request, 2) the response to that request, and 3) what difference it makes for us.

2) the response to that request, and

3) what difference it makes for us.

The Meaning of the Request

1. The meaning of the request—verses 11-12.

Let’s read the request in

Luke 15:11–12 NASB95

And He said, “A man had two sons. “The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the estate that falls to me.’ So he divided his wealth between them.

Luke

The Meaning

• The younger son’s request was stunning, because the inheritance, of course, was not divided up

and distributed to the children until the father died.

• As Kenneth Bailey writes: “In Middle Eastern culture, to ask for the inheritance while the

Father is alive, is to wish him dead.”

• The request would therefore have been a disgrace to the family name, because of the

younger son’s extraordinary disrespect for his father. It would have also been a blow to the

economic standing of the family, since the father would have to sell part of his estate in

order to give him his share.

• In short, this request ripped the family apart. It was a relational and economic act of

violence against the family’s integrity.

• Why would the younger son make such a request?

• Saint Augustine gives us a theory of why we do what we do, and especially

why we sin. He makes this startling observation: “A man has murdered another man—what

was his motive? Either he desired his wife or his property or else he would steal to support

himself; or else he was afraid of losing something to him; or else, having been injured, he

was burning to be revenged.”

Augustine goes on to say that even a murderer, murders... because he loves something. He loves romance or wealth or his reputation or something

because he loves something. He loves romance or wealth or his reputation or something

else too much, inordinately, more than God, and that is why he murders. Our hearts are distorted by “disordered loves.” We love, rest our hearts in, and look to things to give us

distorted by “disordered loves.” We love, rest our hearts in, and look to things to give us

the joy and meaning that only the Lord can give.

• The younger son may have lived with his father and may even have obeyed his father, but he

didn’t love his father. The thing he loved, ultimately, was his father’s things, not his father. His heart was set on the wealth and on the comfort, freedom and status that wealth brings. His father was just a means to an end. Now, however, his patience was over. He knew that the request would be like a knife in his father’s heart, but he obviously didn’t care.

His heart was set on the wealth and on the comfort, freedom and status that wealth brings. His father was just a means to an end. Now, however, his patience was over. He knew that

2 St. Augustine Confessions, trans. by H.Chadwick, (Oxford, 1998), Book 2:5.

2 His father was just a means to an end. Now, however, his patience was over. He knew that

© 2009 by Timothy Keller. You are permitted and encouraged to use this outline as the basis for your own preaching and teaching. 2

His father was just a means to an end. Now, however, his patience was over. He knew that

the request would be like a knife in his father’s heart, but he obviously didn’t care.

• Here is a great irony, which we will return to later in our series.

• The two sons look very different, on the surface. One runs off and lives a dissolute life, one

stays home and obeys and serves his father.

• Yet at the end, the older son is furious with the father and humiliates him by refusing to go

into the great feast. This is the older son’s way of saying that he will not live in the same

family with the younger son. So again the family’s integrity and the father’s heart are under

assault—this time by the elder brother.

• Why? The elder brother objects to the expense of what the father is doing, as we will see.

He shows that he has been obeying the father to get his things, and not because he loves

him, since he is willing to put him to shame. Both the older and younger sons love the

father’s things, but not the father.

The Response to the Request

2. The response to the request—verse 12b, 20-24.

Let’s read the Father’s response to the son’s request:

Luke 15:12b NASB95

“The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the estate that falls to me.’ So he divided his wealth between them.

Luke 15:12b,

Luke 15:20–24 NASB95

“So he got up and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion for him, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. “And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ “But the father said to his slaves, ‘Quickly bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet; and bring the fattened calf, kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.’ And they began to celebrate.

The Response

• The younger’s son request to the father would have shocked Jesus’ listeners, but the father’s

response is even more remarkable. This was a patriarchal society, in which you were required to

show deference and reverence toward those older or above you. This kind of contempt and

insolence would have ordinarily met with outrage. The listeners would expect the father to

explode in wrath, to drive the son out with blows.

• Instead, we read the simple words, “so he divided his property between them.” We need to put

ourselves into the historical context. In those days, most of a family’s wealth was in their land

and property. Indeed, their family land was part of their very identity. It is likely that the father

had to sell some of his land in order to become “liquid” and give his younger son his share.

• This is reflected in the unusual Greek word used in verse 12 translated as “property.” It is the

word “bios” which means “life.” It says, literally, he divided his “life” between them. Why use

that word? Probably it was a way to convey what it felt like for the father to lose his land, his

family’s good name and status, and the presence of one of his two sons. The father is being asked

to tear his very life apart—and he does.

• The older son and anyone else in the community would have thought that the father was being

foolish to give in to the younger son’s request. But looking back, we know better. If the father

had become embittered, and had perhaps beaten the young man or done something else severe

to him, no restoration would have ever happened. The father’s heart would have been too

hardened to ever receive him back, and the son may never have expected or wanted the father to

do so.

• By bearing the agony and pain of the son’s sin himself, instead of taking revenge, instead of

paying the son back by inflicting pain on him, the father kept the door open in the relationship.

The father was willing to suffer for the sin of the child, so that some day reconciliation would be

possible.

What Does This Mean for Us?

3. What difference it makes for us.

• First, it means that whether we are irreligious, free-wheeling, “younger brother” types or moral,

religious “elder brother” types, we have a problem with what Augustine calls “inordinate love”

or idols of the heart.

• For example, imagine a wife who has a husband who spends hours with another woman

talking about all his and her problems, and he goes traveling with this other woman, and

talks and thinks about her incessantly. So the wife confronts her husband and he says,

“What’s the problem? I married you, didn’t I? I pay the mortgage, don’t I? I do all my

duties, don’t I? If someone asks, I say you are my wife. Why are you so upset?” The wife will

say (rightly) that someone else has captured his heart and imagination.

• Some of us are like the elder brother. We may obey all the rules, but our real heart and

• Many of us are like the elder brother. We may obey all the rules, but our real heart and

passion is something else—our career, or making money, or our children, or peer

acceptance. If any thing has a controlling position in our heart, if any thing is more

important to our happiness than God—then that thing is a “god” to us, an “inordinate love.”

• Recognize these things for what they are. Do you see them in your own heart and life? Once

we see these things for what they are, what can be done about them?

• Second, it means that our Lord has done for us what the father in the parable did for his son.

• When God came into this world, we would have expected him to come in wrath, to appear

and drive us out with blows. But he did not. He didn’t come with a sword in his hand, but

with nails in his hands. He didn’t come to bring judgment, but to bear our judgment.

• Jesus went to the cross in weakness, and there, voluntarily, his life was literally torn apart.

And for his only property left, his garment, they cast lots. But he did it so that, when we

repent, like the younger son, forgiveness and reconciliation is now available.

We’re going to sing together now, Megan and Sabrina would you make your way up here? As we sing, focus on what this message of forgiveness means to you, and Jesus who provides it.

Let’s sing:

Jesus doesn’t just forgive, He restores.

true forgiveness for them. Our guilt is dealt with by Jesus’ blood. Subjectively, when we see

the absolute beauty of what Jesus has done for us, it captures our hearts. Money can’t die

for us, popularity can’t die for us. There is nothing more beautiful in all of reality than the

picture of a perfectly happy Being, leaving all the bliss of heaven, and sacrificing everything

for the sake of rebellious, undeserving, ungrateful people. The more you look at Jesus doing

that, the more you will love him above anyone or anything else. He will capture your heart

so that nothing matters more than he does. When you see what he’s done for you, it makes

the worst times bearable and the best times leave-able.

Thank you Megan & Sabrina,

Next week we’ll talk more about the cost of forgiveness, because forgiveness always costs…Jesus ensured that we would have opportunity to not be the ones who bore the cost of our sin. Even though we sometimes act like a younger brother, reckless and foolish, Jesus restores us. Like the Father in this story, God doesn’t just welcome us back, He RUNS to us. All we have to do is turn to Him.

Let’s Pray

Our pleasure and our duty,

Though opposite before,

Since we have seen His beauty,

Are joined to part no more:

It is our highest pleasure,

No less than duty’s call,

To love Him beyond measure,

And serve Him with our all.