The Younger Son

Luke 15:11-24

You Can’t Out-Sin God’s Grace

The Younger Son’s Request
The Younger Son’s Rebellion
The Younger Son’s Result
The Younger Son’s Resolution
The Younger Son’s Reconciliation

This weekend, we’re going to look at one of the most well-known and well-loved stories in the whole Bible. This is a story that has been capturing my heart over the last 3-4 months, and the more I think about it the more it speaks to my heart.

The story is known as the parable of the Prodigal Son, but it’s really about “A man with two sons.” That’s actually what Luke 15:11 says: “There was a man who had two sons.” There are actually three main characters in the story, and we’ll spend a session on each of them. We’ll look tonight at the younger brother, and then tomorrow at the older brother and the father.

The reason this story has been speaking to me and teaching me so much is because I continually see myself in the story. There are times when I see myself in the younger son, other times when I see myself in the older son, and—now that I’m a dad—times when I see myself in the father. The other reason that this story is so captivating is that it is a wonderful picture of the central message of the gospel—reconciliation.

To “reconcile” something is “to restore to friendship or harmony.”[1] This is the central message of the Bible: that human beings have broken friendship and relationship with God because of their sin and rebellion but that God is actively working to reconcile people—to restore friendship and harmony—with himself.

The beauty of this story is that no matter where you come from, what your background is, how good or how bad of a person you’ve been, or how much or how little baggage you have in your past, you can be reconciled to God and experience the joy and blessing of that friendship for the rest of your life. My deep prayer is that by the end of our time together this weekend that you would see from this story that God greatly desires to be your friend and that you can have a thriving, joyful relationship with him.

Let’s dive in.

The parable of the man with two sons is found in Luke 15, starting in verse 11. But, like with any story, it’s important to understand the setting and context in which it’s found. If you look at Luke 14, you’ll see lots of red words—places where Jesus is teaching—and you’ll see at the very end of the chapter that Jesus says, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear” (Luke 14:35). In other words, those who are interested in hearing what Jesus has to say need to pay attention.

Then, Luke 15:1 tells us who responds—“The tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him.” Tax collectors were the most despised group in all of Israel. They were sellouts who were working for the Roman government and taking advantage of their positions to take money from people. They were not allowed to enter the synagogue—they were hated. The only people they could hang with were other thugs and lowlifes. These were people categorized as “sinners.” They were the scum. They were the prostitutes and those who hang with that kind of lifestyle. These people were excluded by society and thought of as hopeless and despicable. And they are the ones who draw near to hear Jesus.

Because of this, many of the religious people criticized Jesus. They made him out to be guilty by association. After all, why would a good, law-abiding rabbi hang out with these disgusting people? You see their criticism in verse 2, “This man receives sinners and eats with them” (Luke 15:2). In that culture, to eat with somebody symbolized friendship. It meant that Jesus was embracing these outcasts and scum as his friends. As you read the rest of the gospel accounts, you’ll see that one of the things that Jesus is constantly criticized for is his friendship with the outcasts of society. It didn’t matter if people were scumbags, sluts, sick, or stupid—he embraced them all. This outraged the Pharisees and scribes—those who went above and beyond trying to be holy and good. They avoided these kinds of people at all costs so that they wouldn’t be “contaminated” by them. This is the setting in which the story of the man with two sons takes place. Jesus’ parable is in response to their criticism.

After telling two other short parables (which we’ll look at in our third session), Jesus begins this story in verse 11. The father represents God, the younger son represents those who are wild sinners, and the older son represents the moral religious people. Tonight we’ll focus on the first part of the story relating to the younger son, and the point of the story is simple: “You Can’t Out-Sin God’s Grace.”

READ LUKE 15:11-24

1. The Younger Son’s Request (v. 12)

The first thing we see is that in verse 12, the younger son makes a ridiculous request. He goes to his father and he asks to receive his share of his father’s inheritance.

Now, the thing you have to know is that this story takes place in a middle-eastern setting where—in that culture—there is one dominant social motivator: honor. In this culture honor is a big deal. People would want to do things that brought honor to themselves and their families, and they would try to avoid anything that would bring shame on themselves or their families. You could do nothing worse than to somehow shame or embarrass your family.

This is different than our culture. We almost enjoy shaming or making fun of people in our family. My dad has always looked up to my sense of style (which is really not particularly good), and I often like to encourage him to wear things that I know are stupid. To me, it’s funny to see him make a fool of himself or be perceived as a dork. And, even though it’s not very nice, it’s not a big deal. But in that culture, a good son would never do something to embarrass his father. And, if he did, it was culturally acceptable for him to be beaten publicly or worse.

Well, this son doesn’t just try to make fun of his dad or make him dress like a moron. He does something much worse and much more shameful. He asks for his inheritance now. According to the Old Testament law, if a man with two sons died, he would leave two-thirds of his inheritance for his older son, and one-third for his younger son. So, when his father died, this younger son could rightfully expect his father to leave him an inheritance—a smaller one—but an inheritance nonetheless.

But the younger son doesn’t want to wait. He wanted his inheritance now, and he asks for it. This is the equivalent of going to his father, looking him in the eye, and saying, “I wish you were dead.” Nothing could be more shameful. He’s saying, “I wish you were out of my life. I wish I could be on my own. You are holding me back from doing all the things I want to do for myself, and I want you to give me my share of the stuff and die.” He wanted to be on his own, doing his own thing. He wanted unrestrained freedom, no accountability, and no oversight. He wanted to be the king and ruler of his life.

While this might seem extreme to you, you need to see that you have done the exact same thing in your life when it comes to your relationship with God. You have had times when you have said to God—either with your thoughts or your actions—“I wish you were out of my life. I wish I could be on my own. You are holding me back from doing all the things I want to do for myself, and I want you dead.”

If you grew up in a situation far from God, then it’s easy for you to see this. You know about all the ways that you ignored God, and rebelled against God. Even if you didn’t even think about it in terms of God, you still know that you lived for yourself and lived as the king and ruler of your life.

If you grew up with a family that talked and believed in God, then it might be harder for you to see, but it’s still true of you. This was more my situation. I grew up going to church, with parents who were school-teachers and they watched me like a hawk. I didn’t have a lot of freedom to do whatever I wanted or sin in wild ways. But, in my heart, I still had many moments where I simply wanted to do my own thing. I wanted to be king and ruler of my life too, even though it wasn’t through as obvious of sins.

You have done this to God, and you still do this to God. Perhaps you even have this attitude here and now. Maybe you’re thinking about how inconvenient this camp is or how much you’d like to be doing something else. Or, maybe you’re really excited to be here and have been looking forward to this, but there are some areas of your life that remain in rebellion. You still gossip about other people. You still look at others with lust or sexual fantasy. In many big and small ways, we constantly are tempted to ignore God and wish he was out of our lives so that we could live our own way, no rules, no accountability, and total unrestrained freedom.

The younger son makes this shameful, ridiculous request that could easily get him publicly beaten and humiliated. But, shockingly, the father gives him what he asks for. Though I’m sure his heart was broken, the father gives his son what he wanted and divides up his estate.

But this is only the beginning of the younger son’s shame. In verse 13 we see his rebellion.

2. The Younger Son’s Rebellion (v. 13)

It doesn’t take long—only a few days—before the younger son takes the property that he gets from his father, sells it to get some quick cash, and heads off to a distant country. Now this too is shameful. Not only does the son have to get rid of his father’s stuff in order to have money, but then he heads off to a distant country going into a land of non-Jews. He goes as far away as he can and there he squanders his wealth.

The word “squander” in verse 13 means to scatter. It means that he goes to this distant land and quickly wastes his money in all kinds of ways. The word was used to describe the process of separating wheat from chaff. The farmer would thresh the wheat and cut it up into all kinds of little pieces, but he needed to be able to separate the wheat kernel from the stalk. So, he would go to a high, windy place and toss the pile in the air. The wheat would fall to the ground because it’s heavier and the chaff would blow away. This process of tossing it in the air is the same word as “squander.” In other words, this younger son is just tossing his money around and letting it blow where it will.

Does $100,000 seem like a lot of money to you? It does to me. Anytime I watch Deal or No Deal and they get an offer that’s around $100,000 the contestant gets nervous and says, “Gee...that’s a lot of money.” How fast do you think it could take you to take that much money and blow it if you visited, say, Las Vegas? I think you could blow it pretty fast. (Makes me think of Rusty in Vegas Vacation)

Now, the story doesn’t tell us how much money the younger son has, but whatever it was, he just scattered it all over. And it wasn’t like he lost his money because he so generously wanted to help people. It says that he lost his money in “reckless living.” This is where we get the word “prodigal”—the word “prodigal” means “recklessly extravagant.”

This son goes off and lives completely for himself. He lives for his pleasure and his desire and he blows whatever it was he had.

I’ve thought about this part of the story a lot, and I have tried to put myself in the shoes of this foolish younger son. What do you think he was thinking as he left his father’s house on this journey? Do you think he intended to blow all his money? I’m not sure what he was thinking, but I do know this—it obviously wasn’t a long-term plan. In all likelihood, his desire for pleasure and to live for his own freedom was probably so strong that all he could think about was the short-term. His lust and desire to have his own way blinded him to the long-term foolishness of what he was doing.

I think the same thing happens to us. We each have some picture in our heads of what will make us happy. Maybe it’s getting certain people to like you. Maybe it’s getting a new iPod. Maybe it’s getting a car. Maybe it’s having a boyfriend or girlfriend. Maybe it’s doing sexual things with another person. Maybe it’s food. Maybe it’s getting really good grades and being at the top of your class. Maybe it’s being an incredible athlete that everybody admires. Whatever it is, good or bad, we all have things that we think will make us ultimately happy. And, because we put our hope and our trust in these things, they are idols. The truth is that none of them will completely or totally satisfy us. But, in our desire to have them, we are blinded to the long-term. We do things that we eventually regret because we want something so badly. And it doesn’t matter if it’s a good thing or bad. Obviously, the short-term desire to get sexual pleasure can lead to all kinds of long-term regret. But, the short-term desire to be the best student that everyone admires can also lead to regret from lost relationships that you abandoned along the way.

Just as the younger brother didn’t expect to blow all his stuff, we don’t expect our lives to go wrong. But, the truth is that anytime we build our hopes or desires or identities on anything but God, we will end up unhappy. Often, the desire we have will spiral out of control until our lives are ruined. I’m guessing that those of you who are hooked on porn never intended to be. But you did have a desire for something thrilling or from curiosity or to make yourself feel in control, but now your addiction is out of control. Now you are a slave to it and it went much farther than you ever planned and you feel stuck. Maybe you never intend to sleep with your boyfriend or girlfriend, but then you start fooling around and things get out of control.

That’s what happened to the younger son. He started off just wanting to have some freedom and have a good time, and he ended up in a world of hurt.

3. The Younger Son’s Result (v. 14-16)

What’s the result of the younger son squandering his wealth and letting his life get totally out of control? The result is a terrible life. He spends all his money and all of a sudden he’s poor. His life, which he thought he had total control over, is now a mess. That’s all an obvious result of his reckless life.

But there’s another thing that happens outside of his control that puts him in even more trouble. Verse 14 says that after he had spent everything a terrible famine arose in that land. This was something totally out of his power or control, but it had a very significant impact on his life.

One of the myths of independent rebellion is that you control your own universe and reality. It’s the myth that you are in charge and that you can overcome any obstacle in the way. But sometimes things happen outside your control. Sometimes there are circumstances that come from God—like this famine for the younger son—and now you’re in a tougher spot than you were before.

So, here the younger son is with a terrible life. his money is gone and there’s a famine. And people aren’t particularly generous to beggars during times of famine—they don’t have any extra to give away. But, this boy needs to eat and needs to do something, so he finds a farmer and clings to him and gets the job of feeding pigs.

Now you need to understand that in the mind of a Jewish person, pigs are the most disgusting and unclean animals on the planet. Jews were not to eat pigs, raise pigs, touch pigs, or have anything at all to do with pigs. So, this guy is at an absolute low. This is the pinnacle of shame and embarrassment. He has fallen so low that the only thing he can manage to do is to take a job feeding pigs.

The passage says that he then got so hungry that he longed for what the pigs were eating. Think about this for a minute. In a time of famine, there is not much good food around, right? When a famine hits, most people will eat anything they can get their hands on. If that’s the case, what do you think they were giving the pigs? Probably the equivalent of garbage. You wouldn’t want to eat what pigs eat in a time of richness and prosperity—but you especially wouldn’t do it in a time of famine. Yet, this guy is so lost and so desperate and so in need that he only wishes he could have some pig trash-food to eat.

But, it says in verse 16, that “no one gave him anything.” Even these dreams of eating trash fell short. nobody gave him jack squat. This boy is in need and he’s hurting. He has made a shameful request, lived out a shameful rebellion, and now he’s living with the shameful result. Sadly, it’s not until this moment—when he has hit absolute rock bottom—that he wakes up and makes the first good move in the entire story.

4. The Younger Son’s Resolution (v. 17-19)

Verse 17 begins by saying, “But when he came to himself...”

This whole time the younger son has been doing incredibly shameful and stupid and harmful things—things that everybody around him could see. Yet, he was blind to his stupidity. I’m sure that as he left his father’s house he was convinced that he knew what he was doing and nothing could stand in his way.

But now, for the first time, he sees things as they really are and he comes to his senses. He wakes up.

I remember one time stepping on a scale after a particularly festive holiday season. I had been with family and eaten dessert with every meal for about three weeks straight. I hadn’t worked out, but I didn’t figure it was that big of a deal. So I step on the scale and I weighed 250 pounds. Wow. That is one of these wake-up moments. I knew that I wasn’t making the best choices and that I wasn’t feeling as good as I did a year or so earlier—but 250 pounds! I came to my senses. All of a sudden I realized that some things needed to change.

Have you had a moment like that? Maybe you were cheating in school and you had that moment where you almost got caught and it scared you—and you thought to yourself, “What was I thinking?” Unfortunately, many of you will not experience this until you’ve been caught in some way. But maybe tonight will be a wake-up call for you—a moment where, like this younger son, you see your foolishness and come to your senses.

So, all of a sudden it hits this boy that the even the hired servants who worked for his father—these were like day-laborers (the lowest role possible)—had more than enough food while he was starving. So, he makes a resolution. He determines in his mind to return home and he prepares a speech.

It goes like this: “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.” In other words, the son is realizing that he deserves nothing at all from the father, but he hopes to be able to get hired and become an employee of his. The son sees that he is far more wicked and sinful than he ever dared believe.

It’s important to see something from this speech. The younger son’s assessment of himself is accurate, but his solution for how to fix it is inadequate.

His assessment of himself is accurate. He realizes that he has sinned against God and against his father. He doesn’t say, “Father, I had an error in judgment,” or “Father, I was immature and stupid”—he says, “Father I have sinned against you.” He doesn’t make excuses. He owns up to the fact that what he did was wrong. This is a correct assessment.

And, he sees that he is no longer worthy to be called a son. This too is accurate. When he made his shameful request, he basically said, “Father, I want you dead—I don’t want to be your son.” So, he is right in saying that he doesn’t deserve to be called a son. This is a correct assessment.

But his solution is inadequate. You have to understand that in this middle-eastern culture, there was no such thing as free forgiveness. It would not be enough to simply say, “Oh, I’m sorry,” and just have the problem go away. There was an expectation that if you wronged somebody, you would make restitution—you would pay them back for the wrong that you committed. That is what the younger son is asking to do when he plans to say, “Treat me as one of your hired servants.” The implication is that he thinks that by getting a job—even a low job—he can somehow earn enough money to pay his father back. But, if you think about this even for just a second, you realize that this would never happen.

This son received a third of his wealthy father’s property—even if he worked for the rest of his life on a minimum wage, he could never pay his father back.

I have a friend from high school who’s father is in jail. He owned his own investment company and he manipulated and deceived people out of millions of dollars. Tragically, there are all kinds of people who literally lost millions. One person won $5 million in the lottery, invested her money with him, and now owes over $1 million because he lost the money and she spent money she thought she had. Another man is over 80 years old, but had to start working full time because his retirement money was totally lost. Meanwhile, this man had multiple houses, a plane, and lived a life of luxury—and then it all came crashing down. He was recently sentenced to life in prison, but he is appealing it. his main appeal is that if he were allowed to be released from jail and even just work a minimum wage job, he could eventually pay his clients back. But that is ridiculous. He owes over $12 million. He could work 24 hours a day for the next 100 years and never pay them back. The debt is too high.

It’s the same thing with the younger son. Though his assessment is correct—that he is a sinful wretch who deserves nothing—his solution is inadequate. The debt is too high and it could never be repaid.

Sadly, our tendency is to do the same thing as this younger son. If you’re a person who can identify with this younger son—you’ve lived your life as a rebel and you’ve done your own thing and you’ve sinned against God in more ways than you can count—then your tendency is to do exactly what this son does. Your tendency is to see your sin and your rebellion and to somehow make a deal with God that says, “God, I know I’m a sinner and that I really messed up. So now I’m going to get my life on track and really live for you. I’m going to get serious about reading the Bible and going to church and I’m not going to do that stuff anymore. If you agree not to punish me for these mistakes, I’ll agree to be the best person I can be.” You think that somehow your obedience and your commitment and your seriousness will make it where God is happy with you and won’t punish your sin. You’re trying to buy God off with your obedience. Your assessment is correct—you are a sinner who deserves to be punished—but your solution is inadequate. You can never buy God off or repay him by doing good.

There is only one adequate solution to be reconciled to the Father. It’s receiving the loving and passionate embrace of God as he pursues you and invites you into his family through Jesus Christ.

So, armed with his speech, the younger son returns home. And I have to think that all along the way he was rehearsing what he would say and how he would say it. And he must have been thinking about all the embarrassment and shame he would feel as he returned to town. And surely he was nervous about how he would be received.

He must have been nervous that things would not go well. But things actually went better than he could have ever expected.

5. The Younger Son’s Reconciliation (v. 20-24)

Verse 20 says that while the son was still a long way off, “his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him.” Wow.

We’re going to unpack this section in more detail in our last session when we focus on the father. But, for tonight, I want you to see that this wicked, sinful son experiences total and complete reconciliation with his father—and not because of his plan to pay his father back—but because of his father’s free and total love.

You see that the father is on the lookout for this son and he pursues him and showers him with love and grace. He runs after him and he throws himself around his son’s neck and he kisses him! he doesn’t make the son work for his love. His son has not even had a chance yet to give his speech. But the father’s love is so radical that he pursues his son and offers him full reconciliation.

Though the son hoped to come home and be even just a hired worker, the father’s love and acceptance go beyond his greatest hopes.

You see in verse 21 that the son begins his speech, but he does not complete the speech as planned. He acknowledges his sin and his unworthiness, but he leaves out the last part. Why? Well, it could be that the father interrupts him—and that definitely seems to happen in verse 22, when the father starts shouting instructions on how to get the party started. But I think the son knew that he didn’t need to ask to be a hired hand. Being a worker for his father was the best he could possibly imagine. But, as his father hugged and kissed and celebrated him, he knew that he had been totally restored. He knew that he was completely reconciled. He saw and felt that his father’s love for him was so great that he would insult him by asking to work his way out of the debt he owed.

In this moment, this younger son saw that though he was more sinful and wicked than he ever dared believe, he was also more loved and accepted than he ever dared hope.

Will you see that God loves you this way? Will you see that it is not only impossible, but also insulting, to think that you could earn God’s love or be accepted because of your obedience? Will you come to yourself? Will you realize that you are far more sinful than you ever dared believe? Will you see that you have rebelled against God and lived for yourself? Will you come home to this father who is pursuing you? Will you receive his compassion and his embrace and his acceptance?

The message of the cross of Jesus Christ is a message of reconciliation. It’s a message of people who have deserted God in hopes of having the life they want for themselves, but who are reconciled to God—enjoying a loving relationship as his children—because of Jesus Christ and his death on our behalf.

You need this message tonight. I don’t care whether you have been in a long term rebellion and have walked far away from God or if you are just struggling with an ongoing sin and struggle. God is seeking you tonight. His desire is to find you and to embrace you as his son or daughter.

Please come home.

Let’s pray.

----

[1]Merriam-Webster, I. (1996, c1993). Merriam-Webster's collegiate dictionary. Includes index. (10th ed.). Springfield, Mass., U.S.A.: Merriam-Webster.