Scripture Notes: The Prodigal, Part 3 (Luke 15)

Now that he has squandered all he had, the younger son in Jesus’ parable finds himself in a very sticky situation. Famine has spread across the far country in which he has chosen to live, and he finds himself lacking the basic necessities of life. He gets a “job” with one of the locals, who sends him out into the field to tend the swine. 

This is about as low as a Jewish person can go. Swine are unclean animals, never kept by the Jews, but here is this young man in closest contact with them. He has to feed them and care for them and keep them together. He lives among them. He undoubtedly smells like them. What is more, even though this is supposed to be a “job,” the young man apparently is not getting paid nor fed. He has nothing to eat and longs to fill himself up with the pigs’ food. No one gives him anything. No one pays any attention to him. No one sees him. No one cares. He has left his father to be his own person with his own life, but now he is nothing at all.

Notice what the young man does do and does not do in this situation. First, he does not eat the pigs’ food. Even in his dire need, he refuses to take something that does not belong to him. Something in his father’s training must have stuck because, even in his current depravity, the son knows right from wrong. What he does do is come to himself. He wakes up. He experiences an insight into reality. 

The young man looks back and catches a glimpse of just how good he had it at home. Even the hired servants had more than enough to eat! And here he is dying of hunger. Yes, at this point, the young man is motivated by his horrible situation. He has reached rock bottom, and he probably does not care all that much about the intricacies of family relations or the connection between mercy and justice. He is starving, and his father’s house is filled with food. He wants to go back. He will arise and go home to his father. No, his motives are not pure and perfect, but they are enough to get him started along the road.

The son does, however, recognize and admit his own sinfulness. Even, perhaps especially, in his hunger, he see what he has done. He makes a plan to confess to his father, saying that he has sinned “against heaven and before you” (Luke 15:18). He has offended God, acting against God’s moral order, and he has done so in the presence of his father, the person to whom he owes the deepest respect and love. His sin is serious and deep, and he knows it. So he humbles himself. Here he is among the swine, the lowest of the low, so he will tell his father that he no longer deserves to be called (or to be) his son. He will gratefully settle for being treated as a hired servant. The one so intent on striking out on his own and being his own man will now return, content to be a dependent, a servant, no longer a member of the family he spurned.

Scripture Notes: The Prodigal, Part 2 (Luke 15)

The younger son in Jesus’ parable has decided that he wants to be his own man and that he needs the material resources to do it. He has greatly insulted his father, who actually responds with great love and generosity, knowing all the while exactly what is going to happen to his son. His son will have to experience the consequences of his bad choices; that is the only way he will learn exactly how bad they are. God does the same with us; He allows us to immerse ourselves in our sin so that we realize just how horrible it is.

So the younger son gathers up everything his father has given him and goes off to adventure in a far country. He leaves his father’s house, turns his back on his family, and proceeds to enjoy himself. But he has no sense of future needs, no sense of truly providing for himself. He gives in to the desires of the moment, again and again and again. He squanders all he has, letting it slip through his fingers. 

This is why he is called the prodigal son. We do not always have a good grasp of the meaning of “prodigal.” Usually we associate the word somewhat vaguely with wickedness, but really, it refers to an  extravagance, a lavishness, even and perhaps especially, to the point of wastefulness. This young man is so lavish in his living that his property disappears quickly, leaving him with nothing and in the midst of a famine at that. The country that has seemed so fine and fruitful is now barren, empty. 

Remember that when the father gave his son the property (as a gift really, for the son had no right to it), he also symbolically gave him his own life. The son has not valued that life, not cared for it or conserved it or treasured it. He has let it go, squandered it, actually driven it away, for the word “prodigal” derives from an ancient word meaning “drive forth.” We must ask ourselves, then, how we squander, how we drive out, God’s gifts and indeed God’s own life that He has shared with us. How have we been prodigal?

Scripture Notes: The Prodigal, Part 1 (Luke 15)

The parable of the prodigal son, as we often think of it, is one of Jesus’ most famous stories. It is a familiar tale, perhaps too familiar, for we tend to glide over the top of it rather than plumbing its depths and drawing out the rich meanings waiting for us.

Jesus begins by telling us, “There was a man who had two sons” (Luke 15:11). This is a family, a group of people bound by blood ties, by spiritual ties, who are supposed to work together for their own good and the good of those around them. But this family has a problem.

The younger son apparently wants to explore the big, wide world. Perhaps he is tired of being under his father’s thumb (for in that culture, the father is head of the family, and sons obey him no matter how old they are), and he wants his independence. In any case, he does something that is almost unthinkable: he demands his share of his family’s property. Essentially, he is telling his father that he wishes the old man were dead, but since he is not, he wants what is coming to him, right now.

This is probably the most offensive thing a son could say and do. It reveals a deep selfishness, a lack of compassion for his father and brother, a complete disregard for the life and unity of his family. The younger son is thinking only of himself and his desires.  

We might expect the father to say something like, “Tough luck, kid. I don’t have to give you anything.” But he does not. Instead, he gives his younger son exactly what he asks for. He lets him have his inheritance early. Why? Because sometimes selfish, stupid people have to learn the hard way. The father here represents God, and God never forces us to choose Him. And when we choose something other than Him, He often lets us have it. He lets us experience the consequences of our bad choices because that is often the only way we learn exactly how bad they are. 

Interestingly, there are two Greek words used to describe the property requested by the younger son. The first is ousia, here translated as property or wealth or goods. It derives from a word that means substance or being or existence. The son is asking for material stuff, but deeper down, it seems that he wants to be in charge of his own existence. He wants to be on his own. The other word is bios. We learn that the father divided the bios between them. Bios actually means life, but here we can take it as the resources of living, the stuff needed for life. Yet there is something deeper; when the younger son leaves, he takes a piece of his father’s very life with him. The father sends it along because he knows that his son will one day need that life. 

Scripture Notes: My Child (1 Timothy)

As Paul continues the introductory verses of his first letter to Timothy, he identifies his initial audience: “To Timothy, my true child in the faith” (1 Tim 1:2). Paul is the one who brought Timothy to the Christian faith. He taught Timothy about Jesus. He trained him in the Scriptures and in the sacraments. Maybe he stood beside Timothy as he was baptized. Perhaps he even ordained him priest and bishop. Timothy was indeed Paul’s son in a very real, deeply spiritual way, and their love must have been strong.

In fact, Paul’s love for Timothy stands behind his next words: “Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord” (1 Tim 1:2). What a beautiful prayer and blessing this is! Paul wishes God to pour out His grace onto his spiritual son, His gift of love and help and support and protection, His gift of life. Paul wishes Timothy to experience God’s mercy, His forgiveness, His saving help. Paul wishes Timothy the great comfort of peace, of having everything in the right order, God’s order. 

Paul knows that he cannot give these great gifts to his spiritual son, so he asks God to grant them, realizing that they come from the Father and the Son (and although Paul does not say it here, from the Holy Spirit as well). Paul understands that God’s love for Timothy is even greater than his own, and he longs for that divine love to flow over and into Timothy, his true child in the faith.

Scripture Notes: Theological Treasure (1 Timothy)

St. Paul packs a trove of theological treasure into the first verse of his first letter to Timothy. We often tend to jump right over these words of greeting, thinking perhaps that they are just an introduction. Indeed they are: an introduction ripe for reflection.

Paul begins by calling himself an apostle of Christ Jesus. An apostle is someone who is sent, someone commissioned for a particular task. Paul has not sent himself; God has sent him (and he knows it very well due to his experience on the road to Damascus; see Acts 9). Paul makes this clear when he tells Timothy (and us) that his apostleship is by the command (or authority) of “God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope” (1 Tim 1:1). Paul is no longer his own; his mission is not his own; he works under the command and authority of Another.

God our Savior. A savior is one who rescues, delivers, preserves, protects. In this modern world, many people do not recognize their need for a savior. They think they are perfectly fine, even doing well. But none of us are. We need to be rescued, delivered, preserved, protected, saved. From what? From sin and death and the devil and, all too often, our own fallen selves. God saves us from all of these.

How? Through Christ Jesus our hope. Jesus died for us, to deliver us from sin and death, to restore us to true life and communion with God. This we believe. In this we hope. And hope in a Christian sense is not some vague idea that someday everything will be okay. Rather, it is a confidence that Jesus makes things right for us, right now and forever. We have to cooperate with Him, respond to His love with our own love, repent and confess our sins, and do our best to embrace His will. All of this arises out of our hope, our faith, our love, and especially out of His grace, for everything good that we have comes from Him.