Scripture: 2 Corinthians 5:16-21; Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
Title: Table Grace

**Sermons are meant to be heard, so listen along here**

Have you ever celebrated when you found something that was lost?
Maybe you didn’t throw a party, but there was celebration.  
Have you ever lost your keys?
Your wallet?
Your phone?
It’s a gut clenching feeling, when you realize something is missing.    

But that feeling, when you find what it is you are looking for.  Oh it’s heavenly.  
It’s a relief, and, depending on your phone addiction level,there’s some joy as well.

I cheer “I FOUND IT!!!!” (or them, because it’s probably my keys) to my husband who is likely being coerced into helping me look.
Layla celebrates all the time, when I inevitably find the thing she barely looked for but said she couldn’t find ANYWHERE.  But she really celebrates the finding.  

Today’s Gospel is a celebration of something lost being found.
But just who that lost person is isn’t as clear as we often think at first glance.
This parable of Jesus is known by many titles:
the most well-known: Parable of the Prodigal Son
But there are others:
The parable of the lost son
The parable of the welcoming father
And my personal favorite, given by a professor: the lament of the responsible child.

While that is funny, it gets at something often missed in this parable.  
There is more than one person in this story.  
That’s why, for today, I’d like to call this one the Parable of the Lost Sons.
Sons.
Plural.
Because this parable does something really incredible that we miss when we move quickly to the part where the father welcomes his son home with open arms.  And we’ll get there, because it’s grace at it’s purest, and it’s important, but we can’t skip all that comes before it.

Because first, this starts, as all parables do, with Jesus responding to some question or comment from the gathered crowd.

Verses 1-3: Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to Jesus. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “ this fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.” So Jesus told them this parable.

Them.
Who is them?
The Greek word for them can mean a few things, one of which is the entire gathered crowd.  Which means Jesus is telling this parable to everyone.
To sinners and tax collectors. The worst of the worst.
and to Pharisees and Scribes.  Teachers of the law.

Both.

Jesus tells a parable to both of these groups.
And they couldn’t be more different.  So you might wonder how he does it.  

Verse 11-12 There was once a man who had two sons.  The younger of them said to his father, “Father give me the share of the property that will belong to me”.  

Holy buckets.
This kid essentially asks his dad for his inheritance.  Before his dad dies.
Which is SO offensive.
So so so so offensive.
He’s essentially sitting his dad down and saying “look Dad, I’ve been waiting for you to die, but you just aren’t dying, so can I just have my share now?”

Can you imagine?

So the entire crowd listening to Jesus – they are BOTH equally offended here.
Because they all know that this is simply not done.  

Both sinners and keepers of the law know how bad this is.
Yet the father does it.
He does it.
He gives the son his inheritance.
Which is almost equally as offensive as the son asking for it.  
And the son goes off with his newly acquired inheritance, and he spends it all, and not wisely.

Then a famine hits the land and he ends up having no money and becoming deeply in need and so he goes and gets a job feeding pigs.
And the crowd goes wild.
Ok, probably not wild, but they would have been fine if the story had stopped there.
Because he had it coming.
This is exactly what they all wanted to have happen.
It makes sense.

But Jesus doesn’t end there.  
He continues on, and the youngest son realizes that the household help in his father’s house are treated well, really well, better than he is currently living actually.
So he begins to head home, all set with a big speech:
Verse 18b-19: “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer

worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.”

But when he gets there, things don’t go the way son expects them to.  

Verse 20: “But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him.  

You guys.

We could spend a whole week on just this verse, there is so much in it.

If you have ever wondered what grace looks like, it’s these next verses.

“While he was still far off” – this little starter to this part of the story means the impossible.  The father, despite having been told by the younger son that he wished him dead, was still looking for his kid.  To see him a far way off means he was on the lookout. Regularly. No matter what, he was still keeping an eye open for his beloved child.

“filled with …” – I think the crowd was expecting anger. The father sees his son and is filled with anger.  Right?  That is what makes sense.  We don’t see pauses in the scripture, but I like to imagine Jesus gave a big dramatic pause here… the father saw him and was filled with ….. compassion.  And the gathered crowd is all “WAIT WHAT?”   It’s a twist they don’t see coming.  And because of how often we have heard this parable, I think we miss this too… his father is filled with compassion.  Not anger.  And the grace continues.  

ran to – He doesn’t see his son and wait for him to come crawling back.  That might be what we’d do, or what we expect, or even what the son deserves, but no – the father RUNS to meet him.  Runs to get him.  

And then, here it is, the moment of truth – the son says:

Verse 21: “Father I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.”

 

And the father interrupts.

That big speech about being a servant instead of a son that he had all planned out, he didn’t even get to finish it!

The Father says
Verse 22-24: “But the father said to his servants ‘quickly, bring out a

robe – the best one –

and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and is alive again, he was lost and is found!”

I’ve read a lot about this parable this week, and there’s some dissent as to whether the son is really repentant, or just gaming the system.  
But here’s the thing… it doesn’t matter.

It doesn’t change the actions of the father one bit.

Let me say that again, the motivation of the son doesn’t change the response of the father at all.

He is celebrating his son.  

The child he loves so much is back.  
That’s all that matters.

And the story could end here.  
Because the minds of the gathered crowd hearing this parable are completely blown.
The Pharisees and Scribes are trying to understand this kind of extravagant love, and the sinners and tax collectors are completely overwhelmed by it.  Because they know they are the younger son.  That’s them.
But Jesus is responding to the grumbling Pharisees, and while the story of the younger son might help them understand why Jesus hangs out with sinners and tax collectors, Jesus isn’t done with them yet.
Verse 25-30

Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. He called one of the servants and asked what was going on.  He replied ‘your brother has come,and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.’ Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out to plead with hi.  But he answered his father, ‘listen! for all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends.  But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you kill the fatted calf for him!”

 

Oh you can hear the sarcasm here.
And the anger. So much anger.  
We often focus on the younger son in this parable.  Mostly because he is just easier to relate with.  He is a sinner.

He’s made bad choices.  

He feels the burden of guilt.  
All of us have been there.  
We have done things we wish we could take back.  We’ve sinned to the point of wondering if God could possibly love us ever again.

So we find it pretty easy to relate to the younger son.

And we hear about the grace extended to him, and to us, and we’re overwhelmed, and surprised, and humbled and delighted.  
But that older son.  
That’s the one we don’t like relating to.

I think it’s easier to admit our sin than it is to admit our anger at someone else’s grace.  

But that’s what’s happening here.  

The older son sees the banquet for the younger son and gets mad.  

Him?

Really dad?

What about me?

The Pharisees see Jesus eating with tax collectors and sinners and they get mad.  

Them?
Really Jesus?
THEM?

But what about me?
I’ve been here all along.
I go to church.
I’m a good person.

I serve.
I give.
I try to be kind to others.

And you’re choosing THEM?

No.

I’m not on board with this, Jesus.
I want the party to be for me.

 

The older son is all of us as well.
We like to relate to the younger son, but we all have a bit of older son in us too.  

Verse 31-32:
Then the father said to him, “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.  But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of your was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.”

 

All that is mine is yours.  
Your brother being welcomed back doesn’t change anything for you, the father says.  

You are still my son.  

You are always my son.

 

Our response to grace is twofold, and Jesus makes it clear today that we are both.
The first is surprise.  We are surprised by the grace we receive – fearing we aren’t worthy but getting it anyway. It’s overwhelming.  It is really what changes lives.  Being given grace when we don’t deserve it is why most of us are here today.

The other response is resentment.  When grace is given to someone else. Someone not worthy.  We are angry because we deserve grace and they don’t.  

 

To both of these, the response is the same: come. you are welcome. you are my child.

The younger son is broken, and is thrown a party.  
The older son is angry and the father comes to plead with him.  
Look, he says – the feast isn’t complete without you. I need BOTH of you.

This parable is astounding.  We lose something when we let it become familiar.  We miss something when we just say, oh yeah that parable.

Grace is for you.
No matter which son you are more like today – God is welcoming you to the table.
See – grace looks like a feast.
If you are lost.
If you feel like you’ve done something or been something that is unforgivable, unloveable,
then this table is for you.
If grace feels unfair to you.
If you’ve become resentful and angry.
If you have begun to decide who is worthy or not,
then this table is for you.
If you are both of those things, sometimes broken, sometimes angry, or a always a little of both – this table is for you.  The feast isn’t complete without you. It’s not complete without all of us.
So do we come to the table – to hear it again, to taste and see the grace of God, given for you.
No matter what.