4th Sunday in Lent – 2025c

Old Testament - Joshua 5:9-12

New Testament – Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32

 

The Whole Gospel

 

INTRODUCTION: So every year a few souls get lucky and buy a lottery ticket that ends up being worth millions. 

 

At the middle of this last week, the current Powerball jackpot stood at an estimated $484 million dollars, or a paltry $228.1 million for the one time cash payout. And so if it hasn’t happened already, some fortunate soul is going to be really, really rich soon.

 

Of course, winning a bunch of money with a lottery ticket doesn’t always turn out to be a blessing, right? First, there are the family members and friends, who quickly begin making a nuisance of themselves.

 

Not too long ago, one guy who won a bunch of money in a lottery actually showed up to collect his winnings wearing a mask and full costume to conceal his identity! He didn't want anybody to know who he was!!

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But then there are also those people who end up blowing all their money, sometimes millions and millions of it, in lavish and wanton spending sprees. Yep, some lottery winners, it turns out, actually end up in worse financial shape after turning in their winning tickets than they ever were before.                                 

 

According to the American Bankruptcy Institute a third of all lottery winners end up declaring bankruptcy within 3 to 5 years of collecting their earnings, which is basically double the rate of other Americans over the same time period. 

 

So as crazy as it sounds, winning the lottery isn’t necessarily a good thing. People win a bunch of money, assume they’ve landed on Easy Street, only to soon be broke and in worse financial shape than ever.     

   

ONE: Of course, that Prodigal Son from Jesus’ famous parable wasn’t all that different from those lottery winners who squander their fortunes, right? 

 

Except rather than buy a lottery ticket, the Prodigal Son goes to his father with a rather shameless and crude request to be given his inheritance early. “Hey old man,” says the youngest son, “since you’ve got one foot in the grave and another on a banana peel, what ya say you go ahead and divvy up your belongings now.” 

 

Robert Farrar Capon sums the scene up nicely when writing the following remarks: “What [the youngest son] in effect is saying is: ‘Dear Dad, drop dead now legally. Please put your will into effect and just retire out of this whole business of being anything to anybody and let us have what’s coming to us.’” Nice, right? 

 

And so with his tactless request granted, the youngest promptly cashes in his inheritance so he can go blow it all in Las Vegas on booze, women, and roulette tables. And of course, after a while, the youngest son, like some lottery winners, finds himself in worse shape than ever. 

 

At home, before cashing in his inheritance, he had a roof over his head, three squares a day, and a place to do his laundry for free. Once he’s blown all his cash, though, he’s reduced to feeding pigs their food. Given that Jewish law considered pigs to be unclean animals the implication seems pretty clear. The youngest son has officially hit rock bottom. 

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No wonder he decides it's time to go home. He’s penniless, living in a foreign land, and feeding pigs their slop.              

 

TWO: Of course, what’s just as sad and startling as the youngest son’s behavior is the father’s, I think.

 

After all, the father just lets his youngest son walk all over him. Yep, if there was ever a real life doormat, it’s got to be the father, I think. Because I doubt he would stand up for himself even if his life depended on it. Talk about an inferiority complex!  We take one look at the way the father lets his youngest kid walk all over him and it’s easy to wonder if he hasn’t been watching too much of the Hallmark Channel. 

 

Somewhere up in Ohio there’s a pastor who runs something called Man Camp. It’s a three day get together for men over 18 years of age. According to the website, over three days the men learn “first-hand the primal power of challenge, brotherhood, and no-nonsense leadership.” Apparently, the camp is quite the rage.

 

Well, the father in Jesus parable probably could have benefited from attending a Man Camp. Because he’s a pretty poor excuse for one. 

 

Why, the father is even more of a namby-pamby when we realize that in the patriarchal world of ancient Palestine he was to be honored and obeyed by his children at all times. In a culture where honor was paramount, the father was actually an embarrassment  for his lackadaisical and soft behavior when it came to his parenting habits.

 

And while the neighbors would have been shaking their heads in dismay at the brazen youngest son as he sauntered out of town with his pockets full of cash, they would have been even more mystified by the father and his own ludicrous and embarrassing behavior. While there were surely some people muttering quietly  “Good heavens! Look at the way that boy treats his father!” 

 

There were also just as many people muttering, “Good heavens! Look at the way that father lets his son treat him. What a shame. What a shame.” 

  

THREE: Of course, even stranger still is what the father does when his son finally comes crawling home with his tail tucked between his legs.

 

After blowing his inheritance at Black Jack Tables and on $300.00 bottles of Cristal Champagne, the father welcomes his philandering son home as if he had just won the Nobel Peace Prize. 

 

Decking his son out in his best attire while also slipping the family ring on his finger, the father announces it’s time to throw the party of the year. “The man has no sense of shame or honor,” the father’s neighbors would have been saying over cups of coffee at the diner. “Just look at the way his son has treated him! And there he is, rolling out the red carpet for that worthless ingrate.”  

 

There is a funny bit about a minister who was preaching on the Prodigal Son. Describing the father rushing out of the house to meet his wayward son, the minister says, “Dashing toward his son, the father throws open his arms and says…”, at which point a small boy in the congregation pipes up loud enough for everyone to hear, “Buster, you’re grounded for a whole month!” 

 

Well, sounds about right, don’t you think? Based on all that the youngest son has put his father through, being grounded for a whole month should be the least of his worries. And yet, there he is being treated as if he’s just graduated top of his class from a fancy ivy league school and is about to start some high powered job at swanky financial firm in New York City.                 

 

FOUR: And then let’s not forget about the older son either and his rather petulant behavior. Granted, he’s not nearly the train wreck his younger brother is, but he’s not exactly a model child either, is he?  

 

With his father throwing a huge bash for his brother, the oldest son just can’t bring himself to join in the festivities. Fuming in the front yard, he forces his father to leave his own party in order to plead with him in front of God and everybody to come join in the celebration.

 

But the eldest isn’t having any of it, is he? “All these years I was the one who took out the trash,” starts the oldest “and you’ve never even once offered to kill a single calf for me.” 

 

“And who mowed the yard and tended to the garden and made the needed repairs to the house while my loser brother was running around screwing up his life? Well, I did, old man! And what have I got to show for it? Nothing, I tell you, absolutely nothing.”

 

Well, the poor father can’t win for losing, can he? He finally gets his youngest son back only to have the oldest dress him down in front of his house guests as they peer through the windows of his living room.

 

And still the father can only think to do what he’s always done. He again throws his honor to the wind by giving the remainder of his inheritance away to his eldest son right there on the spot.

 

“My son, all I have left is now yours. So what ya say you come join the party with me?” The father’s words are  actually a formal declaration which essentially transfers the remainder of his holdings to his eldest son. The father, in other words, no longer has a penny to his name. So by the time the story comes to a close, he’s given everything away – including even the last of his honor.

 

FIVE: And so as the curtain comes down on the final scene of the parable, we’re left with a kind of surprising theology, aren’t we?

 

After all, Jesus’ story ends up painting for us a picture of a God that just keeps giving and giving and giving until there is nothing left to give. We’re talking about a God that only knows how to do one thing, and that’s to love.

 

Or as someone else has put it, “The world needs to know that God’s eternal, extravagant love is not part of the gospel. It is the whole gospel…Death does not have the final word. God has the final word, a word of redeeming grace."

 

Fred Craddock has a wonderful story about a man who approached him one Sunday after a worship service. During the service, Craddock had preached on the Prodigal Son and the man was not very happy . 

 

“I really didn’t care much for that, frankly?” said the man. When asked why by Craddock, he replied, “Well, I guess it’s not your sermon, I just don’t like that story. It’s not morally responsible.”

“What do you mean by that?” asked Craddock.

“Forgiving that boy…forgiving that boy isn’t morally responsible.”  

“Well, what would you have done?”

“I think when he came home he should have been arrested.” 

“And what would you have given the prodigal?”

“Six years.” replied the man. “Six years.”

 

And yet when Jesus gets to telling a story about the nature and character of God, well, he ends up painting a very different picture. While that Prodigal Son may have, indeed, deserved six years, that’s hardly what he gets, is it? 

          

CONCLUSION: And so do you see it now? While we’ve long liked to talk about God possessing certain attributes, perhaps we’re missing the point. 

 

For maybe, instead of just possessing things like mercy and grace, God actually is mercy and grace and yes, even love. For when gazing at that cross, what else are we to assume? 

 

So no wonder we’re encouraged to believe that God’s eternal, extravagant love isn’t just some bit part of the gospel. Nope, turns out it’s the whole gospel. And what more do we need to assure us of such a truth, than that cross perched high on that hilltop just outside Jerusalem with love draped all over it?  

 

And now blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.