The Scandal of Reckless Grace: Beyond Moralism

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]
[00:00:00] Hey, good morning and welcome to West. It is crazy that you are here and whether you're worshiping live stream or you're in the building, I'm not there. And so it was just ironic timing that the Sunday that I've scheduled to be off for the last six months comes after two Sundays of being off and being quarantined because of the snow. And so for those of you who are here in the high school this morning, very grateful for you. And
[00:00:30] it's a special message one that i planned on pre-recording anyway just because of the points that we're going to make and the visuals that we're going to use during it and so it just was
[00:00:40] ironic that it all fell this way so grateful for you to be here for those of you who are newer to west we're grateful that you've taken a few minutes out of your day to check us out and see
[00:00:51] what we're about if you're listening to us on a podcast or live or later this week we're grateful for that as well we have a chili cook-off coming up next week we're really excited about that it's
[00:01:04] a pretty hefty competition but all proceeds go toward acres of hope which is our international mission partner that we've been a part of for uh since its inception and the beginning and in fact in a couple of weeks a team and i are going to be going to acres of hope so frankly i'm a little
[00:01:24] grateful for this weekend of just some gathering myself uh it's it's a long trip and i am 15 years older than i used to be when i went and so i'm looking forward to it but also a 24-hour plane
[00:01:37] ride sort of knocks me on my butt so anyway i'm grateful to be able to have some time to be away actually dawn and lane and i are spending some time or have been spending some time this weekend
[00:01:49] by the time you see this with two of the companies that we patterned soul after trying to learn and we really believe that soul is one of the future ways to fund ministries so we're excited about
[00:02:01] that also one more thing we now have west merchandise and that is a really big deal you don't have to have it sent to the office and all that kind of stuff and and over time we're going
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[00:02:25] We're really grateful for this company because they give us a percentage of all sales and at the beginning of every month we get a check from them.
[00:02:34] So another way to fund the many ministries that you do.
[00:02:38] We're grateful for you, grateful that you're a part of West and I look forward to sharing this message with you today.
[00:02:44] Alright, so how much do you know about birth order? I am an only child, so I know a little bit about only children. I don't know a ton about oldest or youngest or middle, but there are psychologists will show, studies will show that there are certain characteristics, certain behavior traits that different children in birth order have.
[00:03:07] So I want to give you a little quiz this morning just to see how much you know about birth order and where we fall in characteristics.
[00:03:16] It's a true-false quiz. I'm going to read it to you. You're going to see it up on the screen.
[00:03:21] And I want you just to go with your gut response, true or false. Ready? Here we go.
[00:03:27] Number one, firstborns secretly believe the rules apply to everybody else more than them.
[00:03:37] Firstborns secretly believe that the rules apply to everyone else more than them.
[00:03:45] What did you choose?
[00:03:46] The answer is true.
[00:03:50] Next one.
[00:03:51] Youngest children are phenomenal negotiators because they spent their childhood arguing their case to no one in charge.
[00:04:08] That answer is false. Actually, those would be characteristics of a middle child. Middle children are actually very phenomenal negotiators, and they spend a lot of time trying to navigate relationships. They can read a room really fast and figure out where people are. They have really
[00:04:30] keen social skills because of being a middle child. Next, youngest children are more comfortable asking for help because they've been doing it their whole lives. Younger children are more comfortable asking for help than other children, older or middle, because they've been doing it
[00:04:52] their whole lives. That answer is true. Next one. Firstborn children were praised for being mature when actually they were just anxious. Firstborn children were praised for being mature when actually they were just anxious. That answer is also true. Only children generally struggle more
[00:05:22] with social skills than children with siblings. Only children generally struggle more with social skills than children with siblings. True or false? That answer is false. Only children are actually very social. People say it's because they have to work harder at having friends and navigating
[00:05:43] relationships. Last or next to last one, youngest children are more likely to resist rigid structure and authority. Youngest children are more likely to resist rigid structure and authority.
[00:06:02] That answer is true. And then the last one. Birth order has no measurable influence on adult personality or behavior. Birth order has no measurable influence on adult personality or behavior. That one, which I've already told you, is true. Birth order has a lot to do with
[00:06:29] our personalities and our behavior. And a story that Jesus told to two different groups of people was about birth order. There are three characters in this story. There's a father, and then there's a son the eldest son and then there's the youngest son now
[00:06:49] maybe you're thinking right now oh my gosh the prodigal son story heard it don't need to hear it again sometimes I look at stories in the Bible that I've heard before like that but there's always something more to learn and what
[00:07:01] I'm going to share with you this morning is actually a fascinating a fascinating way to look at the story of the prodigal son it actually comes in a trilogy of of stories about lost things, the lost coin, the lost sheep, and then the lost son, and Jesus was
[00:07:19] trying to make a point. He's talking to two different groups of people here, though, so I want you to remember that. He's talking to a group of religious people, like morally righteous people, people that get it all right, and then he's talking to, like, the tax collectors and the sinners,
[00:07:35] and unfortunately, tax collectors back then were known as sinners because they were seem to take advantage of people and and take their money so Jesus has got two very dichotic groups of people sitting here he's got the good and then he's got the perceived not good and so
[00:07:55] he's telling this story and there are three people in the story now I want to give full credit to this uh to this perspective on the scripture to Timothy Keller Reverend Timothy Keller the he's a was a phenomenal preacher pastor he wrote a book and i did a bible study on it years ago
[00:08:14] called the prodigal god and it changed the whole way that i looked at the prodigal son it's a fascinating way to look at it so i invite you to go into the story with me right now we're going
[00:08:26] to look at different sections at a time and we're going to flesh out like what's really going on and I want you to like try to find yourself in the story. Jesus told them, there was once a man
[00:08:40] who had two sons. The younger said to his father, father, I want right now what is coming to me.
[00:08:48] So let's stop right there and just look at it. So here is the son. There are two sons. And back during this cultural time, I want you to understand that like when a father had an estate, had all of
[00:09:01] his possessions. At the time of death of the father, the way that the estate would be handled, they didn't have probate and wills or trust or anything like that. The way that it would happen
[00:09:13] would be that his entire estate would be divided two-thirds to the eldest son and one-third to the youngest. Like if you were the eldest, you got more. But now there's some stuff that came along
[00:09:28] with that. Like the eldest son was expected to do more, was expected to be the man of the house along with the father. He had a tremendous amount of responsibility. And so at the time of the
[00:09:43] father's death, the eldest son would get the most and the youngest son would get the least. Now it is a huge deal for the youngest son to go to his father and say, hey dad, right now I want my
[00:09:58] part of the estate. First of all, the guy didn't have a bank account at Bank of America or Wells Fargo that he could just go take out, you know, several hundred thousand dollars and give it to
[00:10:09] him. He would have had to liquidate all of his assets, which most likely meant he had to sell his land. He would have had to sell his farm stock or whatever he did with his land so that he could
[00:10:22] get money for his son but it's even bigger than that and and this is like the one of the biggest cruxes of this part of the story for the younger son to go to his dad he didn't go and say hey can
[00:10:36] i have some can i borrow some money from you i want to go on a year-long excursion or i want to go find myself he didn't ask him to borrow his money he asked him to give him what was his so
[00:10:49] can we say entitlement? But he goes, and when he does that, he is in this cultural time, by asking for it before your father dies, you are saying to your parent, I wish that you were dead. So there
[00:11:05] had to be some grief with the father, some astonishment, some shock that his son would do that like this is not okay it is not culturally acceptable for him to do that yet he goes and what
[00:11:23] does the dad do like I would have been mortified and angry if my children came to me and said hey you are still around and still need what you've got but I want what's mine go on and give it to
[00:11:40] me. I would have been frustrated and angry, but not this dad. So he says to his father, father, I want right now what's coming to me. So what does the father do? He does it. He goes, he sells what
[00:11:57] he needs to sell, and he divides the property between them. It wasn't long after that before the younger son packed his bags and left for a distant country. There, undisciplined and dissipated, he wasted everything he had. After he had gone through all his money, there was a bad famine
[00:12:17] all throughout that country, and he began to hurt. He signed on with a citizen there who assigned him his fields so he could slop the pigs. The youngest son was so hungry, he would have eaten the corn
[00:12:30] cobs in the pig slop, but no one would give him any. That brought him to his senses. He said, you know what? All those farmhands working for my father sit down to three meals a day,
[00:12:43] and here I am starving to death. I'm going to go back to my father, and I'm going to say to him, Father, I've sinned against God, and I've sinned before you. I don't deserve to be called your son.
[00:12:58] Take me on as a hired hand. And he got right up, and he went home to his father. So there's clearly some self-actualization that has happened with the young son as he struggles and as he is hurting
[00:13:14] that's a little message in there for us that when we find ourselves struggling and hurting and we've sinned we've missed the mark we've done things that we know are wrong that like what can we
[00:13:28] learn from that how can we grow from that the beautiful thing about God that we see in the story is that God always takes us back there's never there's never anywhere we can go that is too far that we can escape the father's love and the son
[00:13:45] somehow in his gut he knows that but instead of coming back entitled or like hey I'm back he wants to come back and earn his father's trust and earn his father's love because it doesn't say he wants to come back and even be a slave
[00:14:03] he wants to come back as a hired hand. He wants his father to hire him so he can earn money to then we infer, scholars infer, so that he can pay his dad back. His heart has changed and so he gets
[00:14:18] ready to go home to his father. We read he got right up and went home to his father. This is one of the most beautiful parts of this story. Jesus says, while he was still a long way off,
[00:14:37] his father saw him, and he ran out, and he embraced him, and he kissed him. The son started his speech.
[00:14:49] Father, I've sinned against God. I've sinned before you. I don't deserve to be called your son ever again but the father wasn't listening so let's unpack that for just a second in my faith journey
[00:15:04] one of the most powerful phrases that i go back to when i miss the mark is while he was still a long way off you know what that means it means the father was watching for him while he was still
[00:15:23] a long way off. The father saw him, his heart pounding. He ran out and he embraced him. So let's think about that for just a second. Oh, and he kissed him too, which he would have smelled,
[00:15:36] okay? He was in with the pigs. He would have had this odor. His dad did not care. But think about what the gentlemen wore back during this time. Like they didn't have jeans or overalls or
[00:15:50] whatever you wear when you're out working in the fields he would have had on a robe and can you imagine running in a robe that goes down to your ankles no it would have been cumbersome
[00:16:04] it would have been difficult and honestly what he would have had to do is pick up the hem of his garment pick up his robe so that he could run and that was scandalous like you just didn't do that
[00:16:19] The men didn't show their legs. He did not care. He didn't care what rules he was breaking. He didn't care what anybody thought about him. He just ran to see his son. And his son launches
[00:16:35] into his speech. I've sinned. And sin, we remember, means missing the mark, missing the mark of being a person of love. I've sinned before God. I've sinned before you. I don't deserve to be called
[00:16:51] your son ever again. So he lays out at the beginning, look, I have no expectations from you.
[00:16:56] I don't deserve anything. I just want to be home. Pause for just a second. And when I say the word home, what do you think of? Like for me, I think of where I live. Perhaps you do as well. But home
[00:17:12] here means so much more than just the place that you reside. Home is a presence. He wants to be back in the presence of his father. Home is his safe space. Home is a relationship.
[00:17:34] Home is a sense of peace. And that's what he wants. He wants to get back into that place with his father but the father wasn't listening and not not listening because he's mad or or like we do
[00:17:50] we listen uh or we don't listen because we're already formulating our response or our rebuttal to somebody else active listening in our culture right now is pretty much non-existent the father wasn't listening because he was calling out to the servants quick bring a clean set of clothes
[00:18:08] and dress him. Put the family ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Then get a grain-fed heifer. This would have been one of the man's prized possession livestock. And I want you to
[00:18:23] kill it. I want you to roast it. We're going to have a party. We're going to have a feast. We're going to have the most wonderful time. My son is home. He was given up for dead, and now he is
[00:18:37] alive, given up for lost and now found. And they began to have a wonderful time.
[00:18:46] What an amazing love. He was given up for dead, given up for lost, and now he is home. The dad doesn't need a long explanation. He doesn't ask him where he's been. He doesn't ask him what
[00:18:59] motivated him to do it in the first place. He just welcomes him back in his love. That is the God that we worship, that is the God that holds all things together. And they had a wonderful time.
[00:19:18] So here we are, we've talked about the dad, right? And this scandalous love, the prodigal God, the prodigal dad, because we know that the dad is God in the story. Prodigal does not just meant wayward it means reckless so the son is not the only one that's prodigal the dad is prodigal
[00:19:41] too our God is prodigal and God loves us with this reckless abandoned love so we've got dad and we've got the son who has come into his own who has recognized I have messed up and I want
[00:20:00] to come home. But then there's a third part to the story. And maybe we don't pay a lot of attention to this part, but today I really want us to. It's the eldest son. All this time that all this was
[00:20:17] going on, the older son was out in the field. He was doing his day's work and when it was done, like the good eldest son, he came in. As he approached the house, he heard the music and
[00:20:30] the dancing he called over one of the house boys and he asked what was going on and the house boy told him your brother came home your father has ordered a feast barbecued beef because he has him
[00:20:47] home safe and sound what does the older brother do he stalks off he's angry he's sulking and he absolutely refuses to join in and once again what does the father do we've watched the father go after the younger son but because this guy's love is so big God's love is so big he cares
[00:21:21] just as much for the elder son like when my kids would fight I didn't always give as much grace to one over the other. Whoever I thought was right would be who got the most grace. And I would tell
[00:21:33] the other one, hey, you need to suck it up. You need to be nice. You need to do this. You need to do that. Not this parent and not our God. God goes to the eldest and he says, look,
[00:21:47] I want to talk to you. He goes outside to him, tries to talk to him, but the eldest son wouldn't listen. The son said, look how many years I've stayed here serving you, never giving you one
[00:22:02] moment of grief. Have you ever thrown a party for me? Have you ever thrown a party for my friends?
[00:22:09] Then the son of yours who has squandered everything, thrown away everything that you have, he shows up and you go all out with the feast. So let's unpack that for just a minute.
[00:22:24] so the dad goes out he leaves the party with a son that he thought was dead he leaves the party and goes to find his son who is hurting and we know that hurting people hurt people he goes over
[00:22:39] to him and he's like look you know will you please come back in your brother's home and if you look at the Greek text here, we notice that when the eldest son replies, he does not even honor his
[00:22:55] father with the term father. He doesn't give him any kind of term of endearment. So that is very intentional in the way that Jesus tells this story. He, without acknowledging any familial relationship, he just launches in. Like, what the heck? Have you not seen all that I've done for you
[00:23:20] all my life? All I've ever done is go by your rules. I've worked hard. I've done this. I've done that. And you've never thrown me a party. Where's my party? Where's my part? You know what
[00:23:35] this shows about the eldest son? It shows that his duty, his morality has not been tied to some deep love that he has for his father. His morality is tied to his righteousness. He thinks he's
[00:23:57] better. He certainly thinks he's better than his stupid brother who went and squandered everything out and everything that he's done for his father, it was transactional. He wasn't being a part of a family and just trying to contribute to the family for the good of the whole. It's all
[00:24:16] transactional. He didn't love the father. He was working to get what he rightfully per culture was deserved to inherit he was righteous and transactional not based out of love his father said son you just don't understand you're with me all the time everything everything
[00:24:50] that is mine is yours but this is a wonderful time and we had to celebrate the brother of yours was dead and he's alive. He was lost and now he is found and the story ends. Lots of times when
[00:25:12] Jesus tells stories, he finishes them. He resolves them in the lost coin and the lost sheep parables that he told right before this one to the same group of people. He reconciled those. You go find
[00:25:30] the lost sheep. You go find the lost coin. But here we have him asking, pleading. Can you imagine him pleading? Look, your brother is back home. Will you please, will you please just let it go?
[00:25:49] Everything I've got, everything I've got is yours. Just come to the party. And the story ends.
[00:26:01] The story ends that way, we believe, because Jesus wants us to find ourselves in the story and then wrestle with what would we do? How would we come home? How do you need to come home? And
[00:26:19] how do you need to come home to this love that holds all things together? Earlier this week, I had the opportunity to talk with someone about God and they confessed to me. They're like, look,
[00:26:29] I have never read the Bible. I'm like, okay, I don't think any less of you because you've never read the Bible. And they started asking me questions about creation and the way the Bible's interpreted. And I'm like, look, it's really tempting to read it literally. I wouldn't
[00:26:45] encourage you to do that. Read Genesis 1, there's a creation story. Read Genesis 2, there's a different one. Read the four gospels. They give the resurrection account differently. It is not intended to be read literally. It is intended to give us this overarching, comprehensive,
[00:27:02] undeniable picture of God and she said well what do you think of God I said you know I think God's a lot bigger than anything that we can fathom or imagine but what I know from my own experience
[00:27:16] is this that God is this presence and this love that holds all things together no matter how hard how bad how far away we go God always welcomes us back just like the father in this story
[00:27:33] and it's interesting like the father welcomes back the son that was the sinner that had made mistakes and and run away but the father also goes after the one who was equally as hurtful I mean don't you think the dad figured out when he's like look I did this this and this
[00:27:56] I didn't do it because I love you I do it because I deserve something from you don't you think that hurt the father when he realized that that son's love was transactional not selfless and sacrificial
[00:28:12] but what does he do he continues to say hey look everything i've got everything i've got is yours that's how much i love you won't you please come home are you the son that has made some mistakes
[00:28:32] and wandered away from that safe space called home if you are just know that god welcomes you back or are you the other son are you the righteous son are you the one that does everything right
[00:28:47] are you the one that checks all the religious boxes and your morality and your righteousness is off the charts isn't it interesting that that's also who Jesus is calling out here as a sinner as wrong are the religious righteous ones I think it's so tempting in our culture right
[00:29:09] now to become religiously righteous? Where are you in the story? And do you accept that love that God offers all of us every time, every step of the way, whether you're the sinner that's squandered everything or the sinner that's righteous? Which one are you? So this week,
[00:29:39] I had another interesting conversation with someone and I've debated whether or not I was going to use this for the closing illustration today, but I've decided since I'm not here in person and I don't have to greet you afterward, that I'm going to have the courage to tell the
[00:29:53] story. Scholars and theologians say that Jesus didn't finish this because Jesus would have wanted everyone there to find themselves in the story and all the good little religious people to see that, hey, maybe being good and religious isn't all it's cracked up to be. That maybe the religious
[00:30:16] people miss the mark sometimes too. Maybe being so morally righteous, there's always room for grace.
[00:30:28] So I don't have to greet you afterwards. So I'm going to have the courage to push us just a little bit. When we look at this message, we ask ourselves, how do we come home? Like, how do you
[00:30:47] come home when you're one of the two in the story? And the answer is this. First of all, you recognize that there is that love of God that is pursuing you every step of your life. A few weeks ago,
[00:31:04] we baptized Naomi, my granddaughter, and I had the privilege of doing that in infant baptism as United Methodist. We believe that that is acknowledging that reckless love of God that is with us from the time that we are created until we grow to a place where we can accept that love
[00:31:27] for ourselves. It's provenient grace. So how do you come home? Well, first of all, you recognize that there is that prevenient grace, that grace that chases us and follows us always.
[00:31:41] The second thing is we have to repent. To repent, which we're going to actively do in a week and a half at our Ash Wednesday service, repent means to turn, to change. We have to repent of our sin.
[00:32:03] what is our sin it's different for every one of us it's why very rarely if ever will you hear me preach sermons like i grew up with in the baptist church like don't do this don't do that don't do
[00:32:17] that what is a sin for one may not be a sin for others but we're also called not to let our stuff impede others so it's complicated but to come home we have to repent we have to turn around
[00:32:33] We have to change from our sin.
[00:32:39] It's easy to see the sins of the younger brother.
[00:32:43] He squandered everything.
[00:32:45] He asked for things he shouldn't have.
[00:32:47] He was entitled.
[00:32:49] He wished his father dead by asking for his inheritance.
[00:32:54] It's easy to point the finger at him.
[00:32:59] But what about the eldest son who truly is living into his birth order?
[00:33:07] He was what we would call a goody two-shoes.
[00:33:10] He was arrogant, egocentric, and entitled, and he thought he was just a little bit better than not just his younger brother, but his dad too. He was morally righteous and he needed to repent. How do we need to repent from our own moral righteousness? I told you that I had an
[00:33:45] opportunity to talk with someone that is unchurched about God this week. And they were talking to me with a heavy heart. They were telling me a story of their best friend's husband who is here illegally. And you know about the ice raids and all this stuff. So her best friend's
[00:34:12] husband is here illegally and really stressed out about that. Now the kicker here is he has been working on citizenship for years. It is a complicated process. I've helped two individuals go through the citizenship process over my 30 years of ministry. It's tough. It's easy to judge
[00:34:37] people that are here not legally and lump them all into a category, and that isn't fair.
[00:34:46] This gentleman, who is an illegal immigrant on paper, owns his own company. Last year, he paid over $100,000 in income tax. He's very successful and a contributing member of our society, yet he's afraid. So that's one side. But there's another side of this coin. And the irony
[00:35:14] of this did not fall on, let's just say I was paying attention. This woman that was talking with me is also really good friends of the mom whose daughter and daughter's boyfriend were killed two weeks ago in a tragic car accident and the driver of the car was an illegal immigrant.
[00:35:44] The words that the mom said to the lady that I was talking with were, I don't want my daughter's death to be politicized. Why aren't we talking about drunk driving? Why aren't we talking about
[00:35:57] that. Why aren't we talking about this at all? Like why did this story not make the news? So here is one person that sees two sides of probably one of the most contentious, heated topics we have in
[00:36:18] our country right now. And as I listened to her talk, I just heard her way out all different perspectives. As your pastor, I'm going to be bold enough to say that sometimes I think moral
[00:36:36] righteousness is when we forget to at least listen to the other side. We become so entrenched in our own stance that we forget that the people on the other side of the coin, on the other side of the
[00:36:53] issue. They have reasons for believing what they believe to. And so if maybe moral righteousness is the sin that we need to repent of, maybe we just become more willing to listen to one another.
[00:37:09] Because when the dad went to the eldest son and said, what are you doing? I love you. This isn't about you right now. The next line says, but the eldest son would not listen. If we're followers
[00:37:25] of Jesus, we're supposed to listen to everyone, even the people we disagree with. I'm not saying you have to change your mind, but I am saying we're supposed to listen. And the last thing is
[00:37:41] to recognize the sacrifice that was made for us to have that reckless abandonment of love, because God sacrificed so much for us.
[00:37:56] Jesus gave up everything just so we could get it.
[00:38:03] He wants us to get it.
[00:38:07] Will you repent?
[00:38:09] Will you accept that love?
[00:38:12] And will you vow to walk in the ways that lead to love and life every day?
[00:38:19] Let us follow a prodigal God.
[00:38:22] Will you pray with me?
[00:38:24] Gracious God, you are big and you are love.
[00:38:28] And it is so hard for us sometimes to see the ways that we get in the way.
[00:38:34] So whether we're the youngest son and we've run away or whether we're the oldest son and we think we've got it all figured out and we refuse to listen to anyone else, God, meet us where we are and receive us into your love.
[00:38:52] Forgive us of our sins and push us and pull us into walking in the ways that follow you and lead to life.
[00:39:02] In Christ's name we pray. Amen.
[00:39:06] So for the benediction today, while we were filming in the office, Dawn and Lane were there with me.
[00:39:13] And I was like getting near the end and I knew what the closing was supposed to be.
[00:39:17] And I hear this jingling over there to my left.
[00:39:20] so I want you to take a look at this clip and then I'll be right back Lane what are you doing stop yes and it's going to make a noise I'm going to kill you yeah right damn it was not my finest boss moment to turn and look at Lane and
[00:39:58] say, what are you doing? I am going to kill you. That is not a prodigal love. That is not anything like being a prodigal God. We all mess up, but God doesn't. God really doesn't make mistakes.
[00:40:16] And God loves you with that love and will carry you in that love now and forever.
[00:40:20] Go in peace, and I'll see you next Sunday. Amen.