Today we continue our walk to forgiveness. We are exploring forgiveness through one of the stories in the bible that paints a picture and is one that has always been pretty significant in my life. It is the story of the Prodigal Son from Luke 15. This story is about a son who asked for his inheritance-meaning he wished his father dead, left for another country, spent all his inherited money, then he started working for someone else, realized the slaves were taken better care by his father, and he decided to go home to his father. Once home, his father welcomed him home, embraced him, and threw a party, while the older son was jealous and resentful towards his brother because of how his brother acted and displeased that his father would welcome him back so easily. So much of this story focuses on the behavior and actions of the younger son. And today, we will focus on the younger son. But before we dive into the perspective of the younger son, let?s recap the perspective of the older son. (Watch Video)

Last week, I asked you to reflect on being the older son and the ways that you have felt you have been wronged in your life. The times that you have felt lost and wondered. The times you have been in the darkness instead of in the light, where you have asked where is your father, where is God? In the passage from last week, the older son names the times where he has felt lost and abandoned, yet we realized there was a deeper yearning we also heard in the passage. The older son felt a distance from his father and desired for the gap and tension to be closed between them. And in that moment, he was put in a place where he had a choice to respond. We always have choices on how we can respond in all situations.

As we talk through the perspective of the younger son, we see many different choices and responses he makes. So let?s put this passage in context first. The younger son has asked his father for his share of his inheritance. Meaning, he wished his father dead. Kenneth Bailey says these words: ?For over fifteen years I have been asking people of all walks of life from Morocco to India and Turkey to the Sudan about the implications of a son?s request for his inheritance while the father is still living. The answer has always been emphatically the same?the conversation runs as follows:

Has anyone every made such a request in your village? Never!

Could anyone ever make such a request? Impossible!

If anyone ever did, what would happen? His father would beat him, of course!

Why? The request means?he wants his father to die (Return of the Prodigal Son by Henri Nouwen pg 35-36).?

Bailey explains that the son asks not only for the division of the inheritance, but also for the right to dispose his part. ?After signing over his possessions to his son, the father still has the right to live off the proceeds?as long as he is alive. Here the younger son gets, and thus is assumed to have demanded, disposition to which, even more explicitly, he has no right until the death of his father. The implication of ?Father, I cannot wait for you to die? underlies both requests (ibid).?? Henri Nouwen goes on to say: ? The son?s ?leaving? is, therefore, a much more offensive act than it seems at first reading. It is a heartless rejection of the home in which the son was born and nurtured and a break with the most precious tradition carefully upheld by the larger community of which he was a part. When Luke writes, ?and left for a distant country,? he indicates much more than the desire of a young man to see more of the world. He speaks about a drastic cutting loose from the way of living, thinking, and acting that has been handed down to him from generation to generation as a sacred legacy. More than disrespect, it is a betrayal of the treasured values of family and community. The ?distant country? is the world in which everything considered holy at home is disregarded (ibid).? Ouch!

Yet as I read this passage of scripture and as I read the descriptions from Bailey and Nouwen, I realize that it summons me to recognize the younger son in myself; just as I recognized the older son in myself. I have left home over and over again. Not only the home I was raised in, but also left the home of God. I would call it a spiritual wandering and wondering. But here is one of the things I love the most about this passage: ?The father couldn?t compel his son to stay home. He couldn?t force his love on his beloved son. He had to let him go in freedom, even though he knew the pain it would cause both his son and himself. It was love itself that prevented him from keeping his son home at all cost. It was love itself that allowed him to let his son find his own life, even with the risk of losing it. Here is the key element, ?I am loved so much that I am left free to leave home. The blessing is there from the beginning. I have left it and keep on leaving it. But the Father is always looking for me with outstretched arms to receive me back and whisper in my ear: You are my beloved, with who I am well pleased (ibid pg. 44).?

Being given the freedom to leave, with hope and a prayer that you will return, is something that makes God?s love even more amazing! The younger son walks us through what it means to go home. The walk home is a hard walk, yet one that everyone can participate in. ?Remember, the younger son has told his father he wished him dead, but now is put in a place where he has a choice to make and needs to determine how to respond. He has wasted away everything that he inherited. He is a very poor man. He left home with much pride and money, determined to live his own life far away from his father and his community. Everything has been squandered. In his deepest moments, he realizes that he is lost-he is empty-he is humiliated-he is defeated-he is homeless-he has nothing. On this journey, the younger son realizes that he has to acknowledge to himself where he is lost, how he has wronged others and himself, where he is, and admit he is in need of forgiveness. He has hit the deepest point in his life-loneliness, isolation, alienation, self-destruction. He takes the very important steps of acknowledging where he has failed and he creates a plan and takes action. The Gospel of Luke says these words: ?But when he came to himself he said, ?How many of my father?s hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, ?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.?? So he set off and went to his father.?

The younger son acknowledged his sin, he has named why he needs to e forgiven, and he takes action. He begins the walk home. I can only imagine the internal conversation the younger son was having in his head. It would be a place of confusion, confession, and more! But this journey is one that is seated in repentance, but not repentance in the light of the immense love of a forgiving God. It is a self-repentance that offers the possibility of survival. It is another step towards forgiveness.

?One of the greatest challenges of the spiritual life is to receive God?s forgiveness. There is something in us humans that keeps us clinging to our sins and prevents us from letting God erase our past and offer us a completely new beginning. Sometimes it even seems as though I want to prove to God that my darkness is too great to overcome. While God wants to restore me to the full dignity of being a child of God, I keep insisting that I will settle for being a hired servant. Do I truly want to be so totally forgiven that a completely new way of living becomes possible? Do I trust myself and such a radical reclamation? Do I want to break away from my deep-rooted rebellion against God and surrender myself so absolutely to God?s love that a new person can emerge? Receiving forgiveness requires a total willingness to let God be God and do all the healing, restoring, and renewing. As long as I want to do even a part of that myself, I end up with partial solutions, such as becoming a hired servant. As a hired servant, I can still keep my distance, still revolt, reject, strike, run away, or complain about my pay. As the beloved son, I have to claim my full dignity and begin preparing myself to become the father (ibid pg 53).?

Acknowledging the need for forgiveness is a walk closer to God. It is the walk away from being selfish, self-absorbed, self-centered; and begins the walk of allowing ourselves to experience the full embrace of God?s love. By not forgiving yourself and others, the distance between you and God will cause tension in your life. It causes you to carry a burden that has already by taken from you through the cross. So today, as you reflect in your seat on being the younger son, I invite you to close your eyes and picture yourself standing there being embraced and held by your father, to acknowledge your sins and the ways you need to be forgiven. Think about how you feel while you see the scornful looks from your older brother. What do you realize about yourself?? What feelings go through you as you put yourself in his shoes? Can you name those feelings? I would encourage you, take a few minutes and write those words down for you to reflect on this week.

One of the things I think the younger son realized is that his actions, sins, comments, behavior, choices, etc. were the ones that were keeping him away from returning home. Once he acknowledged that, the burden he was carrying began to be lifted. He felt lighter. He began to let go, and welcome God?s into the places of his life that needed to be found, that needed to be healed, that needed to be forgiven?and we acknowledge that what he needed the most was his father?s love?God?s love.

It is my prayer that this week, we can continue our reflection on forgiveness through the story of the Prodigal Son and through this story, we can lessen the burdens that keep us separate from God?s unconditional love.