Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32 Commentary

What makes someone resent repentance? That’s really the crux of the matter for the older brother, isn’t it? Or maybe it’s that the older brother doesn’t care about his younger brother’s repentance, but that he resents his father’s compassion.

Jesus tells three stories about something lost being found and how being found is always worth celebrating. We’re only reading the last one with the lectionary selection, but the three parables in chapter 15 build on one another. The first two parables about the coin and the sheep setup the experience the younger son will have, and these stories particularly speak to the tax collectors and sinners listening to Jesus. They hear the good word that all hope for them is not lost! That they too can be welcomed back in, celebrated even.

It’s verse 15 that starts to lead the Prodigal Son story into new parable territory. And it’s here that the muttering Pharisees and teachers of the law may hear themselves echoed in the older brother. Their resentment about the rabbi who celebrates sinners by deigning to dine at their table—sending all the wrong messages, of course—is much like the older son’s anger that his younger brother is having a party thrown in his honour. Honour? What honour is there when you tell your father you would rather he were dead so that you can have your inheritance? What honour is there when you say you’d rather enjoy your life alone than with your family? What honour is there when you come back, hat in hand, having done who knows what with yourself?

And it’s true, or actually, it’s likely worse than the older brother could have imagined. He imagines his brother spending all his money on prostitutes, but his younger brother’s life fell apart so much that he was desperate enough to break basic Jewish customs and laws in order to even have the chance to eat what unclean animals ate. A lifestyle of debauchery is a cry for help, but the dehumanizing realization that someone’s livestock are treated more humanely than you is an altogether worse blow.

Nothing that the younger brother has been through is something the older brother should wish to want to have for himself, so why the resentment? Whatever story he has told himself about his brother has a solid hold on him and has become just as life-shaping as his younger’s brother choice was for himself.

The older brother’s resentment may stem from his sense of responsibility to his father and family, which likely grew when the father agreed to let the younger son jeopardize their livelihood by taking his inheritance early. There is never enough thanks that can be given for being the “perfect child” because it is an identity bound up by duty, not joy or freedom. The older son’s resentment may have stemmed from dreams squandered: what could have been if he had the whole of his family’s resources? If his brother had stayed and helped and been part of it? Yes, perhaps he resents the very idea of possibility being taken away.

In the way this story is told, it appears to me like the older son did not work through these sorts of thoughts and feelings in the same way the younger son or even the father did. The story narrates this internal journey for the younger of the two brothers, but we come to understand the father’s journey by his responses.

The father gave his son over to his son’s desires, allowing him the freedom he asked for but was not obligated to receive. The father is a righteous man: his younger son remembers how he treats his servants fairly. The father also did not lose himself to despair and depression when his younger son abandoned him; he continued to be present to other son, living and working alongside him, sharing life together because he believed that everything he had was also his son’s. Throughout his life, the father never gave up hope, never stopped loving and interceding for his sons. Because of his compassion, he was always ready to receive his younger son, always wanted him to come home and be safe and well. It is the same hope and prayer he has for his older son—that he will be freed from his resentment and able to enter into the joy of being found.

Resentment goes all the way back to the beginning. The evil one’s first temptation was to plant a doubt that would grow resentment towards what is beautiful and true and good. Why would God tell you that you can’t eat from that tree? What does God have that he doesn’t want you to have? Resentment is the type of sin that we tie ourselves, so easily tightening the knot that we need outside help to break free. And as the father does for both of his sons, God will come to us with the power to loose the ties that bind and give us new life.

[Note: In addition to these weekly sermon commentaries on the CEP website, we also have a resource page for Lent and Easter with more preaching and worship ideas as well as sample sermons on the Year C Lectionary texts.]

Textual Point

The details of this story matter. There are all of the ways that the younger son has lost himself: the way he cuts himself off from his family, the way he lives “according to the flesh,” the way he is forced to a life where he isn’t even able to live out his Jewish identity with any semblance of integrity. There’s the way the older son reveals his heart and what’s been festering by what he says: his opinion of what his brother deserves, what he himself deserves, who he feels most connected to, what he implies about how his father should feel… The father’s character is also revealed in the details: he proves his love for both his sons by what he says, but also by what he does. He has always been a companion to the older son, and he threw dignity to the wind by running out to the younger son even while the son was still on his way to repent; the father showed compassion and forgiveness even while the younger son was still a sinner.

Illustration Idea

In an era of revenge movies and culture cries for karma, what a profound reminder of the way Christianity is different. God does not make us grovel, nor does God give us what we deserve. Instead, God restores us and true repentance is part of us coming to our senses about reality. And yet, the older son’s response also reminds us that repenting to God is only part of the process of restoration: we also need God’s help to mend relationships with one another. Even if the older brother came in to celebrate, we all know that rebuilding that relationship will take time and it will be difficult, for everyone involved. Like modern restorative justice processes, it will take a community—like the ones the father gathers for the party—to support both sons.