The Right Thing?
Luke 15:11
Then Jesus said, ‘There was a man who had two sons. 12The younger of them said to his father, “Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.” So he divided his property between them. 13A few days later the younger son gathered all he had and travelled to a distant country, and there he squandered his property in dissolute living. 14When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need. 15So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs. 16He would gladly have filled himself with the pods that the pigs were eating; and no one gave him anything. 17But 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! 18I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; 19I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.’ ” 20So he set off and went to his father. 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. 21Then the son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” 22But the father said to his slaves, “Quickly, bring out a robe—the best one—and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. 23And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; 24for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!” And they began to celebrate.
25 ‘Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. 26He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. 27He replied, “Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.” 28Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out and began to plead with him. 29But 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. 30But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!” 31Then the father* said to him, “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.” ’
A Sermon
There was a tragedy about 100 years ago in my family. The people caught up in it determined to do the right thing, at terrible cost to themselves. They told no one. None of my generation, or the one before, knew what had happened. Then, some 30 years after the death of the last member of that first generation, someone discovered some old hidden documents.
By that time, even though we had not known, I think many of our wider family had unconsciously become more invested than most people in the idea of... doing the right thing; certainly, I was. You must do... the right thing.
Society, of course, runs on the idea of right and wrong. How else would we survive as a civilisation if we couldn't tell right from wrong? We are all invested in this way of living, but I have been especially focussed on right and wrong, unconsciously living out the grief and pain of my forbears.
So, you can imagine why I might be interested in that Jesus story we traditionally call The Parable of the Prodigal Son. Because there... is a boy who is wrong, wrong... and wrong!
And there... is a father, given to us as a picture of God, who lives outside the categories of right and wrong. It turns out that right and wrong are ideas we have dreamed up, and even projected upon God; God's not especially interested in them. Right and wrong are a part of our attempt to live without God.
God says, through Paul, that all things are lawful, but not everything is helpful[i], which is a profound disagreement with a right-wrong view of the world. God says, "I desire mercy, not sacrifice." These words come through the prophet Hosea, and Jesus quotes them in Matthew chapter nine.[ii] When we take this statement out of the world-view and language of Jesus and Hosea and put it into our language, Jesus is saying, "I don't want you to do what is right, for right is always an inadequate cultural definition of God's gifts to us. I want you to learn to be compassionate and to love people."
Indirectly, he is saying right and wrong are inadequate categories for navigating the world. They do not reflect the nature of God. If we navigate the world according to right and wrong, we will injure others, and we will injure ourselves. And my witness is that my obsession with doing the right thing has been a trap which has kept me apart from much of what God has been offering me.
I would go so far as to say that... in many ways, the Bible is a long history of Israel, and of the church, slowly learning that God transcends our ideas of right and wrong. There is a better way of living, which is shown to us in the life and example of Jesus.
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Let's look at the story of the Father and his children which Jesus told us.
The story seduces us into damning the younger son according to the rules of right and wrong. The son is full of himself, blind to everyone else, and lacking any compassion.
To begin with, taking his share of the farm would likely condemn the family to poverty. This is not a society where a family can survive the loss of half its assets and its production potential.
But far worse, to ask his father for his inheritance is culturally pretty much saying, "Dad, I wish you were dead already." In an honour-shame society like Palestine, this was as wrong as you could get. Indeed, for Jesus' listeners, it's likely that part of the scandal of this parable is that the father didn't give him a thorough beating. The father did not do the right thing here!
And the original listeners are also... likely to have thought, "That crazy old man must have ordered the older brother and the uncles not to touch the younger son!" Otherwise, the kid wouldn't have made it out of town alive; there would have been an "honour killing." That was the right thing to do to protect and maintain the family honour. But the father didn't do the right thing. He stopped the "right thing" (so-called) being done.
And it gets worse. The language of the story is full of religious code words.
Firstly, the "far off" country is not some distant place like... Argentina. It is code for "a place and a land far from Israel and far from God." Like Jonah, the son sets out on a journey "away from the presence of the Lord."[iii] The Greek word for the far off or distant country is μακρὰν, and we'll see it again in the story.
Second, the dissolute living, which the older son bluntly calls "devouring your property with prostitutes" is not only a moral thing. It is firstly a sign and a symptom of turning one's back on God and on all that is good. It is code for idolatry.
What happens when we act like this? What do God's people expect to happen? In the Bible, when people go astray, God is merciful. God warns them. Sometimes... God sends a famine—God warns the people of God to repent. But just like Israel of old (and the church?) the son does not repent. Instead, NRSV says he "hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country."
I find the KJV translation makes it clearer: "He went and joined[iv] himself to a citizen of that country." This is a shameful thing for any Jewish man to do. It is to abandon God and form an alliance elsewhere, and that's before we come to the pigs which are the epitome of uncleanliness and separation from God. The son has abandoned all the tenets of his religion. He is wrong, wrong... and wrong.
Finally, he comes to his senses.
But do you notice how tenuous, and how ambiguous, his "repentance" is? "When he came to himself" he cried out to God in horror at his idolatry and his failure and his greed, and at the shame and poverty he had brought upon his family, and his father. My God, I am so sorry. Please God forgive me!
Except he didn't say that, did he? "I will say to my Father..." There is something very calculating about this; everything is still mostly about him. "If I can spin the old man a tale, maybe he'll let me live with the servants, and at least I'll have something to eat."
The truth of this is much clearer in the Greek of the original text. We know this because the text says, "While he was still far off, his father saw him..." "While he was still far off." It's that word μακρὰν again, which we saw meant far off... from God. I'd always imagined that the father spotted him walking the last couple of miles up the hill to the village. I think it means the father saw him coming alright... but that it also means the father saw right through him... and knew he was still far off and distant from God. (NRSV hides this point)[v]
We still use this language today. We say about a crook tradie, "He saw me coming..." We mean he saw into our character, who we were, and he knew how just to rip us off." So it was with the father: He saw the son coming from a long way off. He knew... he knew what the younger son was up to.[vi]
And yet, the father, even though he can see him coming, runs and embraces him. There is no mention, no question, of right and wrong. Right and wrong is our language. The father is bigger than right and wrong. The father only gives and rejoices. The grace of the father is so great that there is no forgiving needed; grace means that forgiveness has already happened. The son seeks to negotiate a limited forgiveness—living with the servants, but the father... interrupts him and says "Let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!” God's grace means that forgiveness already... is. For that son, and for us. It always... was.
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Who does right and wrong in this story? Not the younger son. He just does what he figures will get him the best deal—and, yes, that means he has a whole lot to learn about life and wholeness. The person who does right and wrong is the older son—"For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command..." And the older son can't let himself go into the feast, the symbol of the kingdom of heaven. And that's what I've so often done to myself for years. I've been so fixated on right and wrong... that I've stopped myself entering into the peace of God.
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Of course, it is helpful to do well. It is better to be gentle. It helps to be wise. But right and wrong, good and bad, in and out—all those things used as a measure of how we are succeeding as a human being, are deadly. They tempt us into thinking we can be better people. Just a bit more will-power, just a few more sessions of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, a bit more study to understand what is good and bad—No! These things are the world's siren call away from the gospel of grace. For we can never be good enough; that's not how it works. Right and wrong, I find, is always a measure of... my failure.
We are so indoctrinated with the idea of right and wrong that it's almost impossible to conceptualise that God doesn't work that way. We can't get our heads around it. We can only begin to experience a different life by following Jesus. If we follow Jesus, if we read the stories, we so often find he's bigger than right and wrong. He simply gives himself to the situation and to the person in front of him, and to their needs. It’s the opponents of Jesus who worry about right and wrong.
Give yourself to the person you are with... whoever it is. Treat them with the same respect as anyone else. Treat them as you would treat Jesus. Practise giving.
I'm not good at this. I want to be right. But it's when I give, when I love... that I receive. It's when I give and love that the pain and exhaustion and grief of life begins to lose its hold on me. I haven't got a neat theological formula for that. It's just what is happening to me. And it's the best thing.... .... .... Follow the Christ. Amen.
Andrea Prior (August 2023)
Direct Biblical quotations in this page are taken from The New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Please note that references to Wikipedia and other websites are intended to provide extra information for folk who don't have easy access to commentaries or a library. Wikipedia is never more than an introductory tool, and certainly not the last word in matters biblical!
[i] 1 Cor 10:23 23 "‘All things are lawful’, but not all things are beneficial. ‘All things are lawful’, but not all things build up." This is a fascinating text. Paul disagrees with the behaviour of some people who are blithely saying "All things are lawful," and he seeks to correct them. But he cannot bring himself to say "Not all things are lawful," because he understands that God's love transcends our categories of right and wrong.
[ii] Hosea 6:6, and Matthew 9:13
[iii] Jonah 1:3
[iv] https://www.billmounce.com/greek-dictionary/kollao Is there an echo in ἐκολλήθη of the joining and cleaving to prostitutes that constitutes idolatry?
[v] "travelled to a distant country (15:13) and "while he was still far off" (15:20) from the NRSV translation are both the same Greek word μακρὰν
[vi] I am loosely quoting earlier work by me at https://www.onemansweb.org/fathers-sons-sheep-and-goats.html
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