2008 All Rights Reserved DISCIPLE PLUBLISHING COMPANY
2008 All Rights Reserved: Disciple Publishing Company
And let us eat and be merry. Select the finest calf from the flock
And prepare a feast to celebrate the return of my son.
For this my son was dead, and is alive again!
He once was lost and now is found.[4]
When the older brother who was in the field working heard the music and saw the dancing, he ran to investigate, and he quickly summoned one of the servants and began to interrogate him. The elder son soon discovered that his younger brother had returned and that their father was throwing a party to celebrate the return of his wayward child.
The elder son became angry and refused to enter the house to take part in the celebration. His father, being aware of his absence, went outside to invite him to come in and to join in the merriment. But in his anger and utter frustration, the elder son chided his father, “Lo, these many years I have served thee, and never transgressed at anytime thy commandments, and yet thou never gavest me a calf for him.”[5] The father, being a man of wisdom, paused momentarily and patiently responded, “Son thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine. It was appropriate for me to celebrate the return of your younger brother, who was spiritually dead and lost in the world, but as now repented and returned home.”[6]
Although I relate my life’s story to that of the prodigal son, there are clearly factual distinctions which personalize our individual experiences. The biblical character was Hebrew and Jewish. I am African-American and Christian. His father was a man of means with all the comforts of wealth and the attendant prestige and social amenities associated with opulence. In contrast, my father, a Baptist minister, was a man of little means with only an eighth-grade education.
The anonymous young man of scriptures squandered a handsome inheritance prematurely on riotous living, but to quote the judge who sentenced me to fifteen years to life in prison, I, “a self-made man, had negated every opportunity that life had afforded me with one unconscionable act.”
The apparent difference in our socio-economic, racial and religious backgrounds tends to dissipate when one focuses on the message that is being communicated in the biblical text. No sin goes unpunished, but where there is confession and true repentance, there is forgiveness and redemption. God our heavenly Father, possessor of all wealth (spiritual, intellectual, physical and financial) stands ready to embrace a wayward child who bears a penitent heart and contrite spirit.
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4 Luke 15:23-24
5 Luke 15:25-30
6 Luke 15:31-32
