“Your brother has come,’ (the servant) replied, ‘and your father has killed the
fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’ The older brother became angry and
refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him (Luke 15:27-28).”
We’ve observed how the younger son in Jesus’ famous Parable of the Prodigal Son
ran off to a far country and squandered his wealth and life in reckless living. Let’s turn our
attention now to the older brother. Having heard the sounds of celebration, the older
brother had asked one of the servants what was going on. Learning that his father has
thrown a party to celebrate the return of the prodigal, the older son refuses to go in to that
celebration even as the father pleads for him to do so. “All these years I’ve been slaving for
you and never disobeyed your orders,” he tells his father, “yet you never gave me even a
young goat so I could celebrate with my friends.”
The older brother is now outside the will of his father, even as the younger brother
had been. Notice, the father pleads with him to come in, but he refuses. This is a hard pill to
swallow, particularly for many of us who see ourselves as dutiful and serious servants of
God. Somewhere along the journey, the wonder of the father’s provision and goodness and
steadfast love is replaced by a sense of moral achievement and personal righteousness
based on comparison with others. The prayer of the Pharisee, “I thank you Lord that I am
not like that tax collector over there…” may never actually reach our lips, but it is lurking
somewhere in the back of the mind. Lost in this is the deep gratitude that the younger son
now has because he knows that everything he has and is and shall be is because of the
outrageous goodness of the father.
In this Lenten season, pause to consider the ways the attitude of the older brother
may have become your own. Are you often judgmental? Do you easily become jealous of
others who are recognized, while you are not? Have the sense of duty and a strain of
seriousness replaced the joy of the father? Are you resentful of others because they, not
you, are the center of the party? Acknowledge these things, confess them, and then—this is
most important—turn back to home, the love of God, who made Jesus to be sin so that we
might be the righteousness of God.
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