Luke 15 - Family

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0:00 So, last week we started thinking about, I've been thinking about this question of like, okay, we got through the whole story of scripture, what should we do now? You know? Okay, we like, what are we supposed to do with ourselves? That question. Like, if we want to be not the prodigal, what should we do? What are we called to do?

0:32 What does the follower of Jesus do in the world? And I think like the church has kind of over the years come up with different answers for that. But you remember there's a critical point where one of the, like a young Jewish person comes to Jesus and says, what should I do? And the punchline is, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself.

1:04 Which is pretty cool. I think that gets close to the idea of what we should do. But the best way that that's been like, I think like, I can imagine ways to love the Lord by God with all my heart, soul, mind and strength and love my neighbor as myself. But I would love a little bit, I'd like something a little bit more concrete than that, you know what I mean? And the church over the generations, through down through the ages, has come up with this notion of vocation to try and help us understand what might we do.

1:35 How might we love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength and love our neighbor as ourselves? And this, that you're called to these roles and responsibilities. We talked last week about how God for some reason, from the very beginning, has worked in the world through people. Like he makes the world immediately, it springs out of his imagination at the command of his words, oceans form, stars are hung in the earth, plants spring up out of the ground, animals swim in the water and crawl along the earth.

2:11 He creates the world immediately, but as soon as he's done creating, he puts humans in the garden and says, now you be my image bearers and take care of it, you rule the earth and subdue it. And when humanity tries to become God rather than just be the image bearer and breaks the dynamic relationship between God, earth and humanity, and ushers death and guilt and fear and anxiety and depression into the world, what's interesting is that God doesn't immediately undo it.

2:46 Like the world that humans created, he lets them continue in. He's like, okay, we're going to figure this out together. He doesn't wipe it over, wipe it off the face of the earth and start over, but he also doesn't swoop in and solve it immediately. He like ushers them out of the garden and preserves an opportunity for eternity without failure and death, but says we'll get there together. And so there's this interesting collaboration between God and humanity in the world.

3:18 And so when we're starting to kind of consider, I've got 70, 80 years, 90 years, if I'm lucky, what do I do with them on earth? Love the Lord my God with all my heart, soul, mind, strength, love my neighbor as myself. The church has said that there are particular arenas in which we collaborate with God while we're here. They call them, your vocations are in these three arenas, family, church, and it says civic, we'll call it neighborhood. Family, church, neighborhood, the first one, family.

3:57 I was thinking about the story. When you read the story of creation, actually Genesis chapter 1 and Genesis chapter 2 both tell the story of creation. Complete. And so most scholars think that they're telling it from two different perspectives. One from a like overarching large view and one from a small view. In chapter 1 it says that he called forth vegetation, each according to its kind and in chapter 2 it says that he planted the plants and brought them out.

4:28 In chapter 1 it says that he created human kind, male and female, he created them. And in chapter 2 it says he reached out and formed out of the dust of the clay and breathed the breath of life into humanity. And my image bears stand up and are here, right? And so the very first ones God makes with his own hands and his own breath. And then it's collaboration from then on.

5:00 I was trying to think of like who's really responsible for these children that we keep having. You know? And there's enough stories just in the room here to know the answer to that question is not straightforward. It's not according to what we want all the time.

5:30 But it doesn't happen without us. It's not as though we're completely uninvolved. But also we don't have control it seems like, but we have some control. And it seems like it seems like where, what point is God working? I read Psalm 139 because it said you knit me together in my mother's womb.

6:03 Remember he says to Jeremiah before the, as you were formed I knew you. This like responsibility that humans, that the creation of new people in the world would be on some level a collaborative effort is bonkers to me.

6:34 I mean what a weighty responsibility. Right? I mean he says that in Psalm 8 we've read last week it says that humanity is the capstone of creation. The image bearer of God in the world. And he doesn't do it all on his own. It's fascinating.

7:10 And I think like there is beauty and trauma in that collaboration. Since there, I was thinking about this like from the process of conception all the way through like maturation, trusting the formation of humans to other humans feels reckless.

7:47 Like we are throwing caution to the wind here and we're going to go for it, you know? Like so much can go wrong from conception through maturation. I mean if the parents in the room know this but also the children, we're all children as well. And we came through our own little experience, you know?

8:18 And as good or bad as our parents were or as we are, still we are human. I remember I was like in college had this pastor who liked to think about a lot of like spiritual growth and he was learning at the time how much of our outlook on life was shaped by our family of origin.

8:48 He was in his middle 30s at the time and he was like figuring this stuff out and trying to teach it to a couple of us in college, you know? And this is an imperfect mental image but as he was starting to describe like the potentials of what could happen, I had this image, you know? Like I read what a gauntlet is because I had the image of a gauntlet and I don't know if this is true but the thing that I read this was years ago and it stuck with me was that a very traditional gauntlet, if you had to run a gauntlet, it would be people

9:25 set up about one person with the part, a line like this. Like it would be like if you all formed a line on either side right down here so that there's people standing like this and I'm going to run through the middle of you. Now you each get weapons and you swing them at me as I run through the middle of you. This is a gauntlet. If I'm fast and nimble, I'll get hit less. If you're weak or weary or afraid, I'll get fewer wounds.

9:58 But I'm not coming out of this thing completely unscathed. There's a whole line of you and you've got weapons. And I started to think this is childhood. Nobody gets through unscathed. These are humans out here trying to form other humans. Nobody gets through unscathed. Parents are doing the very best they can but for heaven's sake, they are no gods.

10:33 They are people who were parented by other people. So I started to think at the time it was like best case scenario in this arena of family. You run your gauntlet and start to assess your wounds.

11:04 Worst case scenario, you run your gauntlet and you never look back at why you're limping the rest of your life. And you never get to run again. I feel like this, so okay, here's a question, right? What are we supposed to do with our life? We've been through this whole story of scripture. We know that God made the world according to his own volition, free gift to humanity. Crowns humanity with the capstone of glory, sets him into be his image bearers in the world.

11:38 And through one genius stroke after another accomplishes the incarnation of Jesus, the death, resurrection, ascension, and creates new life for us. Now we're here living in this new life. What should we do? The first thing we should do is recognize that we still have work to do, that there is specific work. Though our years are limited, there are specific places in which God will collaborate with us in the world for his glory and our great joy.

12:08 The best way to build a life you like is to recognize the life you were made for. And what I'm saying is humans were made to collaborate with God in specific arenas. The first of which is this crazy place of family. So if you and I want to build a life that we like, we take seriously our role, responsibility in family, reckless and brutal, though it is. And you're in this interesting matrix where you are, as you have more than one set of responsibilities.

12:48 Where you are like child and sibling first. It's funny, isn't it like that they have the birth order science? Anybody gone into that? I haven't, you have gone into that? You got? There's some legitimacy there, right? Like you can see. Why? Because siblings are just as much of a mess as the rest of us.

13:18 Remember the story where Jacob has a bunch of kids by primarily two women and one of the women he likes the best and one of her kids he likes the best? Remember? And so he has Joseph and he likes Joseph the best and the rest of the 11 brothers resent the fact that he likes Joseph the best. And so they, what? Salamency, slavery? In order to not kill him?

13:51 I'm telling you that God trusting us with humans is reckless. Right. Crazy. You have a responsibility, you have an opportunity. Why would God trust humans to other humans? Well, I don't know. I really, I really like my dad.

14:27 I learned a lot from my dad. I like also healed from the gauntlet of my dad. He was a very good dude. And as far as fathers go, a very good father and I got wounded, man. It would have been better, I think, if Jesus would have just been my dad the whole time. It would have been better for me, I think.

15:02 And I imagine Joseph would say the same thing like, like, Ruben was his brother that intervened to make sure that he didn't get killed. He was like, guys, let's don't kill him. Let's just put him in the pit. Let's just put him in this deep pit. Let's just throw him down there. We beat the crap out of him. Let's just put him down in the pit and we'll deal with it later. And I imagine Joseph appreciated that Ruben intervened so that he didn't get killed, but he probably would have just liked if God would have been his brothers instead of these jerks that sold him into slavery. Right?

15:35 And yet there's a very famous scene in the story of scripture. Actually, it happens twice. Where, you know, Joseph survives, he's in Pharaoh's house, and then there's a famine in the land, and all 11 brothers. And Joseph, by the grace of God and the wisdom and foresight, has preserved enough food so that the whole region can survive. And his brothers are coming as emissaries from their dad because they're outside of Egypt, and in the famine they have no food.

16:09 And they come back, and Joseph is so well healed by the time they come to see him. He's been through prison a couple of times. He's been enslaved a couple of times through prison, and he's risen up to be like the viceroy of Egypt. The most powerful guy in Egypt, and they come to him, and they don't even recognize him. He's probably tan, you know, and in really good shape. He's eating well, and they don't recognize him. And he goes through a couple of things to kind of mess with them a little bit, but at the critical moment when they realize it's him, they're terrified because they're like, now he's got all of the power, and what does Joseph do?

16:49 He forgives them, right? They come up and they look for food, and he forgives them, and welcomes the whole family in. And that's the story we tell a lot, and it's a great story, but there's another moment where the dad has died, Jacob has died. They've been living in Egypt for years now. Joseph has gone on, he's like the guy in Egypt, and the Israelites, Jacob's family has grown, he's settled them in Goshen, the most profitable part, and their dad dies, and all of a sudden the brothers get scared.

17:32 Because they're like, I bet Joseph's forgiveness towards us was just because he loved dad, and dad loved him, and they had this thing, and now he's going to get us. And so they come to Joseph in tears because they figure it's better to come to him and he'll have to do it to our face than for him to surprise us, and tell him, our dad is gone, please don't exact revenge upon us.

18:04 And now this is so many years after the thing, and Joseph in the story is in tears as well, and says, didn't you know that I had forgiven you? There's a thing that happens in the story of Scripture, and it's mirrored actually in the story that we told the kids. If you want to look there, it's in Luke chapter 15. The story is kind of long, it starts at verse 11.

18:37 Verse 11, and he said, there was a man who had two sons, and the younger of them said to his father, give me the share of my property that is coming to me, and he divided his property between them. Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey to a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living, and when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need.

19:16 So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, and he was longing to feed, to be fed with the pods of the pigs, and no one gave him anything. But when he came to himself, he said, how many of my father's servants have more than enough food, but I perish here with hunger. I will arise 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.

19:54 Treat me as a hired servant, and he arose and came to his father, but while he was still a long ways off, his father came to him, and felt compassion, or his father saw him, felt compassion, and ran and embraced him, and blessed him. And the son said to him, father, I have sinned against heaven and against you, I am no longer worthy to be called your son. But the father said to his servant, bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet, and bring the fatted calf, and kill it, and let us eat, and re-celebrate for, this is my son.

20:29 He was dead and is alive again. He was lost and is found, and they began to celebrate. When Jesus wants to tell the story about how the kingdom of God works, he tells the story about this family. And the son who is like incredibly, like unbelievably bad, he tells his dad, I wish you were dead, just give me what I would get if you were dead, and then leaves. And then does everything you are not supposed to do, right? And then as he is coming back, how does the father respond?

21:06 This incredible love, most people that know the situation in first century and Middle Eastern culture suggest that the father runs because the younger son is worth being stoned. The infractions he is committed normally in a town, they would stone this kid because he is so disrespectful, and he is so abhorrent that you have to knock it out.

21:38 And so most scholars think that the dad runs to him because he wants to get to him before the town starts to stone him. And he runs to him and puts the ring on him and puts the cloak around him so that they know the dad is claiming him. He is not running to him because he is mad, he is running to him because he is claiming him as his own. And when I started to think about the reckless nature of the God who trusts humans to other humans in this somehow weird divine and finite collaboration where there is a fuzzy line between what is God doing and what are we doing from conception all the way through

22:15 the whole world. And so I started to think about the one phrase in Paul's letter to the church in Rome. Remember he is talking about the power of forgiveness and he says where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. However these three arenas of vocation are listed, family is always the first one.

22:46 Not because it is the easiest, but perhaps because it is the most consequential. Whether it is birth order or wounds from your parents, it is shapes who you are. The wounds that we could carry from our childhood are so substantial. Why would God subject us to it? I do not know, but I do know that he always will provide grace to overwhelm the failure.

23:19 So that wherever there is wound, there is grace more. Wherever there is failure, there is forgiveness more. This goes on both sides of you. When you have been wounded deeply, lean in and ask for where the grace is more. Don't run from the wound and pretend you can just limp your whole life, examine, explore and ask for the grace to heal.

23:53 When you have swung the bat, when you have failed, don't pretend you didn't or justify your failure. Lean in with repentance because where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. We know in this first arena is the beautiful opportunity to collaborate with God on the foundational experience of life. Existence in the world.

24:24 We have been beat up and we have bruised, but there is grace to surpass them both. So much so that when Jesus wants to describe what grace looks like, it looks like the overwhelming love of parents to children. We get to model this in the world. We get to receive this from others. When you want to know what you might do with your life, start with your family.

25:01 Don't throw people in the pit. When you do, pick them up, get them out of there, man. Go back and ask for forgiveness. When you are thrown in the pit, ask God how you might forgive meaningfully. When you run from responsibility, when you disrespect the ones who love you, ask for the courage to repent and return. In family, we find grace and the measure of love.

25:37 It's why we are subjected to such challenge because there is such promise and deliverance. Let's pray that we might know grace where we have known woundedness. Hey Lord, thank you for the opportunity to collaborate with you in life. Would you give us wisdom and patience, but Lord also hope in the power of your resurrection to restore and forgive and heal?

26:16 Might you teach us how to repent well for the harm we have caused? Might you teach us how to forgive deeply for the harm we have received? Might you expand the love that we know and give in family today? In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.