The Younger Son
Jesus tells a story about two sons. Two brothers.
They both live with the expectations that have been placed upon them. The expectations of their parents; the expectations of their community; the expectations of their faith and their society.
But they do not handle those expectations the same way.
The younger son gets most of the attention in this story. He basically says: “To hell with the expectations placed upon me! I can’t live with those expectations! I’m dropping out! I’m going my own way! I’m doing my own thing!”
And he does.
Going against the expectations placed upon him, he approaches his father and asks for his share of the inheritance. Why should he have to wait for it? He wants it now!
But the thing is: an inheritance is something you get after the person you receive it from has died.
So when the younger brother goes to his father and asks for his share of the inheritance now, he’s saying that he wishes his father were already dead, that the inheritance is more important to him than his father is; that the inheritance is more important to him than having his father alive!
The Father
The father had his own expectations to deal with; and it was expected that if a child were to make such a request, the father would disown him.
Because such a request was so shocking, so offensive, it was expected that the father’s response would be: “You are now dead to me. Your request goes against everything we believe in. It has forever divided us. You can have your inheritance, but from now on, you are dead to me. You are no longer my son.”
Because of how this particular story plays out, I don’t think the father ever actually says that. It was expected of him, but I don’t think he ever said those words. I imagine that, with great sadness, he divided his inheritance, gave the younger son his half, then silently watched through tears as his younger son sped away.
The Older Son
The older son doesn’t really appear until the end of the story. His appearance seems like an afterthought… like an epilogue… an appendix.
And just as the younger brother had to wrestle with the expectations placed upon him… and just as the father had to wrestle with the expectations placed upon him… so, too, did this older son have to wrestle with the expectations placed upon him.
Obviously, how this older son handled those expectations was as different as can be from the way his younger brother handled those expectations.
This older brother did everything he could to live up to those expectations - and exceed those expectations if he could. He stayed at home. He did his chores. He probably took on his brother’s chores once his brother left, doubling his own workload.
Resentment grew, but he kept it hidden inside, because he was trying so hard to be perfect.
When his father got lost in his sadness, and would stare off into the horizon, hoping by some miracle that his youngest son would return, the older son just worked harder and harder.
Maybe, if he worked hard enough, he could make up for his brother’s betrayal.
Maybe, if he worked hard enough, he could bring a smile back to his father’s face.
Maybe, if he worked hard enough, he could prove to his father just how good he is, the son who stayed, the good son, the perfect son…
The more I read this story, the more I think this older brother is actually the main character, the one Jesus wants his hearers to remember long after the story ends. We often call this story the Parable of the Prodigal Son; that’s not the title in scripture; it’s the title that later readers and editors have given this story.
But if we’re really meant to focus on the older son, then I think we should call this story, “The Perfect Son,” or, “The Son who Stayed,” or, “The Son Who Did Everything Right.”
Or, maybe, “The Son Who Tried Too Hard to Live up to Expectations.”
It may be different for you, but when I take the time to seriously ponder this story, I find that this older son is the one I identify with most.
And when, in the story, the younger brother returns home, I confess I share some of the outrage the older brother has. Why is the father showing such extravagant love to my ungrateful, selfish, rebellious brother? Especially after I have spent my whole life trying to earn that love by doing everything right?
But a father’s love doesn’t work that way. A parent’s love doesn’t work that way. Does it?
The father assures the older son that he is indeed pleased by all that the older son has done, and that he’s grateful, and happy. Oh, the older son has made his father so happy! And, yes, the younger son has brought so much misery upon the father.
But the father’s love is present in the joy, and in the misery. Through both happiness and sadness, love flows.
In the story, the older son gets angry, because that doesn’t match his understanding of love. Love, he thought, is something one earns. His whole life, he’d been working hard, trying to be perfect, in order to be worthy of love.
Crashing Down
Back on Ash Wednesday, I talked about being perfect. I talked about the pressure many of us feel, to be perfect.
I talked about the movie Encanto - the Disney movie in which the pressure to be perfect builds and builds until it becomes unbearable, and everything comes crashing down.
Literally. (Right? The whole house comes crashing down.)
And since then, I’ve seen the Pixar movie Turning Red, and in that movie, it’s the same thing: the pressure to be perfect, to be the perfect child - the perfect daughter, in this case - and for awhile, being perfect is easy, but then, again: it all comes crashing down.
Because, in the end, who is actually capable of being perfect?
We know the answer to that: no one. No one is capable of being perfect.
But it doesn’t stop us from trying.
Because for some reason, we think we need to be perfect to earn love, to be worthy of love.
Just like the older son in the story Jesus told.
Just like Mirabel in Encanto.
Just like Mei in Turning Red.
We try to be perfect. We try to be worthy of love. We try and we try and we try.
Because despite what we say, we still think we need to be perfect - or at least better than we are - to be worthy of love, to be worthy of God’s love.
And we create the illusion of our perfect selves. We curate our lives and present images and stories on social media that, we think, will make us look perfect, and which will hide our flaws, our insecurities, our doubts, our fears…
Oh my gosh! We can’t let people see all these imperfections!
But the pressure builds until we can’t take it anymore.
And we start drinking more than we should, to hide the pain; or we spend too much time on social media, or watching TV, until these things become an addiction. Some even turn to pornography, or seek out co-dependent relationships, or become obsessed with eating or working out or accumulating wealth, or just about any activity that, taken to an extreme, is nothing more than a cover for our own sense of inferiority.
And it works… until it doesn’t. Until it all comes crashing down.
Grace
The scripture says that the older brother got angry. I think he had a meltdown. A full-blown meltdown. With tears and yelling and hysterics.
A whole lifetime of pent up emotions and resentment were finally coming out; for him, this is the moment when it all came crashing down.
His father had to go out and plead with him.
His father had to go out and explain to him that he does love him, his oldest son, and has always loved him, and that everything the father has - everything! - he has shared with his oldest son.
“You are always with me,” his father said, touching his own heart. “You are always with me, here, and all that is mine is yours.
“You don’t have to be perfect to earn my love. You don’t have to try so hard to hide your imperfections. I will always love you. No matter what.
“As for your younger brother: Yes, I have welcomed him back. Yes, I rejoice at his return! And I hope you can rejoice as well. I hope you can see, now, just how strong my love is, how nothing will ever keep me from loving him… or you.
“You are so worried about messing up - so worried that one little mistake will separate you from my love. That isn’t going to happen! My love is too strong for that. And you, my precious child, will always have a place in my heart. Always.”
This was just what the older brother needed to hear.
And, it was just what the scribes and the Pharisees needed to hear.
Remember, they were the ones who Jesus told this story to. They had been grumbling that Jesus spent so much time with “sinners and tax collectors.” They were upset that he was spending so much time with people who were less than perfect.
Because, like the older brother, the scribes and Pharisees tried to be perfect, in order to earn God’s love.
Today, some of us are scribes and Pharisees, trying so hard to be perfect; and some of us are tax collectors and sinners, having already given up on ever being good enough.
But one thing we all have in common, is that God, our heavenly parent, the one who created us, will never stop loving us.
Nothing you do or don’t do, nothing you accomplish or don’t accomplish - no matter how perfect you are, or think you are, or wish you were, or try to be - will ever separate you from God’s love.
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