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The Prodigal Son and 'Where the Wild Things Are' || SLP413 · The Speak Life Podcast

• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: Well, hello, and thank you so much for downloading episode 413 of the Speak Life Podcast.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Thomas Thoroughgood, I work at Speak Life, and today we have a bit of a different episode for you.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: Just Nate Morganlock and Paul Feesey today, talking about a sermon that Nate did on Sunday on the parable of the prodigal son, or the parable of the lost sun, as it's sometimes called in the headings of uh some Bible translations, and drawing some interesting parallels between that incredibly famous and profound parable that Jesus told and the children's story where the wild things are.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: And Nate argues that Where the Wild Things Are in in many ways is uh a stripped back version of the parable of the Prodigal Son.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it's an interesting discussion.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: I really hope you enjoy it, and I will catch you at the end.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_03: Hello and welcome to the Speakeasy.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_03: My name is Paul Feezy, and I am joined by No Morgan Locke.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_03: Hello.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_03: Hello, good to have you with me.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_03: It's been time no sick.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_03: It's been a long time, hasn't it?
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_03: Because we've been on uh kind of various different projects the last few weeks, haven't we?
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_03: So I think Glenn and I, neither Glenn nor I were here last week.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_03: No, we were in our own home yesterday.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_02: From the studio.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, because you were all in here, because you may notice that our surroundings are a little bit different to what we've been in before.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_03: Speakers is in space.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_03: Speakers in space, yeah, yeah.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_02: We were filming a little uh a little short film called Good Morning Sasha, which is uh hopefully gonna be a part of a series of short films and teaching that we're going to put out sometime next year, which is kind of the 3-2-1 material that Glenn's been developing over about a decade now.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_02: We're gonna put that out again with some short films to help illustrate what Glenn's talking about.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_02: So that's that's all that's the set.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_02: Look at it.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_02: There's a space door.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_02: Who could come through that door?
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_02: Anyone at any time.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_02: Let us know if they do.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so it was all happening in here last week.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_03: So it was uh high actors hired in from outside and everything, wasn't it?
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_03: So quite a professional kind of thing going on.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_02: We we managed to pull off a professional feeling.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_03: Which will not be a surprise to viewers of the speakeasy and our work, they will know us as the consummate professionals that we always are.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_03: So that's right.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_03: Anyway, we're now uh we're now back here, we're doing the speakeasy again.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_03: Um so Nate, tell us a little bit about what what we think about today.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_02: So having now finished uh a kind of fairly long series of looking at the church calendar and and various events within the church calendar and looking at Trinity last week, because it was Trinity Sunday yesterday.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_02: Uh we're into ordinary time.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_02: Ordinary time.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_02: So now we've just got to think, well, what what do we ordinarily think about?
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_02: Well, ordinarily we also think about the gospel, but um not necessarily in the way that we had before.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um but I was preaching at a baptism service yesterday, it was a great celebration, and because those the family of those who have been baptized asked me, you know, can we can we pick a passage of the Bible that's really going to help to reach out to people with the good news of Jesus?
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_02: And so they gave me the parable of the prodigal son from Luke 15.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_02: So that's what I thought we'd have a look at today, with the kind of frame around it that this is um I think shares a lot of similarities with Where the Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak's 1963 children's book.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_03: Do you want to put a bit of meat on that bone?
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_03: Because I mean I I've not read the book.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_02: Have you not read Where the Wild Things Are?
• 3:57
  unknown: No.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_03: No, don't think well, I don't think so.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_02: But you've got young children.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_02: What do you read them if you're not reading them Where the Wild Things Are?
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_03: We literally just read Leviticus.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_02: Gets them to sleep, I suppose.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um, yeah, well, so um yeah, Where the Wild Things Are, I'm sure lots of the viewers will know that it is a an absolute kind of classic children's picture book, possibly the classic.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_02: It's an American book from, as I say, 1963.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and it tells the story of this little boy called Max, and it begins with On the Night Max War, or sorry, the night Max wore his wolf suit and made mischief of one kind and another.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_02: And it shows this little boy called Max, who's sort of uh playing up around the house, and his mother called him Wild Thing.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_02: So Max said, I'll eat you up.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_02: So he was sent to bed without eating anything.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_02: And that very night in Max's room, a forest grew.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_02: I'm actually gonna just basically know that night in Max's room, a forest grew and grew and grew until his ceiling hung with vines and the walls became the world all around.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: And an ocean tumbled by with a private boat for Max.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_02: And he sailed off in and out of weeks and almost over a year until he came to the place where the wild things are.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_02: And when he came to the place where the wild things are, they gnashed their terrible teeth, they roared their terrible roars, they rolled their terrible eyes, and they showed the terrible claws till Max said, Be still, and tame them with the magic trick of staring into all their yellow eyes without blinking once.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_02: And they called the wild things were terrified, and they called him the most wild thing of all, and made him king of all wild things.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_02: And so Max says, Now let the wild rumpus start, and then you get these three uh we can show this on the on the screen, but these three double-page spreads of um the wild rumpus and they're howling at the moon and they're swinging through the trees and they're marching through and kind of singing a song.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then Max says, Be still.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_02: And sorry, Max said stop, and then the the wild things he he sends them off to bed without their supper.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_02: And suddenly Max is lonely and wants to be where someone loved him best of all, and he smells good things from around the world.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so he gave up being king of where the wild things are, and he sailed back on his boat in and out of weeks and till he came to the night of his very own room where he found his supper waiting for him, and it was still hot.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_02: So the structure of that story is of a little boy who rebels against his mother and then goes off to this crazy wild place where the wild things are, has a wild rumpus, but then very quickly becomes disillusioned with it.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_02: It fails to satisfy, and so in his coming to his senses, he thinks, Well, maybe I should go back, and going back, he discovers grace uh that his supper is waiting for him.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_02: And I I've always thought that that that was incredibly similar in terms of structure to the first half of uh parable of the prodigal son.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_02: So when I was preaching yesterday, I actually read out the whole just similar to what I've just done now, but read out the whole of Where the Wild Things Are uh without introduction.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_02: So it's slightly few people get confused what's this guy doing?
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um and just great to sort of think, well, okay, that story is so familiar to us, and you'll know with children's stories you read them over and over and over again because they they like the repetition.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think, well, why is that one why does that one connect with people?
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I think because it echoes the story of the prodigal with some interesting missing parts.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_02: So there is an there's no father in it, there's no um explicit reference, there's no older brother, there's no so there's all sorts of things that are missing, but the heart of it, the sense of the prodigal, the wild thing who goes off and comes back home is a very um important story because it's the story that so many of us have from the gospel.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_03: So it's like a shadow, a shadow of the stories we all his bigger story we know.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and because it doesn't focus on the father, as we'll see in in Luke 15, it doesn't have that character sort of explicitly displayed for us.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_02: It's therefore a kind of it's a Christian not quite, I suppose it maybe it's a Christian heresy, it's uh it's the story with the the really Christian bit kind of taken out, and we've just kind of tried to live with the consequences of a of a Christian understanding, a Christian approach to grace and forgiveness and and welcome home.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_02: Um but yeah, and and I also sort of mentioned in this the sermon yesterday that finding Nemo it actually shares some similarities.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_02: You must have seen finding Nemo.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_03: No, I've never heard of it.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_02: So finding Nemo is interesting because it is basically this the errant son swims off the drop-off, goes and touches the boat, and then gets kind of carried off to Sydney, and then the father who pursues him, right?
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's gonna be the heart of the prodigal sons, we'll see.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um now, interestingly, what does Pixar do with that father character?
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_02: They make him overly anxious, they make him over cautious, they make him a real warrior, and his character arc over the course of the journey uh of the story is to become more comfortable with the it scary world around him.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas that, you know, in lots of ways, even though he's very dynamic, the father in the prodigal son is moving, he's the one who goes out to find and seek and save the lost.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_02: He's actually a a flat character at one level because he doesn't change in the process of the story, whereas the prodigal son clearly does.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_02: Uh the elder brother doesn't, he he sort of remains quite static as a character, whereas when Pixar do their father going after his son, they're kind of wrestling with their own sort of p uh paternal or parental anxiety, and so that's what's being played back to the audience.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_02: Is this what it looks like?
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um anyway, we've talked for ages about stuff that isn't actually the prodigal son.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe we should Yeah, so you I think you you unpacked it in sort of three ways.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_03: You went through you've got the younger son, the father, yeah, and the older brother.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_03: So do you want to unpack a bit about each of those characters?
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so itself.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_02: So I I mean the three you've got the three main characters who are the the you know, which are given to us in in uh Luke 15, uh in verse 11, we're introduced to all three of them.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, there was a man who had two sons.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so that's a so this is a story about you know, father and sons, and then verse 12, the younger one said to his father, Father, give me my share of the estate.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_02: So he divided his property between them.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_02: And it was interesting, we talked about this um as a team um earlier on, as we think about what we're gonna discuss this evening, and one of the things that came out was the sense in of insult that that uh desire for your inheritance is.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_02: It basically says, I wish you a dead.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_02: So the younger brother is saying to his father, I don't want you, I want the stuff you can give me.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_02: Um it's a bit like sort of treating your parents like the sort of Amazon delivery guy, right?
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you, close the door, goodbye.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_02: I never want to see you again.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I only want to see you, Amazon delivery guy, when you're bringing me my next parcel.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_02: Mine just runs away before I even get to the doors.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_02: Just leaves it and throws it over them over the fence.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_02: So, yeah, in terms of that that sense of you know, I want the stuff, but I don't want you.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, actually, when Glenn did the the anti-santi ranty, you know, lots of people have that view of God, in fact, where they want the stuff that God gives them, but they don't want God to be around.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_02: Um He's here to pour out some blessings and then to to leave, but we don't want him sticking around over Christmas Day.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_02: And so the the younger one, verse 12, as he's saying, Give me my share of the estate, he is saying, I want you dead.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um, because you're only worth something to me dead.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, as alive, you're you're actually standing in the way of my inheritance.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_02: So we look to the younger son and his determination for freedom.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_02: You know, he wants to take what he has, verse 13, and get together all he has, set off for a distant country, to go to the land where the wild things are and squander his wealth in wild living, um, and to have a wild rumpus, right?
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_02: That's what he wants.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_02: He wants the party, he wants to, you know, stay up late into the night, he wants to just spend money, live for the moment.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, there are lots of other ways that you could go away and take the father's inheritance, and use you could go and start your own business, try and start a separate empire, right?
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_02: You could go and invest, and he went and worked hard and you know, sort of invested all his father's income, and and then you could have other problems where you know you don't reflect the heart of the father, but then um here this guy, you know, it's just all about it's the squandering of the wealth, it's that the money is just going to keep being spent until it's all gone.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then after he spent everything, there's a severe famine in the whole country.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_02: So, in a way, the land around him reflects his own financial status.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_02: So as he kind of drops out um and you know, becomes impoverished, so too is the country around him.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_02: There's there is just a complete lack of understanding of the world to think, oh, okay, we're just gonna go and spend and spend and spend, and and there's no sense in which it can be sustainable.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um whereas presumably the father, who is a party guy himself, as we'll see when we get back, he has great wealth.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_02: But he how has he maintained that?
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_02: Well, he's maintained that because he's not squandering it, he's generous, clearly, as we'll see, but but that's a very different thing.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_02: So so the son who goes after freedom very quickly finds himself in chains.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_02: So um, verse 15, he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country who sent him to his fields to feed pigs.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_02: So he wanted independence, he's now dependent on this being a hired worker, and maybe he's gonna get enough money, probably won't, because he longs to fill his stomach with the parts of the pigs are eating.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_02: So his his journey is one that goes, you know, it's it it's got sort of a firework, burns brightly, a big party, and then suddenly it's all gone.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and he's just left um like looking up to the pigs, you know, jealous of pigs.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_02: He's sort of debased himself, he's become low.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so that's that's the the younger son who and and his initial sort of act, if you like, that's the sort of the first act of the drama.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_02: Uh verse 17, then and a lot of people want this to be the sort of the hinge part of the story.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think it really is, because I think it it is it it's not entirely obvious what will happen as a result of verse 17, it doesn't guarantee the outcome.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: It may have an impact, but it doesn't guarantee it.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_02: Verse 17, when he came to his senses, he says, How many of my father's hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death?
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_02: I will set out and go back to my father and say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_02: I am no longer worthy to be called your son.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_02: Make me like one of your hired servants.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_02: So he got up and went to his father.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_02: So at that point he's bar he's basically he starts to kind of plan out a route out of his situation.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_02: And it's a plan that involves a kind of well, I need to acknowledge my status, I'm no longer worthy to be called your son, right?
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_02: I'm saying what I've done is bad, and what is it that I could reasonably expect if I behave myself from now on?
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_02: I think so many of us, when we find ourselves you know, sitting in the consequences of our own sin, we do that same thing.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_02: We have this process in which we say, All right, God, here's how I'll now behave.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_02: If I pledge myself to good behaviour from now on, um, will you let me come in at a lower level?
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and we start to sort of bargain and we start to um just basically plan for the for the way in which we're going to get back into favour.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um and then as we'll see that that plan um basically is just completely ignored.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_03: It's just sort of it's interesting you say like some people want that to be the hinge, and I suppose that is an easy to it'd be easy to preach it, wouldn't it, as kind of you know, you need to make the choice to come back, yeah, just like he makes the choice.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_03: But actually, when he makes the choice, he's not coming back knowing that he's coming back into the open arms of the father, yeah.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_03: He's coming back thinking, well, at best I might be a hired servant who can do some stuff like that.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, I can see yeah, that's interesting, isn't it?
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_03: That often that might be I mean and Glenn's quite big on that, isn't he?
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_03: The sort of uh where where the emphasis is placed on you making a decision to come back, whereas actually maybe we want to see more emphasis on the character of the father in this which I guess you know you kind of go on to.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we do move on to.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, when I what when I'm doing it, I I think partly because I want to leave because in one sense, if I just want the story to stand by itself, just read the story, just read out the prodigal son.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_02: And in a way, that's how Jesus sort of preaches it, is literally just to read the story.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_02: I think when you're when you're stepping back from it a little bit and you're kind of analysing it or you're or you're helping people to see some of the parts they might have otherwise missed.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_02: I do prefer, and I chose to yesterday, to take elder brother, sorry, younger brother first, then elder brother and then father.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_02: Because then in a way that you can you can use that proclamation of what the father's like, declaration of the father's goodness, as the as the one who embraces both uh younger brother, the rebel and the righteous, the you know, the the the elder brother as well.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: So this conversation went out live on our YouTube channel.
• 20:00
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• 20:07
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• 20:12
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• 20:13
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• 20:16
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• 20:21
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• 20:27
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• 20:36
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• 20:44
  SPEAKER_03: Let's get back to the podcast.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_02: So, yeah, looking at the the elder brother, it it means helpful, and lots of people sort of point this out, and it's important too, I think, if you're preaching uh a passage to see it in its context.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_02: This is clearly the third of uh third parable being spoken to this the same audience, which you can see the audience in 15 verses 1 and 2.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_02: Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering round to hear Jesus, but the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_02: Then Jesus told them this parable, and that's parable lost sheep, lost coin.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_02: Verse 11, Jesus continued.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_02: Third parable.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_02: So this third one, then we still have to have in our minds these two audiences that are standing before Jesus the tax collectors and sinners, and then the Pharisees and teachers of the law.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_02: And both of these are groups that um well, they won't mix, but you know, the Pharisees and teachers of the law who who make a comment in verse two, their comment is that Jesus ought not to be eating and welcoming.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: These people.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_02: And so when you then look at the parable of the prodigal son, you see those two groups being played back to back to you very, very clearly.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_02: And younger brother representing these tax collectors and sinners, and then the older brother as representative of the kind of Pharisaic mindset, the religious teachers of the law.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_02: So, I mean, the elder brother, if we just kind of look at him, um, that's from verse uh 25.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um, meanwhile, the elder son was in the field when he came near the house.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_02: He heard the music and dancing.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_02: So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_02: Your brother has come, he replied, and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_02: The elder brother became angry and refused to go in.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_02: So before we get to what the father does in response, it's important to see that there are some, in fact, there are many, who find the the gross sins of the culture to be abhorrent to them.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_02: They would never behave in these sorts of atrocious ways that what that the younger brother does.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um they are very moral people, they're very they're they're ethical, they're upstanding, they keep their noses clean and their bedrooms tidy.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_02: They are they're they're good good people, and they actually pride themselves on their righteousness.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you that I'm not like these other people.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_02: And in a way, because of we understand we have a holy God, we think, well, therefore, if I'm holy enough, I get in.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_02: My righteousness, my my righteousness gets me in.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_02: And the problem is his righteousness keeps him out.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_02: So it's because he's so righteous, because he's such a good person, because he is so aware of how he hasn't behaved in the ways that this younger brother has, that's what keeps him, keeps him from celebrating.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_02: That's what actually keeps him away from the party and away from the celebration.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I think there's there's so many ways that people people do that.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_02: In a when we're called not to, you know, we're called to flee from sexual immorality and you know, abstain from um from sin, and and we're called into a righteous life, but so often our concept of what a righteous life is is simply avoiding the the ne'er do wells and uh and the sinners and and keeping a kind of pristine righteousness, which it is hilariously false.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_02: Like you can't do that, you of all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_02: So you're denying the truth when you when you do insist that you have um have behaved yourself and and have done everything, um, but also assuming that that Christianity is about behaviour or is about rule keeping, which I think is within the culture to some degree, um misses the heart of what Jesus is saying here because of course this is the the son who remains outside.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_02: And and is just angry on the outside.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_03: And I mean it's interesting, isn't he?
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_03: How his I mean in our discussion earlier it came up his the older son's response when he talks about the younger brother is not to talk about the younger brother but to refer to him as this son of yours.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_03: It's like, well, this is nothing to do with me.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_03: Um and I just think I mean it's it's one of those things that's so easy to kind of skip over, isn't it?
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_03: But it just shows the kind of pure almost contempt for that person, what they've done, yeah.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_03: To say, like, even though they are in this case, they are they're physically blood, like, well then they're nothing, you know, this is no brother of mine.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_03: Um and I guess you know that's a very pointed description given you've got the tax collectors and the sinners, and you've got the Pharisees and the religious teachers.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_03: It's very well it's it's very, very strong, isn't it?
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_03: What Jesus is saying here.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_02: And yes, just the the way in which the the sharp end of the parable comes to the Pharisees and tax collectors who uh who are too good to to welcome tax collectors and sinners.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um and they they're actually condemning Jesus for his approach towards towards sinners, that he is the friend of sinners, the one who approaches the unclean, the one who reaches out his hand to touch the leper, the one who's who's who goes to seek and save the lost, they're saying that is not what you should do.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_02: A godly attitude would be to remain in kind of splendid isolation, not sullied by the the filth of the world and and and embroiled in in in the issues of sin.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_02: That there's a kind of self-preservation at play there, isn't it?
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_03: And interesting as well that they you know the older brother says all these years I've been slaving for you, and you never dispaired your orders, you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends, you know.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_03: So the view, the relation, the the the way the elder son views his relationship with the father is one of slavery.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_03: You know, I it's it's a transactional, like you've never given me anything.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_03: So, you know, there's vo it it it's not a kind of thing where you go, Oh, here's a a son and a father who are in this good place with each other.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_03: This son has as much contempt for his father, yeah, because he's he's he said, Well, where's all the stuff I can get from you?
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, where's even the young goat?
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and the irony, of course, is the father saying, Well, you're always here, and I everything I have is yours anyway.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, and and where's it what is his situation?
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_02: His situation in in verse 28 is the elder b brother became angry and refused to go in.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_02: So you are you're embittered and alone, right?
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_02: You're isolated, you sort of cut yourself off from the fellowship of of the father and the and the younger brother and of the household, and so your Christian life, if you're living in this way, is not one that's marked by joy.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_02: So it's fascinating when you look at um wow, where's where's the bit in in Galatians, you know, where Paul's talking to them about um about their their desire to get sort of circumcised rather than just trusting in the fact that Christ was circumcised or cut off for them.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and he just says, uh, oh, where is it?
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_02: What has happened to all your joy?
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_02: It's such a great question.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um someone's probably shouting at their uh screen right now, exactly what the verse is, but but basically, Paul, when he's writing to the Galatians, is saying that joy in the Christian life is actually quite a nice indicator of whether you are living by through grace, through Christ, through faith, or whether you're living by your own righteousness.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_02: Because once you start to think that it's based up your relationship with God is is I've been slaving for you, I've never always obeyed your commands, right?
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_02: That you're you won't have any joy in that.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's joyless.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_02: It's joyless, it's drudgery, it's servitude.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas the the what comes from grace, what comes from from the gospel, and knowing that my righteousness is is that which is given to me by Christ, that brings joy, that brings relief, that brings joyful service.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so and you you will then be part of the party, you'll be at the heart of the party because you'll be celebrating that others have received the grace that you've received.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas if you think no, this is about performance, and kind of we're competing for this, yeah.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and part of his frustration is we were competing, I was winning, and yet somehow you get to get the fat and calf.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_02: Um so the the the frustration I think of the older brother is is largely due to his his his self-righteous attitude, and that that tends not to flourish in joy, but it tends to sort of diminish, you'll be a a a smaller, a weakened, and and yeah, just miserable.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_02: You you will be a miserable Christian if you're living like this.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_02: That's not to sort of talk about other reasons why people might you know be weeping or mourning or grieving uh or lamenting anything, but to say that that for many people their Christian life is leading them into increased frustration and bitterness and cynicism rather than is expressed in joy.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_04: Hmm.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_03: And so that we you've touched on the older brother a bit there, and then you you like to round off with the father, yeah.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_02: So I like to I like to sort of finish with the father just because I think then I you get to appeal with with the voice of the father much more as it in in the sermon.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um so it's to sort of say, well, what does this father do?
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_02: What's the character of this father?
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um as I said, I don't think the hinge is 17.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think it's a significant part of what's going on, but I think the the real question that we should have, and as the original audience would have had, and as an audience who who are not so soaked in this kind of thing that Morris Sendak writes um Where the Wild Things are, when we come to this, we get to verse 20, and that's this is the question.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_02: The hinge point is what's going to happen in verse 20.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_02: So he got up and went to his father, and then we get this kind of it it sort of cuts off.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_02: But while he was still a long way off, we think, oh, what's gonna happen now?
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_02: His father sent out you know armed guards to shoot him, or like they he's you brought disgrace upon my family and my name.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_03: I always remember the curate of our church saying he read this with his children, like this picture storybook, and in the storybook you see the father standing there, like sees the son far off, he's standing there with his stick, and the spirit said to his son, What do you think the father's gonna do?
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_03: And he said, He's gonna go and hit him with his stick.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_02: And and he has every every right to do, right?
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_02: So whilst he was still a long way off, verse 20, the question is what is he gonna do?
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_02: So if you're if you're presenting this or reading this or or filming this, what is it that you're gonna be raising the stakes on and raising the expectations on?
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_02: It's going to be all right, now the plan of the the son, we're gonna see whether it works out.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_02: Will his father accept him as a hired hand?
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_02: They're the only two options we kind of have at the moment.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, I'll take you on as a hired hand and we'll see how you get on, probationary period of six months, and then we'll review potential for promotion over a five-year period, right?
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_02: Either that's or he's gonna say no.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_02: They're the only two options, and yet the grace option, the option that that this father expresses, is verse 20.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_02: But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_02: He ran to his son, threw his arms around him, and kissed him.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_02: And when Jesus is showing us what God's like, he's saying the categories you've kind of worked out for yourself to be reinstated after gross sin or after any kind of rebellion are so ridiculous compared to what God has for you.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_02: The embrace of the father, the kiss of the father, the the the clothing of the robe and the sandals, and the and the this is the father taking him like beyond his expectations.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_02: It's not worth imagining.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_02: You can't even imagine what what the father has in store for those uh of us who who have returned to him.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_02: And he's he's he's active, he's out there, he's seeking, he sees him whilst a long way off, and then overwhelms him.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_02: We we I've used the image of of like a little kind of tower of Jenga other stacking blocks are available.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_02: Jenga blocks like to get like the little wooden blocks all tiled up and they look kind of wobbly, and this is our sort of attempt, like, oh maybe if if I'm sorry enough, and if I just do this and if I promise not to do it again, and I and I change my attitude with this now next week's gonna be different, and we have this very fragile kind of argument to plea our plea, is this, and the wave of the father's compassion just knocks it flying and just overwhelms us, not with a slightly nuanced kind of version of what we'd given, but with the gospel of grace, with with Christ given for us, with with with grace and mercy poured out in abundance, and that's what we see.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_02: And then he says, you know, bring the fattened calf and kill it, let's have a feast and celebrate.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_02: This son of mine was dead and is alive again.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_02: He was lost and is found.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_02: So they began to celebrate.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_02: The the celebration of heaven, you know, there will be what's that great line?
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_02: There is uh we've got it in in the other ones as well.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, rejoice with me but uh and be glad I found my lost sheep.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_02: Verse 7 of chapter 15.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_02: I tell you in the same way, there'd be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous people do not need to repent.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_02: And then verse 10 again, the same way I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_02: So the heart of God's action in welcoming us in is that he celebrates, he is singing, he is rejoicing, he is, if you like, dancing.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_02: This the you know, the the father, son, and spirit in that I think the postis.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so they're their mutual indwelling is that they're welcoming in, and the uh and before the angels, the angels are watching, the angels are seeing this this kind of joy and delight of father, son, and spirit as the sinners repent, as people come gathered home.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, it's time to celebrate, and that that's what he does.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_02: And so then when the older brother removes himself or keeps himself at a distance from the celebration what does the father do then?
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_02: Well, the father actually, I will leave this place and then go out to you.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_02: His father went out to him, uh verse 28 uh and pleaded with him come in, come on, it's time to celebrate, you know, join us.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_02: And because this is the heart of of the father of the prodigal um and the heart of the the father of the elder brother too is is he wants to gather in, you know, his two sons.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_02: Uh he wants them to feast and celebrate.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, and then the the final bit I suppose that we we looked at um is well what about justice?
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_02: Who you know, right?
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_02: Surely are we saying just sin doesn't matter, God doesn't care about he used to maybe care about sin.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_02: Just come back, go back, he's not bothered about it.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_02: No, he's not really interested.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um and you know, if if we say that the without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_02: We have a whole sacrificial system which is being taught to us in j in Leviticus, and and do these things not matter?
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, well, you could speak to the fattened calf, and uh he might have something to say about that.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um and interesting, it's mentioned three times.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_02: Verse 23, the father says it, bring the fat and calf and kill it.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_02: Verse 27, the servant says it, your brother has come and your father has killed the fattened calf.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_02: And then verse 30, the older brother says it, when this son of yours who's quandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you killed the fattened calf friend.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_02: So three times we're told about this fattened calf.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and on one hand, it's like, great, now's the time to celebrate.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_02: Now's the time to bring out the the calf that had been fattened, especially for such a time as this.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, or just the reporting of that's what's happened, and then when the older brother says it, he's basically saying I thought we were saving that for something good.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_02: This is a complete waste.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, he's a waster, so I don't know why we're we're celebrating, you know.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_02: This is the kind of thing that you would like for someone who'd done the right thing who would we were properly celebrating.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_02: The father says, No, this is kind of the purpose for which the calf was fattened over the months.
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_02: So um I think that actually does point us to in some ways to to Christ as the fattened calf, as the one who whose body is broken, that there might be feasting, that there might be a celebration for the church to that the death of of the eternal son is not wasted on sinners, but is the very reason why he came.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um he's not come to call the righteous but sinners.
• 41:18
  SPEAKER_02: And so when we then see Christ dying later on in Luke, Luke 23, and he has these criminal right and left different attitudes towards him, and his final line, you know, today you'll be with me in paradise, is that kind of we're going to feast.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_02: It is time to feast and celebrate because through my seeking and saving the lost, you can be brought in.
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I mean, lots of great stuff in there.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_03: Very encouraging, yes, challenging as well.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_02: It's um, I think the celebration, though, I think that's the thing that's just so wonderful in Luke 15, just how much rejoicing there is throughout the whole thing.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_02: And it's not a wild rumpus, right?
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's not it's not what you get up to where the wild things are, but debauched, it is a the real joy of of fellowship and and and rejoicing.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, great.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_03: Well, thanks for sharing that with us.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_03: Good stuff, like I say, and really encouraging, and hopefully for everyone at home as well.
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_03: Um, food for thought, and yeah, I'm sure it will hit differently, depending exactly where people are at the moment.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_03: Um but yeah, and it's probably one of those passages as well that we've all heard you know a hundred times.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_03: Um but yeah, hopefully there's stuff in there which I think you know, drawing out new bits for people.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, maybe you've heard it with a different emphasis today, which is hopefully uh you know a good thing for us.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_03: So lovely.
• 42:50
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I'm off to go and buy you a copy of Where the Wild Things.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, clearly.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_02: Your children are.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_02: I wouldn't worry about it.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_01: Not as good, not as good.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: This is a thing.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_01: Just because it's a book doesn't need to be a film.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_01: Does it?
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_03: Fair enough, fair enough.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_03: Cool.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_03: All right then.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_03: Well, thanks so much, Nate.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_03: Uh everybody, thank you for joining us.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_03: I hope you found that encouraging.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_03: We'll be back.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_03: I keep I always go to say we'll be back next week, and I literally have no idea whether we'll think we will be back.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_03: We probably will be back.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_03: We'll see.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I thought we'd be waved at them, but Thomas is just stretching.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_03: So whether we'll be in the space station next week or not.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's true.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_03: Not sure what's going on with this set, but we're working out.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_03: Guys, thanks for joining us.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_03: Uh we hope you've been encouraged by that, and we will see you next time.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_03: Take care.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_03: Bye-bye.
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_03: Bye-bye.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_00: Well, there we go.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_00: That's the end of the episode.
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for listening.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_00: Hope you enjoyed it and found it helpful.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_00: As always, you can get in touch with any comments or questions at uh info at speaklife.org.uk email address.
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_00: That was probably obvious that that was an email address, but just in case anyone tries to send a fax uh to that address.
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_00: Oh no, fax machines have numbers, don't they?
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_00: Well, anyway, uh if you do have any questions or comments, you can contact us at that email address.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_00: And we do read all your emails, we're always delighted to hear from you.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_00: We're unable to read all of them out on the podcast or during the live speakeasy, but we will endeavour to engage with as many of those as possible.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, feel free to get in touch.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think that's all from me.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_00: Have a great week, God bless, and see you next time.