The prodigal

Introduction
It’s been very touching seeing so many post about mothers over the weekend.  There are all kinds of mothers for all different walks of life.  I've seen sweet mothers who are still actively involved in their young children's lives.  There are mother's who have grown kids in the full swing of life.  There are mothers who have grown old and passed away and also, sadly, mothers who have passed away too soon before they grew old.

I also think of some mothers who have failed.  I listen to the testimony of a prodigal mother this weekend who shared how she failed as a mother because of some of her own shortcomings.  Thankfully, she repented and Jesus turned her life around.  

There are also the many spiritual mothers that bless people who aren't even related to them, but they love and people who need it.  I have had many spiritual mother's in my life who have been so helpful, especially while I have lived so far away from my own mother.

I knew six months ago that God wanted me to read the story of the prodigal son for Mother's Day 2022. God led me to plan for this as I prayed during a planning session.  However, God didn’t tell me what say until the morning of Mother's Day. So I pray His words come through clearly.  So, let’s read through the story and I will make some comments as we go.

Luke 15:11

¹¹ To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. 

It starts, "A man had 2 sons."  But I can't help wonder: where’s the mother in the story?

I should start with this disclaimer:  We don’t know anything about the mother in the story from the Bible.  Jesus doesn't give any information about the mother in the Bible.  So all we can do is speculate about her.  Still, I think Jesus would be fine with us using our imagination and asking some thoughtful questions.

It could be the mother had died.  We know in our day mothers often die and leave a family motherless.  It was even more possible in Jesus' day, as people didn't live as long and something as simple as appendicitis (which we can easily fix with modern medical technology) could kill you in New Testament times.  Could the Prodigal's mother have died sometime prior to this episode?

It is also possible the father had remarried and the mother was a step mother.  And step mother's can have a complicated relationship with their step children.

It is also possible the mother was not mentioned because Jesus lives in a patriarchal societ where women were often overlooked.  However, I don't think that is as likely, because women played a prominently role in Jesus ministry and he never shied away from including women, even if his society didn't.  Jesus was not a male chauvinist. He greatly valued women and treated them with respect.

Luke 15:12
¹² The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.

This was an incredibly mean thing for the son to say.  He was basically telling his dad, "Look, I have things I want to do in life that I can't do because I'm waiting for you to die so I can get my inheritance.  So why don't you just go ahead and die or give me my inheritance now so I can get on with my life?"  Can you imagine saying something like that to you mom or dad?  Yikes!

I wonder how the mother would have responded (assuming she was alive).  Some mothers might comfort their husbands, put their arms around them, and cry with them.  However, there might have been some mothers fussing and saying, "Why in the world did you go along with this?!”  How would your mother have handled this? How would you handle it if your child said this to you?

Luke 15:13

¹³ “A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. 

Now, in this story, it was the son who moved away to a distant land.  But I can’t help but think of some mothers who have left.  You might think a mother could never leave her child, but it happens more than you think.  My wife works in a neonatal intensive care unit taking care of critical babies and newborns.  You would not believe how many babies are born already addicted to drugs because their mothers have taken drugs like heroine and meth throughout their pregnancy.  And then the baby is born already addicted with severe health problems and the mother is back out on the street chasing her next high.  Addiction is a terrible problem that enslaves many people--including mothers-- and leads to horrific behavior.

The sinful longings of the human heart that draw us away from God affect all people—even mothers.  They turn our eyes away from the truth and make us think the grass is greener.  What we have to realize is the dark seed of sin is in all our hearts.  That dark seed can grow in anyone and, given the right conditions, can take over your whole life.

Luke 15:14-16
¹⁴ About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. ¹⁵ He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. ¹⁶ The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.

Sin, which seems so attractive at first glance, leads to hardship, poverty, pain, and famine.  It is significant that the Jewish son in this story finds himself feeding pigs.  Jews considered pigs to be unclean.  They didn't eat any kind of pork and they didn't keep pigs on their farms.  So for a Jewish boy to be taking care of pigs means he had sunk pretty low.  

People enslaved by sin will sink lower and lower until they are doing things they never thought in a million years they would do. Maybe that was you once. Maybe that is you today. Is it time for you to come to your senses?

And I can't help but thin of the mother’s anguish at the son’s degradation.  She may not have even known what her son was doing, but that's even worse.  A mother mind can go to a very dark place as when she doesn't know if her children are safe.  She can even torment herself, thinking the worst and worrying herself to death.  Is your mother worrying herself to death today because you are wandering from the right path?

Slide – Luke 15:17-21
¹⁷ “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! 

¹⁸ I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, ¹⁹ and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.”’

²⁰ “So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. ²¹ His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.’

The prodigal son shows us what true repentance looks like.  He says, "I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son."  It is unconditional surrender, recognizing one's sins, and throwing yourself upon the Father's mercy.

Repentance is crucial.  People remember many things about Jesus--that He was a miracle worker, that he died on a cross and rose from the grave, and people love to remember Jesus was a man who stood for love.  But we must never forget that Jesus consistent message throughout His ministry was, "“The Kingdom of God is near! Repent of your sins and believe the Good News!” (Mark 1:15)  

The son shows us what true repentance looks like.  In the father’s response, we see what grace looks like.

Luke 15:22-24
²² “But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. ²³ And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, ²⁴ for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began.

Again, the story focuses on the father, but I wonder how the mother responded?  Was she right there with the father, welcoming her wayward son home?

Anyone who knows the way most marriage works realizes while the father was hugging his son and making grand statements about having a party, the mother was probably thinking, “Oh great! There he goes making all these great plans, but the house is a mess and now I’ve got to go grocery shopping to get food for all these people!”  (That's the way t usually works at my house.  My wife does most of the work behind the scenes.  I make the plans and she has to pick up the pieces.  She's a saint!)

The wife was probably thrilled to have her son home, but it’s also possible the mother like the older brother in the story.  

Luke 15:25-30
²⁵ “Meanwhile, the older son was in the fields working. When he returned home, he heard music and dancing in the house, ²⁶ and he asked one of the servants what was going on. ²⁷ ‘Your brother is back,’ he was told, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf. We are celebrating because of his safe return.’

²⁸ “The older brother was angry and wouldn’t go in. His father came out and begged him, ²⁹ but he replied, ‘All these years I’ve slaved for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to. And in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends. 

³⁰ Yet when this son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the fattened calf!’

The older son was angry. He felt unappreciated.  He felt superior to his younger brother who had abandoned the family while the older brother had done his duty.  (How many mother's feel unappreciated sometimes?  That's why we need to have a Mother's Day, to remind them we really do appreciate them.)

Maybe the mother was feeling angry and unappreciated.  Or maybe it broke her heart to see the older, more responsible, son refusing to be be happy at the redemption of his brother. It can break a mother’s heart when her family is full of strife.

Luke 15:31-32
³¹ “His father said to him, ‘Look, dear son, you have always stayed by me, and everything I have is yours. ³² We had to celebrate this happy day. For your brother was dead and has come back to life! He was lost, but now he is found!’”

We must not forget; this story is an illustration. We don't know if it was based on a true story or not.  However, we know the father represents God.  The Father, God, reasons with the responsible son in the story and God reasons with us.  Do not be angry with the sinner who returns to God.  Do not feel superior.  Maybe you didn’t abandon your family and commit the hideous sins as others have, but you are not perfect either.  We all sin and fall short of God's glorious standard (Romans 3:23).  And God looks into the heart.  He sees the sin seed in each of us and knows that, given the right conditions, it can sprout and grow out of control so that we are just as guilty as the person whose sins are incredibly hideous.

Have you, as a mother, felt yourself superior to others who abandoned their family? Is not that feeling of superiority a sin in and of itself?  Are you like the older brother in the story, standing outside, fuming and refusing to come to the party to celebrate the redemption of a sinner who was lost, but now is found? How long will you wait?

Conclusion
Jesus doesn’t tell us about the mother in the story.  A really gifted great storyteller leaves a few things to the imagination so we can ponder them.  Maybe that’s why we are still retelling and listening to Jesus’ stories 2,000 years later.

Jesus also doesn’t tell us how the story ends.  Did the younger brother remain faithful to the father?  Or did he get bored back at home and run off again?  Some of you are the young, rebellious brother in the story.  Your actions decide how the story ends.

Did the older brother ever get over his anger, forgive his brother, and go in to the party?  Or did he stay outside forever, fuming about how he was right and better than his brother?  Jesus doesn’t say what happened, because some of you are the older brother in the story.  And you are the only one who can determine how your story ends.

As for the fathers and mothers out there whose hearts are breaking because your children, in one way or another, have wandered away from the Truth:
God—the Mother and Father of us all—knows your pain.  He is the Father in the story, whose heart breaks when any of His children goes astray.  Yet He is longing for His children to return and He is quick to forgive and embrace every wayward sinner who comes Home.  

Why don’t you bless God's heart and come Home today?

The Names of God - Yahweh-Rapha

Introduction
As we continue through our message series about the biblical names of God, we come today to the name Yahweh Rapha, which means “The Lord who heals.”  As we begin, I want to turn your thoughts to the idea of healing.  What does it mean to be healed? Is there something for which you need healing?

In our modern world, we tend to separate physical, spiritual, and mental healing.  Somehow, we’ve come to believe they are three separate spheres.  Even though we appreciate the interconnectedness of the mind, body, and soul, we still treat them as three separate and practically unrelated parts of a person’s life.  Doctors work primarily to heal the body with little or no concern for spiritual matters. Pastor’s focus on saving souls, but do little to address physical health.  And we still haven’t figured out mental health is inseparable from physical and spiritual health.

Modern people arrogantly believe we are better informed about everything than people in past ages.  However, the ancients were not ignorant of the interconnectedness of mental, spiritual, and physical healing.  In fact, they would not even describe them as interconnected because they would not even conceive of them as separate issues. What was true then is true now.  Healing—true healing—is encompasses every aspect of life--een extending beyon the individual person to the community and even creation.

We can sense the wholistic healing power of God in the Exodus story.  God delivered the Israelites from slavery in Egypt.  He convinced Pharaoh to let God's people go free and God lead them to freedom through the Red Sea.  However, just because the Israelites were no longer in physical bondage doesn’t mean they were free in their own hearts and minds.  Their people had spent 400 years as slaves in Egypt.  One does not simply stop thinking like a slave overnight.  It requires healing and that healing may take generations to take full effect.

Exodus 15:22-26
²² Then Moses led the people of Israel away from the Red Sea, and they moved out into the desert of Shur. They traveled in this desert for three days without finding any water. ²³ When they came to the oasis of Marah, the water was too bitter to drink. So they called the place Marah (which means “bitter”).

²⁴ Then the people complained and turned against Moses. “What are we going to drink?” they demanded. ²⁵ So Moses cried out to the Lord for help, and the Lord showed him a piece of wood. Moses threw it into the water, and this made the water good to drink.

It was there at Marah that the Lord set before them the following decree as a standard to test their faithfulness to him. ²⁶ He said, “If you will listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in his sight, obeying his commands and keeping all his decrees, then I will not make you suffer any of the diseases I sent on the Egyptians; for I am the Lord who heals you.”

Jehovah-Rafa/Yahweh-Rafa
The Hebrew name of God is hidden in this passage.  I don’t know why they didn’t list it as they have in the previous passages we’ve read in this series.  To see the name, you have to look at the original Hebrew where God’s name in the text is Yahweh Rafa.  Some may pronounce it Jehovah, but most scholars agree Yahweh was the original pronunciation until the middle ages when people wanting to refrain from saying or writing God's proper name used the vowels from AdOnAI (the Hebrew word for Lord) with the Ancient Hebrew YHWH (or JHVH).  This produced Jehovah.  

Also, the second part of the name Rafa or Rapha can also be spelled/pronounced variously as Rafa, Rapha, Rophe, or Ropha.  The letters/sounds P and F are closely related and shift over time and in different regions in human language.  For instance in English we say "Father"; in Spanish they say "Padre"; and Germans say "Vater".  So Rafa could have been pronounced a variety of ways.

Ok, enough of the nerd stuff.  What does this have to do with healing?

Rafa means healing.  In the ancient, biblical sense it wasn’t just medical healing.  It was an all-encompassing, wholistic healing of every part of a person’s being.  And not just a personal healing, it was a healing for the whole community and even the whole world.  You may recall from the creation story in Genesis that all of creation was corrupted when Adam and Eve first sinned.  Our sin doesn't just effect us; it effects others and even creation.  Therefore, all creation needs healing.  Yahweh (the Existent One, the Great I Am) said, “I am the Lord who heals you.”

God wanted to heal the Israelites.  He wanted to change their thinking from slaves who lived with a scarcity mentality—just trying to survive day by day, hour by hour—to a people who trusted God completely and knew, in His love, they had nothing to fear.  He wanted them to know in their heart they were royalty and priests with the holy task of showing God to the whole world.

We see the Israelites' sickness in their spasmodic thinking.  Just three days after Yahweh miraculously parted the Red Sea and they walked across on dry land, the Israelites have lost faith and are complaining about the bitter water they’ve found at the oasis in Marah.  These people have a long road to find healing.

So God gave them many rules and traditions to guide them toward a wholistic healing where they finally accepted and trusted Yahweh as their creator and Lord.  These rules, which we call the Old Testament Law would also set Israel apart as a peculiar people who would represent God to the whole world—because God’s desire is that every nation and all people (even all of creation) would know Him and find healing and wholeness and deliverance from slavery to sin.

Yahweh provided for the physical needs of His people.  He showed Moses a piece of wood to throw into the bitter spring at Marah and it made the water good to drink.  Some translations say it was a tree, but the original Hebrew literally means a piece of wood.  It cold have been a branch or a stick; that makes more sense than throwing a tree into the water.  The wording is vague.  There was a very famous piece of wood Moses is known for carrying.  I like to think God told Moses to use his staff he to make the water of Marah sweet.  It was the same staff God turned into a snake to show Pharaoh God is more powerful than the Egyptian gods.  It was the same piece of wood Moses raised to part the Red Sea.  I I can imagine God answering Moses' cry for help about the bitter water by saying, “Hey, remember this?  Remember this simple piece of wood I used to do all those other miraculous things to save your skin?  Use it to make the water sweet!”  

How quickly people forget God's providence—even when we've been through something tremendous.  Traditions help us to remember and celebrate.  They can help us heal.  This past Sunday, Robert and Melissa Starling placed flowers in the sanctuary of my church.  It was a special occasion for their family.  You see, July 18th is the birthday of their son Harrison.  Harrison was born healthy but developed a virus within a couple of hours of birth and got terribly sick.  He did about a week later.  It was a terrible loss, as you can imagine.  However, God used that situation.  My wife was a nurse who took care of Harrison in the NICU.  And I hear that some friends of mine from Atlanta had a grandson in the NICU and wen to pray for hi and his family, and it turned out it was the same family my wife was caring for.  We prayed for healing, but it didn't come in the way we expected.  Harrison went Home to be with the Lord in Heaven.  And it took many years for Robert and Melissa to heal from losing their son (they are still healing).  But one way they have been healing is to place flowers on Harrison's grave every year on his birthday.  However, this year, the Starling family placed them in the sanctuary of my church because they joined as members of our church.  They were not attending church before Harrison's death.  But now, Melissa has transferred to my church and Robert has professed his faith in Jesus and been baptized along with their two sons who will be growing up learning about Jesus.  God has taken all these broken pieces and arranged them together into a beautiful mosaic of healing.  

Healing Isn’t Always Easy
Healing and growth aren’t always easy.  Sometimes they hurt.  Kelly and I listen to an amazing podcast by Radiolab about how a baby first starts to breathe.[i]

A baby spends 9 months inside the womb. 
Until the moment of birth, the baby gets all it’s blood through it’s umbilical cord.  So that useless scar everyone has on the belly that seems so useless, used to be one of the most important areas of your body.  Through it, the baby receives all the nurishment and oxygen it needs to live.  

Ababy can’t breathe because it’s living under water of the womb.  Their lungs are useless.
Then at the moment of birth, the lungs have to fire up and get to work.  There’s a door in the wall of the heart—between the left and right side of the heart.  In adults, the door is completely walled off, but it's open in unborn babies because the lungs aren’t working and the blood flows to the umbilical chord.  At the moment of birth, the door in the babies heart closes so the blood and oxygen stops flowing through their belly button and starts going through the lungs to exchange oxygen and carbon dioxide.  When a baby is born, it is wet and feels cold for the very first time in it’s life. It’s quite a shock to go from the perfect temperature of mother's womb to the cold light of day in the real world.  When that cold air hits the baby’s skin, the skin sends little signals to the baby’s breathing center in the nervous system and BOOM! the baby starts breathing and the door in the heart closes and the blood begins to flow to the lungs and the baby has a heart and respiratory system just like every other human being on earth.  It’s just one of a million of God’s amazing miracles that happens in our first moments of life, but as you can imagine, it’s incredibly shocking and painful for the baby.  Why do you think they come out crying?  Fortunately, that pain serves a purpose.  It’s vital.  Otherwise, we would all be flopping around like a fish out of water trying to breath through our belly buttons!

Healing and growth aren’t always easy.  Sometimes it’s very uncomfortable or just plain hurts.  I want you to know that you don’t go through that pain alone.  God goes through it with you.  Think about the Israelites wandering through the desert.  People sometimes think it was cruel for God to make them wander there for 40 years before entering the Promise Land.  Do you think they were going through that wilderness alone?  No.  God was right there with them.  He told them to build a tabernacle, a tent in which God would live with them.  God could have been in the glory of Heaven, but He chose to wander through the desert with a bunch of whiny, rebellious, sinful former slaves for 40 years.  He was with them.

When you are going through whatever painful suffering and healing you must face, remember God left the glory of Heaven to live among us in our broken world and even suffered the agony of dying on the cross in order to heal you and our whole world.  And God is with you in your pain now because He is Yahweh Rafa—the Lord who heals.  The healing of Yahweh is complete and wholistic.  It covers you from the top of your head to the bottom of your feet.  It penetrates to the very center of your soul and extends out to your family, to your community, and to the whole world.  Think of it, when you get your life right with God through Jesus, it effects stars that are trillions of light years away.  Furthermore, it’s not a temporary healing—as all physical healing is in this life.  God’s healing is eternal and leads to eternal life where there will be no more sickness or sorrow or suffering or death.

Along the way, God may give you some rules and traditions to follow.  These are not meant to restrict us from enjoyment, but are merely the roadmap to the perfect place we want to be--the place of healing and wholeness.  God knows how we should live because He designed us and every part of creation.  God heals us on every level of our being when we follow His perfect plan for life through Hus Son, Jesus the Christ.

Yahweh Rafa says, “If you will listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in His sight, obeying his commands and keeping all his decrees, then I will not make you suffer any of the diseases I sent on the Egyptians; for I am the Lord who heals you.”

Invitation
So, I want to invite you to pray for God's healing—a healing that encompasses every aspect of your life and ultimately leads to eternal life with God as Lord.  

Are you weary from weary and carrying a heavy burden?
Do you need to forgive or be forgiven?
Pray to Yahweh-Rafa, the Lord who heals you.

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[i] https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/breath