Fields United Methodist Church

Thoughts Along the Way

Pastor Tom Joyce

August 18, 2021

“The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.’ So he divided his property between them.”

Luke 15:12

The story of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-24) is all about grace, sin, confession, repentance, forgiveness, redemption, salvation, and even more grace.  The inheritance is more than about money, more than about how the younger son disrespected his father to obtain his portion of what would be his upon his father’s death. It is all about the amazing grace of God. The father freely offered an inheritance and probably had a suspicion that the younger son would abuse what he was given; and the son did just that.  Our inheritance from God is not about material resources or monetary distributions, rather God’s inheritance freely given is God’s eternal love through Jesus Christ that is a cure for our sin-sick soul and an opportunity for another chance to live this life and the life to come consumed by the grace of God which has been offered to each of us from the time we were conceived. We may say, we did not squander God’s grace as this younger irresponsible son did; we honored what was offered through the cross and the empty tomb of Jesus. Yet we can squander our inheritance and cast this precious gift aside every time we abuse our relationships with others, when we judge others, when we gossip, when we utter an angry word towards another, or when we fail to treat all people with dignity and respect. Every time our pride and jealousy has us acting contrary to the love of Christ, we squander our inheritance, just as the younger son did in the parable. Yet there is hope, and that hope is Jesus Christ and that hope is made real when we repent, turn back, to the giver of every perfect gift, confessing that we have gone in a different direction than we should have gone in this life. Here is the really, really good news; it is by God’s amazing grace that we are redeemed, set free, to live a life filled with the love of God and begin to witness the same love to those around us. Jesus’ arms are wide open for you, to give you another chance, to offer grace “that will pardon and cleanse within; grace, grace, God’s grace, grace is greater than all our sin.” (“Grace Greater than our Sin,” #365UMH) It is all about that grace, freely given to you because you, especially you, are loved by God more than you will ever know.