‘Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living.
Luke 15:13 NIVUK
‘Don’t need nothin’ but a good time
How can I resist?
Ain’t lookin’ for nothin’ but a good time
And it don’t get better than this’
The 1998 single from glam rock band Poison was often played on our record player. I was quite a fan of the song. Their decadent outlook on life seemed to sum up much of 80’s culture. We were on top. We knew how to party. It was all we needed! Paar-ty!
But the contrast could not have been more dramatic. My family was financially struggling , living in social housing in a poor neighbourhood. We just about had the money for our daily needs. Partying was mostly off the agenda.
For the people around us, though, it was not. State benefits were quickly spent on alcohol and drugs, not food or clothing, so they could forget their depressing surroundings. The cry to party was not a desire to celebrate and be happy, it was more a psychological escape from the drudgery of every day life. And they were addicted to that escape.
Jesus, at this point, is citing a first century parable that was often circulated to prevent a kind of poor behaviour that we are all far too familiar with nowadays. Like teenage spring breakers making their way to Mexico or the Med or to Bali nowadays, Jewish young men would head off to pagan, Gentile nations where morality was way more loose, and they could be far enough from home to do whatever they liked without daddy and mummy finding out.
The reason was very simple. This law existed in Scripture:
If someone has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and will not listen to them when they discipline him, his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his town. They shall say to the elders, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a glutton and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of his town are to stone him to death. You must purge the evil from among you. All Israel will hear of it and be afraid.
Deuteronomy 21:18-21 NIVUK
Yikes!
So if a rich child wanted to do exactly these things and not have to face the wrath of their parents or community, they headed outside of Jewish countries and into those where even worship was wild and unruly.
This was, perhaps, an early example of what has become: ‘What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.’
It goes without saying that the religious rulers had to put a stop to this. Their behaviour would make a mockery of their families and their nation. So they told a tale of a son who did exactly this. And it is this tale Jesus is picking up.
This rebellious, impetuous son does three things:
· He gathers together all he has – likely selling off real estate and livestock to convert it into cash. But the level of his recklessness is interesting. He leaves nothing behind. He has no safety net. He is all in on this new life of his. He cuts ties and runs.
· He sets off for a distant country, to be far from his father’s discipline and way of life, hoping to be ‘out of sight, out of mind’.
· He, to quote Poison once more, spends his ‘money on women and wine’. Or, as Jesus says, wastes everything on wild living. The Greek here is taken from the throwing of seed into the air to thresh the wheat from the chaff – he is throwing his money into the air. It also indicates that his new life is wild, careless, carefree and undisciplined.
Maybe you’re thinking, ‘Wow! That sounds like a lot of fun! Where do I sign up for that?’
Let me tell you, it is not.
A life like that is utterly selfish, superficial and wasted. It is not, and never can be, a life well lived. It is meaningless, purposeless, aimless and empty. It leaves nothing – no mark at all in this world other than wrecked hotel rooms and broken lives.
And the seeds for this man’s downfall were sown even in this verse:
· He gathers up everything he has – so he has no safety net. He is effectively free-falling from a great height without a parachute. Do you know what happens when people live like that? Eventually they hit the ground.
· He sets off for a distant country – for from his father’s morality, yes, but also far from his support – the very support that got him to where he is.
· He wastes everything on wild living. This is the height of foolishness. He has no income. He has no job. He is simply burning down his savings every day. It is obvious – although not to him – that one day the gravy train will no longer stop at his station. One day the money will run out.
I spent many years living and working with people who got their pay check and immediately had a big blowout: alcohol, drugs, you name it and they did it.
Within a week or too, a month’s wages were gone. They would struggle to feed themselves and their families. They would borrow money.
People who live like that are easy prey for unscrupulous money lenders and loan sharks. It doesn’t take long for the debts to mount up.
And then the party stops.
But if that is not enough of a cautionary tale, how about this?
When I was a teenager I knew a lot of my peers who were involved in drinking, drugs, underage sex and gang violence. I met one of them on the street once. She was sixteen – the same age as the older of my two sisters. And she looked awful – completely bereft.
Honestly, I have never seen someone so devastated.
I asked her what was wrong. She told me.
A few months previously, she had got drunk and woke up in the bed of a local rogue. She turned to him and asked, ‘So, does this mean we're in a relationship, then?’
‘No!’ he snapped, before cursing at her and telling her to leave.
She soon found out she was pregnant. And lost the baby.
At the tender age of sixteen.
An adult woman would struggle to cope that that. Let alone a sixteen year old child.
If you sign up for this wild lifestyle, you do so at your own risk. And that risk is enormous.
Way too big, in fact. Let me tell you, a bad hangover is the very least of your problems.
Because your earthly father and mother might not know what you’re up to (although, in this parable, they do), but God does:
Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.
Psalms 139:7-10 NIVUK
You can escape your parents. You can outrun your problems – for a while anyway.
But you cannot ever outrun God.
Wherever you go, He is there.
The hedonistic life of the younger son is nothing but a mirage.
Don’t be fooled by it.
Prayer
Lord, I confess that I'm sometimes a little too impressed with the selfish, hedonistic lifestyle of the people around me. Help me to scratch beneath the surface and see that it is hollow and empty. I don’t want to live like that. I want to follow You. Help me to do just that – even when the temptation to do the opposite is strong. Amen.
Questions
1. Why do you think the younger son takes all his belongings on this trip? What is he doing? What does this say to those around him?
2. What was he trying to do by travelling so far away? Did it work?
3. Why is living like this such a bad idea?
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