Tag: Luke 15

Luke 15.31-32
“‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’”

Reflection: Prayer for Older Brothers :: Guided Prayer
By John Tillman

Mature believers must recognize the dual message in Christ’s parable of the prodigal son. In many ways it could be considered the parable of the prodigal sons. 

One son refused to stay in the home due to sinful rebellion.
One son refused to enter the home due to sinful unforgiveness.
One son squandered his father’s wealth.
One son coveted his father’s wealth.
One son was humiliated by his own scandalous behavior.
One son was humiliated by his father’s scandalous grace.

Beginning our faith journey, we struggle to understand how God could love us and adopt us into his family despite our sinfulness. But after living comfortably as a member of God’s family, we soon struggle to understand how God could adopt anyone else.

There are limits to what is restored to the son who returns. His inheritance is spent and will not be restored. He will be financially dependant on his older brother. But in every other aspect, he is restored. He is restored to full fellowship, full honor, and full trust. These things are indicated by the sandals, robe, and ring. His identity is restored. His authority is restored. He is not a second-class family member.

Pray this prayer for an older brother this weekend. God the Father will come out to you, and beg you to rejoice at the scandalous sinners he has adopted as his children.

Prayer for Older Brothers

God, your mercy is a mystery to me.
I see the sins of others and I am scandalized.
How could such a one be accepted?
How could such a one be loved?
How could such a one be forgiven?
How could such a one be trusted?

You come out and embrace me, Father.
You invite me to celebrate
The sinful repentant,
The wanderer returned,
The prideful humbled,
The scandalous purified.

Over your shoulder I see the celebration.
And I remember…
The day you celebrated me, repentant.
The day you celebrated me, returned.
The day you lifted me up when I was humbled.
The day you purified me from my scandalous sin.

The party is not for my prodigal sibling but for me.
The celebration is not for his sins but for your mercy.
Put your arm around my shoulder, Father.
Lead me in, to celebrate mercy shared.
Lead me in, to rejoice for sinners changed.

Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons
Mercy and truth have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other. — Psalm 85:10

Today’s Readings
Exodus 12:22-51 (Listen – 7:31)
Luke 15 (Listen – 4:19)

This Weekend’s Readings
Exodus 13 (Listen – 3:30), Luke 16 (Listen – 4:27)
Exodus 14 (Listen – 4:46), Luke 17 (Listen – 4:22)

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Read more about In the Face of the Impossible
In a very real sense, not one of us is qualified, but it seems that God continually chooses the most unqualified to do his work, to bear his glory.

In the Face of the Impossible

Read more about The Focus of Christ’s Anger
Seek today for what in your life causes Christ to grieve, to be angry. Ask the Holy Spirit to soften your heart and cleanse you.

The Focus of Christ’s Anger

Scripture: Luke 15.23
Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate.

Reflection: Fasting as a Feast
By John Tillman

While fasting is practically a Western spiritualized industry, and industry elites use it as a body-hack to eke out more labor and profit, feasting is viewed with shame. Our cultural concept of spirituality is bent toward asceticism so much that we have a hard time accepting anything resembling a “feast” as spiritual.

Christians have a conflicted relationship with feasting, though we seem fine with most other extravagances.

Celebrating with food is almost always discussed online and in social media as either something to be guilty about or something earned through hard work in the gym or previous fasting or cleansing. In the moralist, ascetic West, we don’t have feasts. We have “cheat days.”

Feasts are prescribed as spiritual practice right alongside descriptions of fasting in the scripture. When the Israelites left Egypt, God established a yearly liturgy of feasts and fasts—times of abstinence and times of indulgence. Feasts were times of celebration and teaching, and were intended as times of thankfulness and mindfulness toward the work of God.

Even the regular sacrifices in the Tabernacle and the Temple were times of feasting. Specific offerings for sin were burned up entirely, and some offerings could only be eaten by the priests, but, after a representative sample was burned and the priest removed his portion, many offerings were eaten by the family offering them. Regulations required these sacrifices to be eaten on the day it was sacrificed. Leftovers could be eaten the next day, but anything still leftover was to be burned. Even for a large family, eating an entire bull makes for quite a feast.

No matter what level of fasting we are pursuing, a natural part of fasting should be a spiritual feast of worship.

In experiences of fasting we are not so much abstaining from food as we are feasting on the word of God. Fasting is feasting! — Richard Foster

As we observe Lent by abstaining, may we maintain a more constant connection and relationship to God through Scripture, prayer and meditation. May more frequent times of worship be feasts for our mind, our heart, and our souls.

Prayer: The Call to Prayer
Bless our God, you peoples; make the voice of his praise to be heard; Who holds our souls in life, and will not allow our feet to slip. — Psalm 66.7-8

– Prayer from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Full prayer available online and in print.

Today’s Readings
Proverbs 1 (Listen – 3:12)
2 Corinthians 13 (Listen – 2:19)