prodigal son (verses 15:11-12)
Sticks and Stones
“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are messengers of overwhelming grief...and unspeakable love.” - Washington Irving
“In The Beginning was the Word…”
- St. John
I stood in front of the sink looked into the mirror as I washed my hands. Mom had called me in from playing. At six years old, I learned to fight, to skateboard, to imitate the older kids around the apartment complex, and among other things, how to cuss.
And that’s what I did; I cussed at the top of my lungs. I yelled out some despicable obscenities about Mom, turned off the water, dried my hands and walked out of the bathroom.
“Justin, can you come here Mijo?”
Still furious, I walked towards her as she stood next to the couch, arms folded, one hand over her mouth, her eyes moist and her nose red.
“Mijo,” she paused, “What did you just say?”
I looked up into her eyes, shouted back what I said in the bathroom and then stood there. Her eyes got watery, she grabbed her mouth, started to cry softly and then after a few seconds said, “Just go to your room.”
Mom walked passed me down the hall, passed the bathroom to her room. Her crying got louder. My eyes got watery and my nose stung as it always did right before I cried. I turned around and ran to my room, jumped on my bed, buried my face in my Scooby-Doo pillow and wept. Mom’s cries carried down the hall into my room. My crying got heavier. In my snot-soaked pillow, I laid there and cried till I had no more tears, till my stomach hurt, till my head throbbed.
The times I saw Mom’s beautiful face tighten - the frown of her brow, the way her tone of voice changed when she yelled, the way she cleaned the apartment to calm herself down - were because she was angry. But this time was different. She didn’t grab for the toy or the shoe or the spoon or whatever was around. It was me and Mom and the residue of my words.
• • •
Over the years my words with Mom grew louder and quieter. Sometimes we screamed at each other at the top of our lungs. We’d hurl words back and forth at each other like boxers throwing punches. Sometimes we didn’t talk for hours, sometimes for days.
I was puzzled as a kid. How could Mom who had the softest voice when she spoke to me with love and warmth turn
“I’m beginning to hate you,” she told me after one of our fights.
“Now you know how I feel!”
Maybe Mom didn’t really mean what she told me, but with every fight we had, I grew further away from her. And as dreadfully as I wanted to repeat those words I’d once screamed in the bathroom, in all of our fighting never again did I purposely cuss in front of Mom.
At six years old, I saw, felt and heard the power of words. These seemingly meaningless scribbles on paper and verbal utterances pack within them the power to bring life and death. We interpret them through the grid of our life experience to bring them meaning, to make sense of our world.
The old saying, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me,” has always been a lie. As I saw, not only do they hurt other people when we recklessly use them, but like a bullet that has ricocheted, they bounce back, penetrate and wound us.
In Christianity, Jesus is referred to as the Word, the Logos; the life-force that holds the world together and gives order to the cosmos.
For thousand of years, the Jews spoke and recorded their story. When other cultures around them created art –carvings, sculptures, paintings etc. - the Jews wrote. Today, because of their consistent and grueling task of recreating exactly what was written and spoken before them, we have a bible that is nearly identical to the scrolls they read in ancient times. Imbedded in those words are the very voice of God calling and wooing people through the ages to listen to the story he has written for their lives.
God spoke and through his voice created everything in the universe. He looked at his work of art and said everything was good. But it still seemed to be lacking something. So he created people and said creation was very good. As the Apostle John said in his narrative of Jesus life, in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God and through him (meaning Jesus) all things were made.
It’s into this culture built around words and stories - spoken, written, given by God - that Jesus tells one of the most famous and moving stories in human history: the Parable of the Prodigal Son.
Jesus casts his characters, all of which are symbolic. The younger son: people apart from God and more specifically, the sinner and outcast gathered around listening to Jesus speak. The older son: the religious elite, the self-righteous, the teacher’s of Jewish law, the ones accusing him of “eating with sinners.” God the father: the one who dismantles our preconceived ideas of himself, who runs to and welcomes sinners, who cleanses, saves and celebrates with them.
From the outset of the story the crowd is hooked because from the mouth of the younger son comes words that bring devastation to his father and family, “Father give me my share of the estate,” words that the crowd knows are the most humiliating and degrading thing a son could ever say and ask of his father in that culture. Asking for his inheritance before the father dies is saying he has no use for his father in his life. Though his father provides, cares for, loves and raises his son, the son sees no value in it. No longer does he want to be near his father. He has purposed in his mind to take his inheritance, abandon his family and to set off for a life he can provide for himself.
The son brings destruction. The crowd is shocked. But what’s more shocking is the father’s response to his son, “So he divided the property between them.” People listening would’ve predicted the father’s response to his son to be a swift beating, a reactionary response of anger, a punishment, yes, but more so, a show of patriarchal force and might by subjugating the son, forcing him to his status beneath the father. Instead, the father liquidates all his assets and divides the property between them; 1/3 as was customary to the younger son, 2/3 to the older.
Is it that the father is weak and unable to withstand the demand of his son? No. He had no need to give the older brother his inheritance too, but he does. Both of them received their share when only one asked for it.
The father who represents God is allowing his son to choose for himself. God so respects human freedom that he doesn’t force his will upon us although knows our actions will ultimately hurt us. We are free to choose or reject God. God provides all we need in this world and we can either choose to be close to him and live the life he’s declared is the most life-giving or we can reject him, take all he’s given to us, set off for a far away land and waste our life. We may curse God by our words and our actions and still he provides for us and lets us choose him or deny him.
Going to Christian church growing up, I learned that Christians don’t use foul language; that we are to be very selective with our words. It’s part of our Christian ethic. I was never taught this story of the Prodigal Son. But how could’ve I understood a story that says you can reject and humiliate God and he will not only let you go, but will withhold the punishment you deserve, watch as you gather all the things you’ve demanded of him and then abandon him for another life? I was too busy learning things not to say or how to behave and when I didn’t behave how God or my parent’s or my school wanted me to, I was punished. God seemed more like the chief of moral police than like a patient father. And I always seemed to be getting moral tickets.
Created almost 4 years ago
