Culture of Expectation

Sunday I was part of the prayer team after church and an older lady approached in tears.  I was desperately casting about for any female, heck, anyone! to take this one!  Give Kris a teary eyed woman and Kris is about as comforting as a cactus ... unless I know you.  So for her sake, how I needed a surrogate.

Through her tears she dumped on me, a life story of  entitlement, never having to take responsibility for ANYTHING she has ever done.  Now in her early sixties, she has awaken to find her family is all gone, she is living in a basement of someone she does not even know, driving a car which is an embarrassment to her, etc.  I had twin thoughts; the first was compassion - I wanted to slap her unconscious (or at least half way into tomorrow!) and then when she woke up - explain to her what big girl panties are and what life is all about - not her!  Of course, how lacking in compassion, how unloving, how politically insensitive!  Yet, what she really needs.

My second thought kept me occupied through lunch, how this woman has awaken this morning in exact parallel to the the moment when that young man woke up in a pig pen in the Middle East and realized that even his father's servants lived better than he did.  Of course, he sort of brought on his own destruction by burning off his inheritance he had taken from his father.....

Luke 15:10-20

The Parable of the Prodigal Son

¹¹ Jesus continued: “There was a man who had two sons. ¹² The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them.
¹³ “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. ¹⁴ After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. ¹⁵ So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. ¹⁶ He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.
¹⁷ “When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! ¹⁸ I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. ¹⁹ I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.’ ²⁰ So he got up and went to his father.
“But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

 So, we have a tale known to almost everyone, in or out of the church!  Even the story has been redone as a daughter instead of the a son.  Whatever, today's culture demands creativity is the taking of others ideas and then call them your own.....

This story is always told from the standpoint of the younger son - the ungrateful son, whom would take what is not actually his yet, perform every unclean act and then living amongst unclean animals, desires to return home.  Of course, his compassionate father has been waiting for him to return and throws a party.

The story is also told from the standpoint of the older son - the faithful son, whom stayed and tended the flocks and family business, then throws a fit when his brat brother returns.......

But, is that really what the story is about?