The Lost Son - Part 1

Sunday, February 17, 2019 - Imaginative prayer – The Lost Son (Part 1)

Today we are going to do something different.  We are going to ask you to use your imagination as we enter the story of lost son in Luke 15. 

We’ve been doing this with our kids last week in Kids at the Ridge, and Mike has been doing this with our Youth at Source.  Meg and Brad have done it with their spiritual practices group on one Thursday night so some of you have had some practice.  But by and large, we are out of practice using our imaginations when it comes to our spiritual lives. 

But using the imagination in prayer has been a treasured tradition in prayer for centuries. It prompted St. Francis of Assisi to encourage people to create nativity scenes at Christmas, Four hundred years later, Ignatius of Loyola used imaginative prayer as a key part of his life-transforming Spiritual Exercises.

As human beings, our soul is still fired by color and imagination. Our minds are storehouses of images and memories and through them God works in our hearts. Praying with our imaginations can create a deeper and more personal intimacy with God as we meet God in Scripture. 

So today, we are inviting you into a journey through the story of the Lost Son in Luke 15. We have two tables set up at the back with blank canvases and paints and so we welcome you to head back there and get settled in painting an image or scene from this story that strikes you.  This is not an art show or gallery… amateurs and younger kids under supervision are more than welcome!  We also have some other art supplies – paper and pencil crayons if you prefer a less messy medium of artistic expression.  We just ask that you keep movement to a minimum as we are going to be using our imaginations and we want to reduce distractions so that we can pay attention to what God is showing us today.    

We are going to enter the story twice.  The first time, Jenna will read through it slowly so you have a sense of the overall contours and flow. Then, we will enter the scene again and I’m going to invite you to begin to imagine the scene as if we are standing right there. For some of you, this might be a hard exercise.  But stick with us as we begin to imagine the scene.  Think about the conversation that takes place? What is around me? Who else is there? What do I hear in the scene? What are the smells you might imagine? At certain points, I will slow down and give your some guided questions .  What is the mood – tense? joyful? confused? angry?  At other points, Ron & the team will lead us into song.

This is letting God take our imaginations and reveal to us something of the life of Jesus or others. This is God revealing himself to us. Are you ready? Let’s begin!

The Text is Read – Jenna

To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. ¹² The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.

¹³ “A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. ¹⁴ About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. ¹⁵ He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. ¹⁶ The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.

¹⁷ “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! ¹⁸ I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, ¹⁹ and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.”’

²⁰ “So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. ²¹ His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.^[b]’

²² “But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. ²³ And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, ²⁴ for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began.”

Reflection – Brad

The text of this reflection comes to us from The Practice Gathering in Illinois and it is used by permission.  You are welcome to close your eyes as there will be no prompts or images on the screen.  I will be taking us through the story slowly.

Jesus invites you and I into this this parable once more with him.  Be attentive to what character you identify with most today. 

Is it the prodigal son?  The Father?

Be curious as to what is stirring in your mind, in your heart.

Picture the son and the father.  The younger son wants his inheritance NOW before his father dies.  He is impatient, cocky, sure of himself. And he wants what is coming to him.

So the father chooses to give this son what he wants. His full inheritance. 

The son, full of pride and wild plans, packs up all his belongings and leaves his father’s home immediately. Without a glance back.

He’s headed for the city, where he is sure to find some excitement.  Can you picture the youngest son, briskly walking down the road, kicking up the dust with his sandals?

What is he feeling as he walks away from the home we grew up in – with all its possessions and plenty of money in his pockets?

What is the expression on his face? How is he carrying himself?

What is the expression on the father’s face as he watches his younger son leaving without so much as a backward glance or a wave goodbye?  What is the father feeling?  

Imagine the younger son arriving at his destination.  He is living large now.  He loves the fast pace, the parties, the expensive clothes and food. All the attention and popularity.  He is sucked into a wild party lifestyle, often paying for his friends to join him.  Women come after him as well.  After all, he spends money freely and parties constantly. 

It feels like nothing can go wrong.  Until it does.

MUSIC – Begin “Free Falling”

It goes very, very wrong. He comes to the end of his money.  All those so-called friends conveniently disappear. He finds himself homeless.  Friendless. And hungry.  Very hungry and desperate. 

To make things worse, a famine hits. He looks for work but can’t find anything respectable. So out of desperation, he takes the only thing he can find. A job feeding pigs on a farm.

Can you imagine his total humiliation?  How far he has fallen from his former status and life?

As a Jew, pigs were unclean animals, never to be touched or eaten. And yet this son would have done anything to eat their slop. How low can it get for him?

Can you see the look on his face now? Can you imagine the smell?  Can you feel the pig grime and slop?

What must he have been feeling? Where were all his friends now?

Have you ever found yourself in a similar place? Where you felt nothing could go wrong and then it did. Or it felt like the bottom fell out of your world and you were left broken and abandoned.

Lying there in the middle of the night, miserable, his mind turns to a better time and a better place – his home.  Not here in the city but his true home, with his father and brother. 

He thought of his warm bed. Clean clothes. A hot bath. Shelter from the cold and rain. Safety.

His father’s love.

Have you ever felt this despondent?  How did you feel?   

Music: Free Falling Fades out

The son has a glimmer of a thought that grew and grew until he was compelled to act on it. He would go home.

He knew he did not deserve to be reinstated as a son, but even his dad’s servants were cared for better than he was experiencing right now.  He began to gain courage as he thought “I’ll go back and repent of my self-serving, prideful sin against him and against God and ask for my dad’s forgiveness”

Then I will ask him to let me come back as one of his hired hands. 

Before he loses courage, he begins the journey home.

Music: Begin “LIVING HOPE”

Imagine what the journey was like for him… What was on his mind? What was he feeling?  What did his body feel like on the long journey?

SING Living Hope – Verse 1

How great the chasm that lay between us

How high the mountain I could not climb

In desperation I turned to heaven

And spoke Your name into the night

Then through the darkness Your loving-kindness

Tore through the shadows of my soul

The work is finished the end is written

Jesus Christ my living hope

[Continue playing instrumentally – hold the same level of build / intensity]

Finally, after many miles of walking and many hours or rehearsing his speech for his father, his home comes into view.  He takes a big breath.  What will happen?

He turns up the same road he left on. What was his countenance now?

While still a long way down the road, he looks up and sees a figure running towards him. His heart begins to beat fast. His mind begins to race.  “Is that my father?!  He’s running!? Running towards me!” Is he angry?  No, there are tears running down his cheeks.  His face is filled with JOY! How can it be?!”

Imagine how the son felt at the moment they met.  Feeling the Father’s embrace. Hearing his voice again. Smelling the familiar scents of home as he buried his face in his father’s robes.

Watch the scene unfold in your mind’s eye. The son trying to offer his rehearsed apology. The Father holding him close while turning to the servants and ordering them to prepare a party.  To bring the best robe, shoes. The family ring. 

Watch the reaction of the Father towards his son. What does the expression of unconditional love look like on the father’s face?  In his body?  His embrace.  His voice?  Take in this moment where sheer brokenness and humility meets unconditional love and joy.

Do you recognize these emotions somewhere in your story? Where you able to turn your face toward the forgiving father and let yourself be enfolded in his unconditional love for you?

Maybe you can identify with this in some area of your life today. Do you long to be held in His embrace now.  Take a few moments to let the Father hold you in his unconditional love. Receive His affection and forgiveness.

SING – Verse 2

Who could imagine so great a mercy

What heart could fathom such boundless grace

The God of ages stepped down from glory

To wear my sin and bear my shame

The cross has spoken I am forgiven

The King of kings calls me His own

Beautiful Savior I’m Yours forever

Jesus Christ my living hope
 

[keep playing instrumentally]

In this story, Jesus invites you to consider the father.  Who does He extend love and forgives toward?  How does that make you feel? 

Ponder what the Father meant when he said “my son was dead but has come back to life. My child was lost but as been found.” What does that mean to you? 

Where in your life is God inviting you to become more like the forgiving and loving father in this parable?

Talk to Jesus about this story.  What more do you want to say to Him? Ask Him if there is something more He would like to say to you? 

Sing - CHORUS   

Now Jesus calls you back from the story.  He looks at you. You look at Him.  Jesus says to you “I am inviting you to my banquet table.” What is your response to him?  Where do you long to feel the loving embrace of the Father? 

How do you respond to the forgiving father’s invitation to come home?  Do you hesitate – why?  Take a moment to tell Jesus if there is anything blocking or preventing you from receiving His invitation and welcome. 

SING – Verse 3 to the end of the song.

Communion – Brad or Wally

We are going to move into a time of responding to God in communion. 

As we do, I want to highlight one other station or practice that you may have been wondering about – you can see we have a prayer station set with candles. 

In some historic Christian traditions, the practice of lighting a candle when you pray is connected to the teaching that Christ is the light of the world.  Lighting a candle serves as an outward sign of the light of faith that is burning in our hearts.  Some of you have never come for prayer response because that feels risky to speak out loud that things you are praying in inner recesses of your heart.  This might be something that you want to experiment with. 

Some of you may have an area of your life or a person in your life who still feels like a prodigal.  It seems like they are far away from the Father’s love.  So you want to come and light a candle on their behalf here today as a silent way of saying “God, I need the light of Your love to illuminate this situation that seems dark or hopeless”.  That station will remain open throughout our time of response.  You’re welcome to remain there & pray or light & return to your seat. 

We are also going to do communion quite differently today. 

 I am going to invite our servers, Jon and Anita and Tyler and Lindsey, to come up and you’ll see that the tables are set differently.  We don’t have the traditional individual servings.  What we have instead is representation of the banquet table that the Father has set and is setting for you and for me.  When the Father says “we must celebrate with a feast”, this is nodding more in that direction than the tiny cups and cubed bread!   And the invitation from the father really is to celebrate.  So communion, while often somber and reflective, does not have to be that way.  And it certainly will NOT be that here today. 

So Ron and the team are going to lead us in two songs of celebration.  And we are going to invite you to come to the table.  Some of you may want to dance up to the front because you are just so full of joy.

The table is set for all who are part of God’s family – all who are living in a loving relationship with God and with each other.  So church, today, hear the Father’s words of welcome: “because of the work of Jesus, my child… You are forgiven!  You are Welcomed at the banquet table. Come! Let’s celebrate!”       

SONG – CELEBRATE GOOD TIMES, Moves into “My Redeemer Lives”

Song – O Praise the Name

Benediction:

God of the lost, the least, and all who long for home,

We rejoice that you have welcomed us to yourself. 

We are grateful and thankful that You open your table to the likes of us  

when we wander from your ways and waste the gifts you have given us, welcome us back, we pray, so that we may celebrate and rejoice in your presence forever; through Jesus Christ your beloved Son.

One with the Father, and with the Spirit present, not only in our midst now

But also as we go our way from this place. 

Give us opportunities to welcome others this week,

Always pointing them back to You as the Source of light and life and hope.

Amen. 

Friends, God has poured out God’s love into your hearts with lavish generosity.

Go and do likewise this week.