Monday, August 29, 2022

Trusting God’s Grace – Nah, I’m Good

August 29, 2022/in Week 4, Bible Study

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I’ll be honest, the “Parable of the Lost Son” has never sat easily with me.

There’s always a flicker of indignation and a sense of injustice whenever I read it. The older brother stayed by his father’s side, faithfully working, striving to never put a toe out of line. Yet the prodigal son receives a more lavish party than his brother ever had.

How is that fair?

My struggle to swallow this story reveals something about my own heart—the same thing the older brother and Jonah both wrestled with: an inability to accept both God’s judgment and his compassion.

This past weekend, Lead Pastor Ben Snyder unpacked the similarities between the older brother in the parable of the prodigal son and Jonah. In the final chapter of Jonah, we see Jonah’s petulant response to God deciding to have mercy on Nineveh.

Jonah 4:

So he [Jonah] complained to the Lord about it: “Didn’t I say before I left home that you would do this, Lord? That is why I ran away to Tarshish! I knew that you are a merciful and compassionate God, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. You are eager to turn back from destroying people.”

Jonah didn’t trust God’s verdict of mercy, preferring to rely on his own view of justice. It’s the same complaint the older brother had against his father in the parable.

Luke 15:29-30

29But he [the older brother] replied, ‘All these years I’ve slaved for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to. And in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends. 30Yet when this son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the fattened calf!’

Jonah and the older brother would rather see punishment than forgiveness. They trust their own sense of indignation in the face of mercy. But in their bitterness, they don’t acknowledge the compassion they have been shown. Jonah was saved from the belly of a fish, and the father willingly shared all he had with the older brother.

We can do the same thing. We can render judgment or resist serving “those people” while secretly being glad we’re not as bad as them. We can rely on our own sense of justice instead of trusting God’s. In doing so, we not only miss God’s heart for the lost, we also lose sight of the fact that we were once Nineveh and the prodigal son, in desperate need of grace.

When we remember that we are rescued people, it prevents us from getting stuck in self-righteousness and, instead, invites us to trust God’s justice and his mercy.

Questions:

Do you ever resist God’s grace when it doesn’t fit your idea of justice?

Do you trust God’s sense of justice?

Next Steps:

Take time to write out how you first learned about Jesus—who you were before and who you are now.

Read Jonah 4 and reflect on God’s compassion.

Prayer:

Dear Lord, thank you for being merciful and compassionate, slow to get angry, and filled with unfailing love. I’m so grateful for the grace you have shown me. Please keep me from becoming proud, and instead, help me to trust your justice. Show me who I can help rescue because you have rescued me. In Jesus’ name, amen.