Three Parables

There is a series of three parables in the fifteenth chapter of Luke.  They come together because they are meant to be read together.  Most unfortunately, our lectionary separates the third from the first two.  The first two are the reading for this week (Lk. 15:1-10).

The first two involve a shepherd who leaves 99 sheep behind to go in search of one that is lost and a woman who searches diligently for one of ten silver coins that has been lost and then throws a party to celebrate.  In both cases, Jesus asks a question:  Who would not do likewise?

The correct answer is no one.  I know we like to assume it is everyone, but I don’t think anyone who actually heard Jesus tell these stories would have made that mistake.

A shepherd with 100 sheep leaves 99 to go in search of one.  It’s a sweet picture, but it would be insane.  No one in their right mind would put 99 sheep at risk, leaving all of them at the mercy of the wolves, to go in search of one.  For one thing, it makes no economic sense at all, and sheep in Jesus’ world were not pets; they were commodities.  But even if you want to project compassion onto the shepherd’s motives, it is not compassionate to put one sheep in harm’s way, to say nothing of 99, in order to rescue another.

And the woman with the coin is certainly just a matter of economics.  She loses one coin and searches diligently for it.  Perhaps anyone would do that.  It makes perfect sense.   But what does not make sense is to throw a big party to celebrate finding the coin when the party probably cost more than the coin that was lost.  The woman would have been better off financially to just leave the coin lost. 

And that’s where the third parable comes in, the one that is saved for the next week’s readings.  We know it as the Parable of the Prodigal Son.

Now a son or daughter, everyone would indeed agree, is of much more value than a sheep or a coin.  And the lost son in the story clearly did break his father’s heart.  But unlike the shepherd or the woman, the father does not go looking for him.  That, I suspect, was as difficult for Jesus’ hearers to understand as it would have been for them to fathom the shepherd leaving the flock or the woman’s response to finding the coin.  At least it is difficult for me to understand.  If Jesus had pointed out that the father did not go after the boy and again asked those around him who would not do likewise, I suspect they once again would have exclaimed, “No one.” 

Nevertheless, I think Jesus knew what he was talking about.  At least when it comes to lost sons or daughters, they rarely come home by pursuing them.  Pursuing them, in fact, quite often has the opposite effect.  Keeping a distance, and maybe even increasing it, works better.

It’s much harder to do.  But, God knows, it’s probably the only way.  One can only hope it works as to us.

Peace,
+Stacy