Episode #246 - The Prodigal

We can all feel like the prodigal son or daughter and yet we find that both the older brother and the prodigal were wrong in their perceptions.

Transcript

Welcome to Episode #246 – The Prodigal.  

 11 ¶ And he said, A certain man had two sons:

12 And the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living.

13 And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living.

14 And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want.

15 And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country; and he sent him into his fields to feed swine.

16 And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat: and no man gave unto him.

17 And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!

18 I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee,

19 And am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.

20 And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.

21 And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.

22 But the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet:

23 And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat, and be merry:

24 For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry.

25 Now his elder son was in the field: and as he came and drew nigh to the house, he heard musick and dancing.

26 And he called one of the servants, and asked what these things meant.

27 And he said unto him, Thy brother is come; and thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath received him safe and sound.

28 And he was angry, and would not go in: therefore came his father out, and entreated him.

29 And he answering said to his father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment: and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends:

30 But as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf.

31 And he said unto him, Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine.

32 It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.

The parable of the prodigal son is perhaps one of the most famous parables of the Savior.  Now today I am going to take this story out of its usual context.  We normally see a selfish, young, entitled man take his portion of the inheritance and waste it on things of little to no value.  We see a young man, lacking understanding, run to sin, the first moment he gets a chance to get out of the house.  And yes the word prodigal does give it away.  The meaning of the word is lavish or reckless spending.  He took that which his father intended to give him to support a family and his choice of work and simply spend it in careless ways.

And so we tend to place anything that appears reckless or rebellious as something akin to the prodigal.  It is the natural man, who runs to pleasure once given just a little freedom.  We are often far too quick to judge the actions of another and to assign our own intentions to those actions.  We say, He knows better.  She was raised better.  One of the major problems with judging another person actions is the simple fact that we don’t know the why, or the heart of the person.  And this is why the Savior stated that we shouldn’t judge.  Now we need to be able to make judgements and take actions but our judgements of other people should be limited and filled with mercy.  For instance, I tend to think every person who speeds by me on the freeway running in and out of traffic is an arrogant young man or woman with no regard for the safety of others. Or every weaving car is another distracted young woman looking ta her phone.  And my wife reminds me frequently, you know it could be a young father trying to get to the hospital. Maybe that person doesn’t always look at their phone but an emergency has just occurred, Is my judgement more accurate, maybe, but does that really matter if I assign selfish intentions to a situation where I have very limited information and don’t know the driver.  What should matter is that I give the benefit of the doubt to the situation and apply mercy rather than judgment.  And that brings me to the story of the Prodigal.

We are not told why the prodigal did what he did.  Intent is only assumed in the word “prodigal” and perhaps riotous living.  Although those are fairly broad intentions.  We assume that he is simply spoiled and needs to learn an important lesson about family and righteous living.  We make assumptions about his rebellious and selfish nature, saying he was raised better.  We judge him before we know him and simple by what we see from the outside.  We have no understanding of what is occurring in his heart and mind and that is really where one’s story begins.  I admit that I don’t see the prodigal in just one way.  I never really have.

Given that I have experienced bipolar on a moderate to severe level during a good portion of my life.  This young man could easily have been me.  I don’t experience bipolar in that way anymore.  It is more residual depression and anxiety brought about by a long term illness, than any type of mania but when I read this story in some ways I can see myself.  What if instead of simple rebellion, this young man or woman was experiencing symptoms of mental illness?  One of the signs of bipolar is at times reckless spending.  What some may term as riotous living may simply be signs of mental health struggles.  I often felt as though I wanted to be somewhere else rather than at home.  That was not because my home wasn’t wonderful.  It was just part of the illness.  I have since learned that this desire to be somewhere else is actually part of the illness.  A physical manifestation of trying to get away from the emotional problems and start anew.  Those suffering also tend to self medicate to dull the pain and suffering.  This can also be seen as rebellion rather than self-medication that needs a doctor and helpful medication. How does this change the story for those of us who suffer and not just with bipolar, depression and even anxiety?

So often individuals with mental health concerns are tagged with the prodigal sign.  Our actions can seem strange and even riotous living to others.  How we interact, manage and medicate our problematic emotions can make us seem like your best friend and the worst enemy all at the same time.  Think about this prodigal from the perspective of mental illness and how he acts and you can see parallels in his behavior to problematic emotional illness.  Many if not all individuals who suffer mental illness will go through at least one phase of the prodigal son if not several.  It can be very difficult to distinguish a true prodigal from the one suffering from emotional hurricanes.  And so because no one sees the emotions of the moment and our attempt to survive them, we become prodigals in so many ways.  We demonstrate coping mechanisms and behaviors that are strange to others.  We tend to cut ourselves off from home, love, comfort, relationships and so many other wonderful things because we can’t feel them.  And when others do feel them it causes us greater grief not to be able to experience them.

And so we set off on our own and find individuals who share our emotional experience.  And often this turns out just as the prodigal’s life did.  Full of emptiness, pain and isolation.  We find that home provided a great deal of emotional support and the removal of that support has only caused us to suffer to a greater extent.  We find as the prodigal did that home is really the only place we can find the support and peace we need.  But returning home to those who knew and know us is not an easy road.  Feasible yes but not easy.  To those who were left behind, nothing has really changed in our lives and the lack of acceptance we expect often keeps us attempting to eat husks.  We know that we are loved but facing a possible rejection we stay in the fields with the swine. We expect the response of the older brother in the parable.  We expect to be rejected and told that a place at the table no longer exists for us.  We expect to be servants rather than a son or daughter.  Ultimately that is just fine with us as it was for the prodigal in the story.  We feel that is what we deserve.  We come with the expectation that judgment day is going to be tough but if we can be but servants we can still partake in some of the goodness around us.

When we return home, as expected our brothers in the world around us struggle to accept us.  They see us through their eyes and their experiences and if they had done what we had done, they would never have returned home.  They see our struggle to live the gospel as lack of discipline and a lack of character.  What do you mean that you can’t attend church?  All you have to do is sit there.  How hard can that be?  They see us struggling with things they do not and cannot understand.  This is the older brother in the story.  He sees the world through his own eyes and character and simply cannot understand anything outside of his experience.  When the prodigal returns, the brother is naturally out tending to the family business.  And his response is not one of compassion because he can’t or won’t understand that something may exist inside of another he may never fully comprehend.  When he complains to the father about his brother, he enumerates all the good things he has done as evidence of his worthiness over his brother.  The fatted calf should have been his because he deserved it and disciplined himself for it.  His brother had done nothing to merit that calf that the brother had raised.  But we see in the brother a lack of compassion, a desire for retribution, a call for judgement.  However, we don’t see understanding, love, kindness, acceptance or mercy.  And in some ways perhaps everyway this is also part of the natural man.  Justice without mercy. Punishment without full understanding.  The brother did not even know that his younger sibling had offered to be a servant recognizing that acceptance may not have been possible for him at the family level.  I admit having felt very similar at times about returning to old wards and places where my emotional challenges were on display.

Interestingly the father did not denounce his rhetoric.  It was true that the older brother had been disciplined and had done his father’s will.  And that he would be blessed for it.  The father did not diminish the older brother’s claim.  He even stated that everything his father had would be given to him.  His reward or his status was not diminished because his brother had returned.  What the father wanted the brother to see was that it was not about the fatted calf, the family business, or even the heavenly reward.  He wanted him to understand that we each have a road to travel in life.  We each have been given a very specific set of trials to face.  The older brother’s trials were not the same as his younger brother.  But accepting the younger brother back into the family did not diminish his efforts in the slightest.  Forgiving the wrongs, perceived and actual, did not diminish the family, the older brothers reward or anything to do with the brother. 

Yet we who suffer know that big brother from the parable awaits us.  Our illness tends to cause relationship issues, broken promises, broken lives and so many other difficulties.  We can consistently feel prodigal in our nature.  Looking at the righteousness of the older brother, we are reminded of our weaknesses and lacking nature.  We are reminded that we don’t belong.  We have cast ourselves out for a reason.  It is better that way, we will just hurt and disappoint more people.  We accept the role of the prodigal in our lives.  Maybe the Lord can just give us a small portion of the terrestrial kingdom and we can live out our lives away from the judgmental gaze of the older brother.  

Our weakness and often the righteous gaze we feel cause us to take upon us the role of the prodigal.  But what we learn from the story is that both individuals are wrong in their perceptions.  The sins of the older brother are noted by the Savior as greater than the prodigal.  He has stated that those unwilling to forgive, forget and demonstrate compassion are possessed of the greater sin.  By his very actions the older brother has placed himself outside of the nature of Christ.  He has judged where he had no authority to judge and condemned where he had no right to condemn.  He was comparing salvations which is a terrible problem we all face.

The prodigal also had a perception problem.  He did not understand the love of his Father or his ability to accept and include him in the family.  He did not understand that while his actions caused grief and suffering, that did not constitute a final condemnation.  The prodigal did the exact same thing as the older brother but in different ways.  They both condemned and judged someone when it was not their right to do so.  So many times in our lives when we battle mental and emotional illness we will disappoint, dishearten, and cause destruction in our most cherished relationships.  Yet we assign ill intent where none exists.  The question you should always be asked yourself is this a symptom of the illness or is this truly who I am.  The answer to that question is almost always the illness.  And yet we learn so much by being weak.  One of the great lessons and perhaps the greatest lesson we can learn in life is to live compassionately and with kindness towards those who appear to be wandering in strange paths or shouting from an elevated building.  Our illness can teach us so much about love and compassion.  It can teach us forgiveness of others and to build up rather than to tear down.  What I love about this illness, if there is something to be loved, is that I see from new perspectives and horizons that teach such difficult but valuable lessons about life and eternity.  

Yes you have probably seen yourself as a prodigal and maybe someone has stated as much.  Maybe you think that a heavenly home just isn’t feasible for you.  Maybe you think that you just don’t belong anywhere.  That hope is lost.  Yet that perception is wrong.  As wrong as the prodigal was about his father’s reaction and as right as he was about his brother’s hostility.  There is no possible way that a loving father would give such a difficult trial and not provide ample support and forgiveness to allow for the illness.  It wouldn’t be just for him to do so as he would be condemning you through something not of your own will.  The Father’s love and acceptance in that story is the real truth.  Many prodigals who think I will never be accepted will find a seat at the table and many older brothers will refuse to enter into the house.  If I could impart one thing that I know about mental and emotional illness, I would state emphatically that the perception of the prodigal was wrong.  You have a heavenly home and a pathway to get there and that path includes a great deal of mercy and some back tracking.  You are worthy to be called son and daughter.  You will find a loving Father, Mother and Savior standing waiting for you to come and sit with them a while.  And you will be offered everything the Father can give.  I hope with all my heart that you can see yourself as the Father in that story does.  May he bless you.  Until next week do your part so that he can do his.