Toward Greater Inclusion: Re-examining the Gospel Net Parable of Matthew 13:47-50

 

I was reading my scriptures today, particularly in Matt 13, reminding myself of some of Christ’s parables, when I ran across v47, which made me ponder.

 

“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a net, that was cast into the sea, and gathered of every kind:

Which, when it was full, they drew to shore, and sat down, and gathered the good into vessels, but cast the bad away.

So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just,

And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.” (Matt. 13:47-50)

 

There is no explanation for this parable, unlike that of the wheat and the tares. And it is really short, so it’s almost like it is expected that the reader will understand it without too much trouble.  

 

And yet, beyond the pretty obvious message of judgment and the fact that the plight of the wicked is highlighted when they are removed, it is hard to know why Christ thought it was necessary to tell this in addition to the parable of the wheat and the tares.  I felt like there had to be something more in this that I had overlooked.  These parables are supposed to share the mysteries of the kingdom, after all.

 

I started thinking about the process of catching fish with a net. Is the kingdom of heaven like a net used in fishing?  Honestly, I don’t really know because I’m so far removed from anything like that.  It seems like fish don’t just jump willy-nilly into the gospel net through missionary work unless they are super-spiritually-prepared. I’ve grown up in the gospel net and I’ve chosen to stay in it.  I’ve heard of some life-long members who might feel like they are “caught” or “trapped” in the Church’s net though.

 

Something that caught my attention in the parable was the phrase “gathered of every kind.” I have seen short clips of movies of workers on fishing boats sorting through a catch of fish, picking out the types of fish they want.  That made me wonder with relation to the parable--what happens to the types of fish they don’t want?  What if the fishermen catch a jellyfish, for instance?  Is that a marketable product, or do they throw that out?  What if the fishermen in this parable don’t want jellyfish? 

 

That’s when I noticed that in this parable Christ doesn’t necessarily talk about the fish-sorting people being particular about the kind of fish they want. He only tells of them distinguishing between “good” and “bad.”  He speaks of the net having “gathered of every kind.”

 

This led to an encouraging realization—Christ wants every kind of “fish” in His kingdom. He wants jellyfish, shark, and sea anemone, right along with tuna and salmon. He wants every type.  I love that because there are times when I can get my tuna on, but there are other times when I’m a crazy sea cucumber, letting my freak flag fly, and that’s the best I can do.  But if Christ will accept my sea cucumber, I’ll be the best darn sea cucumber I can be.

 

Something else I noticed is what happens to the fish. We might make the assumption that the good fish of the parable are sold in the market for other people to eat, but they’re actually not. They are actually “gathered…into vessels.”  But what for? What happens to them? 

 

This might make you laugh, but the only thing I could imagine those vessels might be was—an aquarium collection!  If they were to be eaten, the fish could just be in baskets, but “vessels” implies some kind of pot that can hold water and thus keep a fish alive. Even though we don’t visualize Bible people having aquariums back then, an aquarium actually makes perfect sense.  Because if the fish are gathered in vessels for an aquarium, then the fish stay alive, and they are fed and stay safe, and they don’t have to worry about other fish eating them out in the big scary sea where big fish are always eating little fish. The aquariums are a safe, nourishing place.

 

So of course the aquarium-owner wants every kind of fish! He loves them all! He wants to see the best specimens of every kind of fish out there. (This is kind of like Finding Nemo, but in reverse…)

 

So maybe this parable is teaching us that we don’t have to worry about fitting to some stifling cultural norm that doesn’t take into account our various personalities and quirks. The only thing we have to worry about is being the best we can be according to God’s commandments. And maybe this parable was meant to teach church leaders to appreciate the good manta rays along with the good trout and bass so they don’t throw them out just because they don’t fit trout-and-bass expectations. It’s also a good lesson for all of us that maybe we need to be humble enough to observe each other and study each other to learn what type of “fish” we’re meeting. We may have met a very good hammerhead shark or moray eel and we just don’t know it.

Some Thoughts on the Parable of the Wheat and Tares

24 ¶ Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field:

25 But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way.

26 But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also.

27 So the servants of the householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in thy field? from whence then hath it tares?

28 He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up?

29 But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them.

30 Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn. (Matt. 13:24-30)

To me, this parable is about the church and how the church ends up with a mix of people in it, both good and bad. We wish it were all good, but of course people have their choice and at the same time that God does His work, Satan is also on the march, seeking to destroy faith and tempting to sin. It stands to reason that at the same time that God has His successes, Satan is going to have his as well, even in the church.

At the beginning, all the seed looks the same, but over time when the fruits of our works start to appear, then it becomes clear that some fruits are good, and other fruits are…not so great. Naturally, the bad fruits concern us, and we want to correct the people who were responsible or root them out.

To the desire to gather out the tares, Jesus says “Nay, lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them.” Rooting out the bad requires a surgical precision and accuracy. Our knowledge is so often incomplete that we can’t always see the line between the good and the evil or the causes behind each, so if we were to try to root out the bad, we might accidently condemn something good that had been intertwined with it. Good people might see the condemnation and say to themselves, “I have those qualities in myself too; I must be evil as well,” and become discouraged and self-condemning. Or we might not root out all the bad and thereby give those left some reason for self-justification and complacency.

Instead, Jesus says, “Let both grow together until the harvest.” The key word there is grow. Both good and evil does not remain the same over time. They both grow. Evil that was present only in thought or intent eventually become action, and if it isn’t arrested by repentance, it multiplies into a pattern of behavior, then grows into a habit, and hardens into a way of life. And naturally, patterns of life may be hidden for a while, but eventually they manifest in stronger and bolder public actions. When evil gets that big, then it can be dealt with by church discipline.

In the same way, good that was only sporadic likewise turns into a pattern, then a habit, then a confirmed way of living that brings a rich harvest of blessings.

So how does this parable help us? If we’re wise, we will look at everything we do and think about what it might turn into if it is grows bigger and stronger in our life. If we don’t like what it will become, we need to squash it. If we want more, we need to nurture it.

Our errors and mistakes and sins will magnify over time if we don’t repent and overcome them.  Laziness will turn into inactivity and spiritual apathy. Unbelief and fault-finding will grow into apostasy. Looking to lust will turn into adultery. Occasional meanness and flashes of temper will grow into cruelty and abuse.

On the other hand, our service will become sacrifice. Diligence in the scriptures will become the skills of a scriptorian. Kindness will become deep charity. Following the promptings of the Spirit will make us a mighty instrument in the hands of God. Paying regular tithing will become complete and total consecration. Encouraging others will become inspirational leadership. Exerting a particle of faith over and over turns into the ability to move mountains and work wonders.

No doubt the Lord wants us find the tares in our own character and weed them out before they grow into something so malignant and poisonous that requires others to remove us out of the kingdom. He also wants us to continue to nurture the goodness within us that we can eventually enjoy the unspeakable satisfaction of heaven’s favor.

The Samaritan’s First Aid

 

In the parable of the good Samaritan, I wondered about some of the things the Samaritan did for the wounded man.

33 But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him,

34 And went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. (Luke 10:33-34)

Why put oil and wine in the wounds? Wine would have some alcohol in it, and so would be an antiseptic and disinfect it. The oil would keep the skin soft and prevent any forming scabs from cracking prematurely and reopening the wound. Antibiotic ointment today is made up of a petroleum jelly with antibiotics in it, and the jelly does about the same thing as the oil.

So, it seems the parable had some solid practices of wound treatment in it, and this makes me wonder if this represented the first aid knowledge of that time or if this shows Jesus knew something about wound care that others didn’t and put that in the parable too.

Others have observed how the parable could be read as an analogy for the way Christ saves us, so this makes me think about what spiritual care might be analogous to pouring oil and wine into wounds. Perhaps they correspond with the way Christ purifies us from our sins and begins the process of healing with the Spirit, helping us to keep a soft heart.

Jeremiah 24 on Trials and Disaster

1 The Lord shewed me, and, behold, two baskets of figs were set before the temple of the Lord, after that Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon had carried away captive Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah, and the princes of Judah, with the carpenters and smiths, from Jerusalem, and had brought them to Babylon.

2 One basket had very good figs, even like the figs that are first ripe: and the other basket had very naughty figs, which could not be eaten, they were so bad.

3 Then said the Lord unto me, What seest thou, Jeremiah? And I said, Figs; the good figs, very good; and the evil, very evil, that cannot be eaten, they are so evil.

4 ¶ Again the word of the Lord came unto me, saying,

5 Thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel; Like these good figs, so will I acknowledge them that are carried away captive of Judah, whom I have sent out of this place into the land of the Chaldeans for their good.

6 For I will set mine eyes upon them for good, and I will bring them again to this land: and I will build them, and not pull them down; and I will plant them, and not pluck them up.

7 And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the Lord: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.

8 ¶ And as the evil figs, which cannot be eaten, they are so evil; surely thus saith the Lord, So will I give Zedekiah the king of Judah, and his princes, and the residue of Jerusalem, that remain in this land, and them that dwell in the land of Egypt:

9 And I will deliver them to be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth for their hurt, to be a reproach and a proverb, a taunt and a curse, in all places whither I shall drive them.

10 And I will send the sword, the famine, and the pestilence, among them, till they be consumed from off the land that I gave unto them and to their fathers.

This is an interesting chapter. In it the Lord shows Jeremiah two baskets of figs – one good, one bad. The Lord tells Jeremiah the good figs represent the Jews who had been carried captive to Babylon, that the Lord did it for their good, and that He would build them and gather them, give them a heart to know the Lord, and make them His people.

On the other hand, the Lord tells Jeremiah the bad figs represent those who remained in the land of Jerusalem or Egypt, who the Lord will remove into all kingdoms of the earth to their hurt, to be a reproach and a curse, to suffer famine pestilence, and so on until they are consumed.

This would be a very unusual message to the Jews of Jeremiah’s day. They probably looked on those who had been carried away captive to Babylon as the cursed and unfortunate ones and looked on those who had stayed in the land as the blessed and lucky ones.

But the Lord wanted to teach the people that, contrary to what they thought, the Lord could make physical calamity into a blessing, and that avoiding disaster could be made a curse.

The question that arises then should be, “What makes disaster into a blessing?” and “How can the Lord make a tragic event good for me?”  (I think the Lord wanted the Jews to think about this.)  The answer is, if we turn to the Lord and repent and keep the commandments, He can make good things come out of disaster.

That doesn’t mean it is easy, of course.

It is neat to me that at the bottom of this odd story about baskets of good and bad figs is a lesson that is still applicable today.

Increase Our Faith

5 And the apostles said unto the Lord, Increase our faith.

6 And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you. (Luke 17:5-6)

How does this teach us how to increase our faith? In what way does a mustard seed have faith? What principle is being taught with this parable of commanding a tree to plant itself in the sea?

Let’s think about the mustard seed. It’s very small, insignificant even.  But it doesn’t think about how small it is, or the obstacles it faces, like the weight of the soil over it or the hardness of the ground under it. It simply does what it can, does what is told to do, which is grow upward and send roots downward.  

From this, I think the lesson is that no matter how insignificant a person is or how small, if they just follow the Lord’s instructions, their faith will grow.

What about this telling a sycamine tree to plant itself in the ocean?

I think this one is about the faith that apostles have to have. Apostles (and other church leaders) have to give instructions to the church, call them to repentance, etc. according to what the Lord wants them to do.

Without faith, I imagine there would be church leaders who would wonder if talking to the church members does any good, like talking to a tree. Telling people to repent is like telling a tree to uproot itself and replant in the ocean because 1) there is a high chance of being ignored, 2) and if obeyed, the person has to do it themselves. If a leader gets too worried about being ignored, it would be easy to think there is no point giving instructions at all.  But I think Jesus’s message is if they do and say what they are told (like the mustard seed), they will be obeyed.

I like these principles. They are pretty simple. Just do what you’re asked to do. Do the basics, the simple stuff—prayer, scripture study, church attendance, serve where you can, follow the Spirit--and you’ll grow.

The Parable of the Children Sitting in the Market

31 ¶And the Lord said, Whereunto then shall I liken the men of this generation? and to what are they like?

32 They are like unto children sitting in the marketplace, and calling one to another, and saying, We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned to you, and ye have not wept.

33 For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine; and ye say, He hath a devil.

34 The Son of man is come eating and drinking; and ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners!

35 But wisdom is justified of all her children. (Luke 7:31-35)

The general impression I get from this parable is that Jesus was trying to say that the men of that generation were out of step with what God wanted while they accused the prophets and Jesus of being out harmony or out of step with them.

When I was reading this I decided I needed to analyze it more closely to see if there was more to learn from it.

First, Jesus says this about the men of that generation and compares them to children, not other men or even to women. To call them children expresses they are young and ignorant.

He also compares them to children sitting in the marketplace. Not sitting in the temple, not sitting on the seaside, not sitting at home. The marketplace is a place of business, of exchange. Real men and women are doing business in the marketplace, but these children are sitting doing something else. So spiritually speaking, that’s like saying the men of His generation were ignorant of the real business of life and the things of the Spirit, and they were sitting around doing something different while significant things were happening all around them.

What were they doing? They were playing dance music and then wondering why no one was dancing to it, or they were crying and wondering why no one else was crying too. It’s as if they thought their product (if it could be called a product) was the only thing in town or they thought they were offering something significant and appropriate and that others should follow their lead.

However, the opposite was true. They were not the only game in town, what they offered was insignificant and inappropriate, and they were not worth following. And they were missing out on the real spiritual business to be done because of ignorance.

A lesson from this for us today is how important it is to stay in step with the prophets and the real business of the gospel and working out our salvation. The minute we start thinking the prophet and apostles are out of touch, it is really us who are out of harmony, and anything we think we can add will be actually detracting and distracting.

Jesus noted how the men of His time thought John was a crazy ascetic on one hand and on the other dismissed Jesus for being too social with sinners.  The styles of John and Jesus were very different from each other, and I imagine this was Heavenly Father’s way of using different strokes for different folks in order to reach as many as possible with the gospel.  But at some level, you have to go beyond style and get to the substance.  The substance of the message of John and Jesus was the same: believe in Christ and repent.

To me, a modern application of this is to carefully consider how we respond to the messages of the prophets and apostles. I know many of us have personal favorites among the First Presidency or Twelve Apostles. But of the ones we like less, do we dismiss their message because their style grates on us?  Or can we stretch to receive their message regardless of their personality or delivery? 

Today let’s open the conference edition of the Ensign to the talks of the apostles we like least.  Let’s pray for the humility to receive the substance of their message while ignoring their style.

Re-examining the parable of the unjust steward

 

1 And he said also unto his disciples, There was a certain rich man, which had a steward; and the same was accused unto him that he had wasted his goods. 

2 And he called him, and said unto him, How is it that I hear this of thee? give an account of thy stewardship ; for thou mayest be no longer steward. 

3 Then the steward said within himself, What shall I do? for my lord taketh away from me the stewardship: I cannot dig; to beg I am ashamed. 

4 I am resolved what to do, that, when I am put out of the stewardship, they may receive me into their houses. 

5 So he called every one of his lord’s debtors unto him, and said unto the first, How much owest thou unto my lord? 

6 And he said, An hundred measures of oil. And he said unto him, Take thy bill, and sit down quickly, and write fifty. 

7 Then said he to another, And how much owest thou? And he said, An hundred measures of wheat. And he said unto him, Take thy bill, and write fourscore. 

8 And the lord commended the unjust steward, because he had done wisely: for the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light .  (Luke 16:1-8)

I was reading through this parable and I noticed some things that I hadn’t noticed before. 

First it came to me that the debts the steward forgives might represent sins that need repenting. (Sins are represented as debts in other parables, so this is not farfetched.)

Next, it came to me that the steward might be a stand-in for church leaders responsible for church discipline, since part of what the steward is responsible for is overseeing those who are indebted to the master.

The parable of the unjust steward comes right after the parable of the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the prodigal son, and therefore might be considered to be another parable dealing with finding the lost and receiving them back.

The steward was accused of wasting the master’s goods.  It may be that the steward was allowing the forgiveness available to go unused, or he was claiming mercy liberally for himself and not extending it to others.

Someone accused the steward of wasting the master’s goods, and the master lowers the boom and asks for accounts from the steward as a means of finding out the facts, along with a blanket condemnation that the steward will be out of the position regardless.

When the steward realizes he will be cast out of the stewardship and he can’t dig or he’s ashamed to beg, it may be that he’s realizing how dependent he really is upon his master. Without his master, he is nothing.  All the power and authority he thought he had, all the riches, didn’t really belong to him.  (Likewise, without the mercy and atonement of God, church leaders are themselves nothing.) 

In the process of studying his master’s financial records in order to prepare to give an account of his actions, the steward discovers the way he can make things better for himself.  So he goes through the accounts of who is indebted and forgives parts of the debts in order to gain their goodwill. His plan is that the debtors’ gratitude will inspire them to help him in his coming difficulties.  He also reasons that partially forgiving the debts will bring honor to his master as a merciful man in a way that can’t be argued with or undone.

The master can’t complain about the steward of partially forgiving debts without making himself appear stingy and ungenerous to the debtors in comparison to the steward.  So the master lets the steward’s acts stand as valid.

This is also in line with one of Jesus’s pronouncements else’s where:

Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.” (John 20:23)

One features in this parable is that the steward forgave part of the debts owed the master in order to ingratiate himself with them and increase the honor of his master as a merciful man.  The message is that stewards over the household of God should forgive part of the sins immediately so as to increase the honor of God as a God of mercy. 

When Jesus advises his disciples to make friends of the unrighteous mammon, He can be understood to be advising those who act as dispensers of church discipline to make friends of those who are going through the repentance process so as to help and support them along the way. 

When it says the mammon of unrighteousness may welcome Christ’s stewards into everlasting habitations after having made friends of them, that means that the initial offering of partial forgiveness generates goodwill and gratitude that helps the debtors reach for the rest of that forgiveness.  Eventually they are saved in heaven and therefore are able to welcome the steward into heaven and enjoy glory with him.

It is possible that better understanding of this parable would have done a lot to help members in the early church.  I have read that in the early church that there arose a tradition of requiring a long and painful repentance process on those who repudiated their testimony under intense persecution.   The process could last over a year, and this led to people preferring not to be baptized when young because they feared they would sin and require that painful repentance process.  This also led to people choosing to not be baptized until near death.

I personally felt this kind of mercy was extended to me when I was a debtor, and I’m very thankful for it.

More lessons from the Parable of the Prodigal Son

I was reading the parable of the prodigal son recently and I noticed that both the sons had alienated themselves from their father in different ways.

The younger son thought he could enjoy his inheritance independent of his father, and then when he came to himself and returned, he still had a problem of feeling like he was not worthy to be called a son.  The father in the parable had to show him he was still his son, clothing him with the robe, ring, sandals, and giving him a feast with fatted calf.

The older son alienated himself by getting angry and not going into the house to the party. Even though he knew he was a son, he still didn’t feel like a son because to his mind a bigger deal was made over his returning brother than himself, even though he had stayed obedient.  He questioned whether he was a son too because he felt he didn’t experience the benefits of sonship. His father had to remind him that he was “ever with me” and “all that I have is thine,” which meant that the oldest son really could have a party at home whenever he wanted.

I suspect that we as members alienate ourselves from our Heavenly Father in those two different ways. If we sin awfully, we think we’re not worthy to be His child anymore. If we stay faithful, we may question whether we really are His child, thinking we can’t or are not enjoying the privileges.

Satan would really like us to believe those things, so we need to recognize the source of those thoughts and throw them out. Also, just like the father in the parable worked to overcome each son’s difficulties, if we recognize how we are alienating ourselves and take it to the Lord, He will help us. 

I appreciate the reassurance the father gave to his oldest son. The reminder “you are ever with me” corresponds to having the Spirit to be with us always, and “all that I have is thine” corresponds to the promise of someday receiving celestial glory.

New thoughts on the parable of the ten virgins

I was thinking about the parable of the ten virgins recently and realized some things about it that I hadn’t thought of before.

The main thing the parable seems to hinge upon is whether each virgin has enough oil ready to use to light her lamp and keep it lit.  At the beginning, they all think they have enough, but there comes a time that proves that half of the virgins really do not have enough, and the other half realize that they must draw on a reserve, but they do have enough. 

The question that haunts us is, “How can I tell if I have enough oil?” Because when we get to the dark midnight, it will be too late to buy oil; we must have enough.

In the past, the oil has been interpreted to mean testimony, good works, faith, and so on.  But how do you know if you have enough to get you through the dark times? 

I suspect that this story is actually about grace.  Because grace is that enabling power to do and maintain good works that we otherwise could not do on our own. It is the fuel we need beyond our own works.    The testimony, the good works, the faith—all of that might be compared to the light of the lamps, but Christ’s grace is the fuel that keeps our light burning.

The wise virgins who had the extra oil are those who knew how to access the grace of God.  They knew they weren’t enough on their own, so they accessed God’s grace through the atonement.  They had plenty of practice doing this, and they were prepared.   Counter-intuitively, those who know they are not enough on their own can turn to the Lord for grace and He becomes enough. His grace is sufficient.

The foolish women did not know how to access God’s grace, and when more was asked of them, they had nothing left to give.  They didn’t know how they could go on.  They would desperately ask others for strength, for something that could help them keep going.  But grace has to come from God, not from other people.  People can encourage and lighten burdens, but the power has to come from God.

So here’s where this parable can really help us today.  We have daily experiences that stretch us, and each one is an opportunity to buy oil for our lamps and gain experience accessing the grace of God.   Grace is the power we need, the fuel that keeps us going. Our testimony and our good works is the flame, the light we shine, but grace is the fuel.

Jesus on casting out devils

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28 But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is come unto you.

29 Or else how can one enter into a strong man’s house, and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man? and then he will spoil his house. (Matt 12:28-29)

The context for these verses is Jesus explaining to the Pharisees why he does not cast out devils through the power of Beezebub.

V29 above puzzled me for a long time.  I knew it was setting up an analogy somehow.  There’s the invader and the strong man who owns the house. I wasn’t sure which one was playing the devil’s role. 

Eventually I realized it was describing how Jesus cast out a devil.  It compares a strong man in a house to a devil in a man, and Jesus is the invader.  The invader has to bind the strong man first before he could spoil the house, meaning Jesus had to do something first to restrain the devil.  I suspect that it means Jesus had to rebuke by teaching some righteous principles and commit the person to live them, and use His priesthood power.  That restrains the devil, and then Jesus can take the devil’s possessions (the human soul) as the individual repents.

Some things we learn from this parable is that Jesus is stronger than the devil.  And because He is stronger, He can make us stronger too. 

We could also turn this parable around.  If Satan is invading, he can’t take over, unless he can bind us down and get us to give in.  So to overcome Satan’s temptations, we have to resist longer than he attacks.  And prayer can help us do that.  “Pray always, that ye may come off conqueror, yea, that ye may conquer Satan” (D&C 10:5).

The Parable of the Astronaut Release

One of the temptations members face in the church is the tendency to perceive leadership callings as more important than other types of callings.  We even tend to think of those callings as “higher callings.”   Members released from leadership callings may have a hard time upon release and may have difficulty adjusting to less visible callings.

I ran across a bit from An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth by Chris Hadfield that helped me gain some extra perspective on this issue, but from an unexpected direction—NASA.

Astronauts who’ve just returned from space get a lot of help from NASA with the “moving on” part.  When you report back to the Astronaut Office at JSC, there’s no hero’s welcome. Rather, you get a brisk acknowledgement—“Good job”—before being unceremoniously booted off the top rung of the organizational ladder, at least in terms of visibility and prestige. Astronauts fresh off the Soyuz are reabsorbed back into the support team as middle-of-the-pack players, essential but not glorified.

In most lines of work there’s a steady, linear ascent up a well-defined career ladder, but astronauts continuously move up and down, rotating through different roles and ranks. From an organizational standpoint, this makes sense: it keeps the space program strong at all levels and also reinforces everyone’s commitment to teamwork in pursuit of a common goal—pushing the envelope of human knowledge and capability—that’s much bigger than we are as individuals. For astronauts, too, it makes sense, because it helps us come right back down to Earth and focus on our job, which is to support and promote human space exploration. Any inclination we might have to preen is nipped in the bud, because our status has changed overnight and we are expected to deliver in a new, less visible role, not sit around reminiscing about the good old days when we were in space.

At NASA it’s just a given that today’s star will be tomorrow’s stagehand, toiling behind the scenes in relative obscurity. For instance, Peggy Whitson, who was Chief Astronaut and ran the office in Houston for three years, is now back in the regular pool of astronauts, supporting other astronauts in orbit and hoping for an assignment with no better chances of being selected than anyone else has. One thing that makes this kind of transition easier is that the line between being a member of a crew and a member of the office is already more blurry than might be readily evident to outsiders. A CAPCOM, for instance, does some training and goes to sims with a crew, then supports them or is on call every day of their flight, and afterward, also attends debriefs. In a very real way, then, the CAPCOM is integral to that crew—as is the entire cast of people who directly support any mission.  (pp268-269)

It’s kind of astonishing how similar NASA’s methods are to the church’s in this respect.  We can recognize the blessings of the approach too.

·      Rotating through different roles and ranks does keep the church strong at all levels and reinforces everyone’s commitment to God and His kingdom more than commitment to any one individual. (Yes, we have a prophet, but the church continues beyond his death. Yes, we have apostles, but we have 15 of them!)

·      The goal is to push the envelope of human knowledge and capability in building the kingdom of God, and that is bigger than any individual.

·      It is an excellent antidote to pride to have that change happen so quickly upon release.

·      Behind-the-scenes roles are no less important to the church’s success than the visible roles.

I’m thankful for all the callings that I’ve had for the growth that I’ve experienced during them.  I’ve learned a lot of skills that I don’t think I would have learned otherwise because of them.  They’ve given me opportunities to serve in ways that it would be difficult to find outside the church.  They’ve helped me feel the Lord’s love in new ways and express that love to others.

New perspective on the prodigal son Luke 15:11-18

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I was reading the Sunday school manual on the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15 and some of the questions asked in it set me on a whole different train of thought that I’d never considered before.

“In the parable of the prodigal son, what did the younger son do with his inheritance?”

Obviously he wasted it, but this got me thinking about how this parable was supposed to be analogous to our brothers and sisters who are lost from the kingdom of God.  I started to wonder, “What does the inheritance really represent?”  In what way do our lost brothers and sisters take their inheritance and run off?

Let’s look at v11-12:

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.

An interesting thing we can see here is that the father doesn’t just give the younger son his portion; he seems to give a portion to the older son as well.  We’re used to thinking the younger son was wrong to demand his inheritance, but what if he wasn’t?  (Odd thought, I know, but hear me out.)

On earth, inheritance is distributed upon the death of the father, so a request for inheritance before death is like a request that the father just lay down and die.   But in terms of our Heavenly Father, we can’t receive our inheritance upon His death because He is immortal. So there has to be a distribution of inheritance upon some other basis besides death, so in that respect, the parable is quite analogous to spiritual realities.

The fact that the father divided the living between the two sons makes me think that the younger son’s request might have been a good one and the younger son’s fault lay in not staying. 

It is also interesting to me where the italics are in that verse. The italicized portions represent words that were added by translators to make the translation flow better according to English grammar.  But occasionally it is interesting to try to read the verses without those italicized words and see if the meaning changes ways that have significance.  Without the italics we get “give me the portion of goods that falleth. And he divided unto them living.”  It suggests that the younger son was interested in the less important part of the inheritance.  It also suggests that part of the inheritance was living, or life, which makes me think of eternal life.  (Is eternal life part of our inheritance as members?  Yes..)

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.

Wasting can happen when one spends profligately, but it can also happen if property is neglected and allowed to fall into disrepair until it is in no condition to be used.  I think this coincides with how our lost brothers and sisters neglect their testimonies and neglect to obey the commandments such that their faith slowly decreases until their knowledge is only a ghost of what it was before.

I’m also intrigued by the repetition of that word “living” in that verse and the contrast between the father’s living and riotous living.  It suggests we compare what we know of the quality of a faithful life with a life completely devoted to the pleasure of the flesh. Which one renews and which one wastes the substance of eternal things?

The next few verses are very interesting because of how the focus is so much on hunger and food and the quality of food.

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, (Luke 15:11-18)

What does this hunger represent?  Could this be a famine of hearing the word of the Lord?  Did the famine just conveniently arise once all his substance had been wasted or was it actually there all the time and he never knew until all his own resources were exhausted?

I suspect that the job of feeding the swine was meant to represent something like teaching the commandments of men mingled with scripture, since they aren’t very wholesome or filling.  The swine may represent the unclean gentiles who are content with empty platitudes and what we might call doctrinal twinkies, but notice that the younger son can’t fill his belly with those things.  The pigs might be perfectly happy with that stuff, but having tasted the real nourishment, the younger son can’t stomach it.

Thus, we see what really brings the prodigal son to himself. He realizes he is starving, starving for the truth that he can’t get anywhere else but from his father.  We learn from this parable that some of our lost brothers and sisters leave because they think there are other ways to be saved, other gospels with efficacy besides that of Christ’s, other ways to live fully.  Sooner or later, they are brought to realize the spiritual poverty of all other ways in comparison and then they have a reason to make their way back.  But they have to have tasted the goodness before they left.

Now, the prodigal is not the only one who has trouble.  Remember the elder son?  He got his inheritance too, but even though he stayed, it hasn’t done him much good either. His complaint to his father upon the return of the younger son is “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” (v29).

Who prevented the elder son from using his inheritance?  Would his father have gotten irked at him if he had asked for a goat or a fatted calf every so often?  The eldest son’s trouble is that he thinks his father is too stingy to let him use his inheritance. The eldest son has wasted his inheritance in a different way by never using it.  From a spiritual perspective, how many feasts on the word and celebrations could he have enjoyed but didn’t?

For those of us who stay faithful, the eldest son is a warning to us to beware of ingratitude. In the midst of our service we must not forget the privileges we have inherited by becoming sons and daughters in God’s kingdom.  It is worth it to ask the question “When do we inherit and how early can we begin enjoying our inheritance?  Are we only limited to enjoying it after our resurrection or can we begin enjoying it and rejoicing over it earlier than that?”

Also consider the things we learn about our inheritance from what the father does in the parable to reinstate the younger son – he tells his servants to bring the best robe and put it on, to put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet.   The robe might symbolize being clothed in temple robes. The ring may have been a signet ring that gave him authority to transact business for his father and therefore might symbolize the priesthood. What might the shoes represent?  All this the elder son would have a right to enjoy too, if he would.

We have the privilege of feasting on the word, of making use of the inheritance our Heavenly Father has divided to each of us, even a piece of eternal life we can feel through the ministrations of the Holy Ghost.  We all have spiritual gifts, we all have a portion of the Spirit, we all are given access to priesthood blessings, and more.  These are all reasons to rejoice and celebrate with our friends in the gospel.  And too, there is the rejoicing we can feel as we repent and feel the forgiveness that comes from God.  Also, consider the father tells the eldest son “you are ever with me.”  To be with the Father is no small blessing. Again, to have the constant companionship of the Spirit is a big part of our inheritance.  So how much do we appreciate that?