Living from the inside out

By Beth O’Brien

This Sunday we’ll hear Jesus’ parable about the generous father: a loving father who throws a party for his irresponsible yet penitent son to the consternation of his older brother. This story has an obvious lesson, but today’s preparatory readings take us deeper and fit perfectly with Lent. 

Gifts of confession and repentance  

In Psalm 32, King David presents us with two simple life formulas to choose from: sin + silence and reliance on self = agony or sin + confession and faith in God = joy. Sharing his personal experience, he contrasts his pre-confession misery with the lightness and love felt post-confession and makes an impassioned plea for us to follow suit. God’s voice makes an appearance towards the end of the passage and basically says, don’t be stubborn, just do it! 

God repeatedly saves us; remember Him 

In a deja-vu moment harkening back to the Red Sea, Joshua 4:14-24 recounts how God directs Joshua to command the priests holding the ark of the covenant to cross through the Jordan River. Indeed, the waters are held back and the Israelites arrive dry and alive in Gilgal, the Promised Land, where Joshua sets up twelve stones as a reminder of God’s might and saving grace.  

Live for others and have faith in the unseen 

Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians 5:6-15 reminds us that Christ died for us and it encourages us to both spread the Word and to please the Lord through right actions. He relays that Jesus died for us so we need to give our lives up to Jesus. And that means living from our hearts, unselfishly, and caring about others as we’d want to be cared for.  

These three scripture passages help us look beyond the don’t let your envy get in the way of someone else’s generosity lesson in this Sunday’s parable. The readings take us to the tomb in that Gilgal means “roll away,” and then straight to the Cross with confession, forgiveness and joyful life everlasting.