Two sons, two points of view

Few, if any, of Jesus' parables are more familiar to us than the one found in Luke 15:11-32. Pastoral Intern Jared Stoltzfus challenged us to look at this familiar parable anew, and to do it in light of 2 Cor. 5:16-21, which speaks of the radical transformation we experience as we view humanity from God's perspective. We are being changed to live as ambassadors for Christ. So how might this impact our reading of the Prodigal Son? Do we place ourselves with the prodigal son? Have we squandered God's gifts, turned from God to do our own thing, and now need to come back to God? Do we identify with the extravagantly loving and forgiving father, either because we need God to respond that way to us or because we want to live that way ourselves? Perhaps we are more like the other son, crying "It's not fair" when we hear that God loves everyone. With the new lens of being a new creation in Christ, we can move forward to bring reconciliation to all we encounter. How will we respond?