"All these years I have toiled for You..."

The prodigal.
Never responsible. Reckless. Carefree. Living only in the moment without regard for consequences. Disrespectful in his selfishness.
He can't wait for his dad to die to get his third of the inheritance, he wants it now to spend it on partying in the big city; whatever happens after that, he'll figure it out. He is truly prodigal-- he spends money like it cost him nothing, as if money's sole purpose is to bring him pleasure now.

The older son.
The strength of the father, defender of the family name. Destined to inherit a double share for the burden he bears always being responsible, serving the family, being proper, showing respect, maintaining appearances, working alongside the servants in the field and managing the estate.
He is both outraged and disgusted when the prodigal dares ask the Father for his inheritance without waiting for protocol. When his younger sibling leaves the nest, he can't quite fathom that all the Father has to leave as the remaining estate is going to be his; the younger has already sold out his shares. All that the Father has... is his? Except the Father is still the patriarch, still the head of the family, still the master of the estate.

Then one day the younger son, Junior, finds himself destitute and on skid row, a Jewish boy wanting to eat with the pigs. The wages of his work have finally caught up with him; the path he chose finally arrived at the obvious destination-- the deepest poverty that comes when the soul invested in hedonism finally gives birth to its eventual progeny: the deepest form of nothingness that pulls everything to itself like a metaphysical black hole. Situational death with no soul to show for it. Dead man, walking.
Like all narcissists, he carries a mental ledger of all the resources he can take advantage of because people are only of value if he can get something from them for himself. But he has exhausted his list; he has used and abused people in his sphere so much that there is nothing left for him in the big city... and then: he remembers his dad.
He knows that culture dictates that when a son treats his father like he disrespected his dad, that son is "dead" to the family, cut off and not spoken of like a skeleton in the family closet. He has no leverage left in his sonship, no access to using his Father as a resource. He is dead; dead man, walking. Yet he remembers how his father treats the slaves, the servants in the estate... they at least were cared for, they had enough food and clothing... perhaps, what if he came to his father, not as a son but a dead man, walking? Even if his Father rejected his offer he would be in no worse shape than now; he has nothing to lose, and a glimmer of hope from the deepness of this abyss.

Out in the fields the oldest son is working in the heat of the sun, tireless plodding alongside the servants, trying to guide the oxen to make the straightest furrows and break up the compacted soil. With God's blessings and a good rain they can sow and reap another crop before winter comes and turns farming into ranching. "Just keep moving... gotta encourage the men to stay at it," he coaches himself. So tired, like there's nothing left; as if he were almost... dead; dead man, yet still walking.
It seems a lifetime ago that Junior left him to do all the work after his Father became too old to work in the fields. And what's it all about anyway? Who knows whether he will even live long enough to see his Father's inheritance? No man knows the hour of his reckoning with death. Wouldn't it be ironic that he die before his dad, having nothing to show for his years in the field except a memory and a stack of rocks out back? Day in, day out, the same routine of making a living and providing for the family as if the burden of responsibility was squarely on his shoulders alone. Is this living?

A long day today, maybe even a bit hotter than before, but the cool of the evening was helpful and now signals time to head back to the tents and be refreshed, rested and ready for another day in the morning. But something has changed. Instead of the quiet of a tired evening, the homestead seems to be alive... with music? He yells to a servant who comes running to meet him. "What is the meaning of all this?" he asks, confused by the disruption of his crepuscular rhythm.
"Your younger brother has returned home, and the Master is preparing a feast for him in celebration of his return!"
Returned? Feast? Celebration? Has his Father lost his mind? Is he under some codependent spell that he would welcome into His home such a son as this, one who would betray them all for the sake of complete selfishness, and then have the audacity to dare come back to pillage them more?
"I'll have nothing to do with him," replies the eldest, sending the servant back toward the sound of celebration. "He's dead to me!," he yells to the back of running servant.
The long shadows of his approaching Father reach him with his earnest plea, "My son, come join us in this wonderful celebration! You of all people should enjoy the fattened calf that we have been preparing for such a time as this!"
"Father, how can you do such a thing for a disgraceful man as this younger son of yours? He has betrayed our family and spent your hard-earned wealth on whatever his flesh beckoned do next. I have never stopped doing what you've asked, always in the fields, always trying my best to please you and honor you, but never once did you say, 'Son, let's celebrate you with a cabrito fiesta and have a party with all your friends,' ...Never!".
The Father looked at his eldest son, his firstborn child, the sign of his strength, and pleaded, "My son, everything I have is yours to enjoy, everything that you see-- it is yours; enjoy whatever your heart desires. But your brother has  returned from the dead and has begun to live again, he was lost but now is found, so we must rejoice and celebrate such an event as this!"

And then...?

How did this first-born heir respond?

In the Gospel of John, chapter 5, we read the story of a man who was crippled by illness for thirty-eight years. He waited alongside others by the pool of Bethesda, hoping that someone would come and help him into the stirred water, that he would receive his healing. All these years he waited, thinking maybe one day would be his turn to be healed. And he waited, there on his mat, his self-made station in life refined by repetition over generations, hoping maybe it would be his turn, but not really believing such a thing would come to a man such as himself. After all, he by now new how to navigate this familiar routine, how to do this inkling of a life.
Then Jesus shows up.
The query is poetry: "Do you want to be healed?"
Do you want to be healed? It is a simple yes-or-no question. Do you? or not?
Is that which has become so familiar what the Father has for you, or is it about what you have settled for? Do you barricade yourself from the prospect of "more" with excuses and iterations of rationalizations for settling for what is familiar?
What if the Father offers you more than you are comfortable with?
What if His heart beckons: "All that I have is yours"?
"Do you want to be healed?"
It's actually a terrifying question.
What if the supernatural was reality? What if there was more to life than pig slop and unending labor?
What if Jesus looked you in the eye and commanded: "GET UP! Take that mat and start walking!"?
Would you lay there, surrendered to the familiar prison of the familiar?
Or would you embrace the profound foolishness of abundant Grace and enter the party?