The Inheritance Series

This sermon series is entitled “Things That Keep Us Up At Night” and we’re looking at the question: “What do I leave my children when I die?” I’m getting to the age where I’ve got to consider writing a “Last Will and Testament.” I have to decide what kind of inheritance I’m going to leave my children.

Proverbs 13:22 tells us “A good man leaves an inheritance to his children’s children...”

I’m told that it’s not a good thing to die “intestate” (without a will). One site I visited explained: “A last will and testament is a legal document that lets you decide what happens with your estate after you die. When you die without a will, you leave important decisions up to a local court and your state's laws. You won't have a say in who receives your property and other assets.”

That makes sense. When I die, I want to make sure my kids are taken care of.

But, that said, I am aware that inheritances can be… difficult. The wrong kind of inheritance can ruin a family.

One comedian stated: “You know what they say, where there's a will… there's a family fighting over it.” Matt Wohlfarth.

Researching the sermon, I read of numerous stories of siblings who fought over money, real estate and keepsakes of their parents after the parents had died. And when the dust settled - and the lawsuits ran their course - nobody in the family was talking to nobody about nothing.

ILLUS: My mom told me that when her parents passed away, her brothers took over the family farm and cut mom and her sister out of their share of the inheritance. (PAUSE) They didn’t talk to each other much after that.

The Bible has a number of stories that have roughly the same message: There’s Jacob, who cheated his brother Esau out of his inheritance. In the book of Judges we read about Jephthah, whose half-brothers ran him off rather than share their father’s inheritance with him. And then there was David’s son Absalom who decided to speed things up a little by killing his dad off and taking the throne and his inheritance by force.

So, its’ no surprise that - in today’s text - we read about a son that didn’t even want to wait until dad had died to demand his inheritance. Luke 15:12 The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.’ And (the father) divided his property between them.

Stories like these tend to make you wonder about the value of an inheritance. Or, at least, the value of the WRONG kind of inheritance. If you’re going to leave your family an inheritance, you at least want it to be a legacy that’s going to benefit them rather than destroy them.

(PAUSE)

So, let’s consider this story Jesus told. We’ll start with the boy we call the Prodigal Son. Actually, he’s more of a PATHETIC son. He’s essentially told his dad --- that he wished he were dead. “I want my inheritance … now!!!!” He’s a selfish brat who wants out from under his Dad. He doesn’t even seem to love or care about his father. All he wants is money to do what HE wants to do with his life. And he ended up going to a distant country where he squandered his property in reckless living. Now he’s got nothing… he’s a loser!

Now, let’s look at the dad. The dad is a good guy. He loves his son, he takes good care of his servants. Even the boy recognizes that his “father’s hired servants have MORE THAN ENOUGH bread”

But you’d think, a good father, a righteous man, would have raised a righteous son. Many people would believe that a dad like this must have failed somehow. How could a father (who does everything right) have such a loser for a son?

In fact, when Christians work hard at raising their children - and the kids don’t turn out right - one of the first questions they consider is: WHERE DID I FAIL? What didn’t I do right? This last week, I talked to a lady whose daughter is all messed up. And she said “What did I do to deserve her being like this?”

And it’s a natural response that it must be my fault! And SOMETIMES it is our fault. But it doesn’t necessarily follow.

Ezekiel 18:5-13 tells us “If a man is righteous and does what is just and right — if he does not eat upon the mountains or lift up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, does not defile his neighbor’s wife … does not oppress anyone, but restores to the debtor his pledge, commits no robbery, gives his bread to the hungry and covers the naked with a garment, does not lend at interest or take any profit, withholds his hand from injustice, executes true justice between man and man, walks in my statutes, and keeps my rules by acting faithfully — He is righteous; he shall surely live, declares the Lord GOD. (BUT) “If he fathers a son who is violent, a shedder of blood, who does any of these things (though the father himself did none of these things), who even eats upon the mountains, defiles his neighbor’s wife, oppresses the poor and needy (etc. etc. etc) shall he then live? He shall not live. He has done all these abominations; he shall surely die; his blood shall be upon himself.”