Giving it all away

Speaking of the Parable of the Two Lost Sons (which I did yesterday), have you ever considered calling it the Parable of the Prodigal Father?  As we were talking it about the parable on Sunday night, it struck me how shocking it is that when the younger son asks for "the share of the property that will belong to me," (Luke 15:12), that the father does it.  Would  you do that if you child demanded to receive his or her inheritance now?  It's a rather radical choice that the father makes.

The word prodigal means (per Google):
1.  spending money or resources freely and recklessly, wastefully extravagant
2.  having or giving something on a lavish scale

The younger son is wasteful, and we often call him prodigal, but the father is lavishly extravagant. Some might even call him wasteful.  Why does the father make that choice?

I think in this parable, Jesus is revealing what God is like.  God is lavishly extravagant.  God is prodigal.  God gives all that he is and has to his children.  We might call him unwise through our own eyes, because we do seem inclined to waste what we have been given.  Nevertheless, God makes that radical choice that the father in the parable makes.  God is prodigal.