The Prodigal God (5)

The brothers’ hearts (Luke 15), and the two ways of life they represent, are much more alike than they first appear.
What did the younger son want most in life? He wanted to make his own decisions and have unfettered control of his portion of the wealth. How did he get that? By a flagrant defiance of community standards, a declaration of complete independence.
What did the older son want? If we think about it we realize he wanted the same thing as his brother. He was just as resentful of the father as was the younger son. He, too, wanted the father’s goods rather than the father himself. However, while the younger brother went far away, the elder brothers stayed close and “never disobeyed.” That was his way to get control. His unspoken demand is, “I have never disobeyed you! Now you have to do things in my life the way I want them to be done.”
The hearts of the two brothers were the same. Both sons resented their father’s authority and sought ways to get out from under it. They each wanted to get into a position where they could tell the father what to do. Each one, in other words, rebelled—but one did so by being very bad and the other by being extremely good. Both were alienated from the father’s heart; both were lost sons… Neither son loved the father for himself. They both used him for their own self-centered ends rather than loving, enjoying, and serving him for his own sake. This means you can rebel against God and be alienated from him either by breaking his rules or by keeping them diligently.
It’s a shocking message: Careful obedience to God’s law may serve as a strategy for rebelling against God. ( Keller, The Prodigal God, 35-37)