Psalm 85:10-13,
Luke 15: 11-32
Unfinished Stories: Open Doors and the Ways of Homecoming Click the arrow below to listen. Might take a few seconds to download…
Last Sunday afternoon, I walked through the galleries of The Florence Griswold exhibit on a private tour our church middle schoolers and their families. The show entitled, “Nothing More American” astounded me once again.
The diverse people who’ve sought refuge through our church community as they sought a place to call home is extraordinary. Many of them needing to start their lives over again from top to bottom. Up on the museum walls are beloved faces from many parts of the world and it was fun to see our church kids run up to the black and white photos (by Matthew Lefiheit) of Mohammed Hamou, or Roniya ben Rehman or Adrian and Gustavo or the Kazadi and Torres families.
“Hey, I know them! They’re my friends!” I heard some children exclaim.
What better lesson for our children to learn in today’s world.
“They’re my friends!”
You, dear Church, have done this, you welcome the prodigal and the stranger over and over again into your hearts. You have shown up for the missing, the lost, the traveler seeking asylum, the family waiting in tears for their deported mother to return, the undocumented neighbor needing a week’s worth of groceries, the senior hoping for respite, the Bethlehem University students seeking hope, the exhausted ones released from detention.
The search for home, belonging and acceptance is universal in the human story– and in scripture. It is a journey of courage, hardship, perseverance and hope.
Today’s scripture of The Prodigal brings us familiar themes. Jesus tells his disciples about a lost family of broken relationships in need of repair. Scholar Amy Jill-Levine unpacks the parable form and how Jesus challenges us to look into the hidden parts of our lives, our values, memories, deepest longings and loves- the challenges inherent in human bonds.
The parable of the Prodigal, like other family stories in the Bible, is loaded with sibling rivalry, ancient baggage, misunderstandings and people who hard to tolerate at a family gathering. Who in the narrative might you identify with at this time in your life? The wayward one, responsible sibling or the loving/forgiving parent? Prodigal literally means spendthrift, over generous, or excessive and what’s intriguing in this text is that it not only describes the younger man in his behavior but the father with his love, as well.
We don’t know how the father or older child must have felt when the younger took off. Was there ongoing tension and resentment lingering for the remaining sibling? Nonetheless, after losing it all, the younger son makes his way home, starving. We can imagine the level of humiliation. Hitting bottom and nearly dying of hunger. Eating with the pigs.
In the next scene, we’re told, the father sees his child from afar, “was filled with compassion” and runs. Runs to put his arms around him and kiss him” (v.20)
And here’s where my tears start. No matter how far from home, Love continues to wait for us. Races to meet us where we are.
There is a restoration of dignity, illuminated by the father’s embrace. An embrace full of compassion and reconciliation. No questions asked. No judgement.
This is something Jesus models and teaches over and over again. Jesus makes visible the dignity of those that are marginalized, bringing forth a person back into the community fold once again. And what’s more, in the next scene, we hear of the words of celebration, new clothes from head to toe…” He was lost and is found!” The language of resurrection is used and new life and amazing grace. What a homecoming! A feast for the senses.
This flock is complete again. Or is it?
Being human, most families I know of have unreconciled, messy relationships, separations of one sort or another, and bewildering family members. As we see the holidays around the next bend we’ll be getting a strong dose or two whether you join your family of origin or a family of choice. Perhaps, you, too, have watched the horizon, to welcome someone whom you love back home.
No wonder the father gets a bit lost in these preparations of joy. Imagine what you love is lost and has been returned to you.
However, the conflict continues. Not everyone in this family feels welcomed. Who is the lost one now? In our final passage, anger and pain. The text tells us, the elder son “heard music and dancing” v. (he was on the outside looking in) but hadn’t been invited to the celebration. Then, his father goes out to him and a conversation ensues.
“Listen! The son speaks and we hear his truth. He felt overlooked and taken for granted.
I get the feeling this conversation should have happened a long time ago, don’t you?
And then the father speaks, “You are always with me, all that is mine is yours” (v.31) Is this the first time this son is hearing these words? One wonders if this declaration may go a long way to building a new relationship between the two.
Finally, each speaks their truth and is vulnerable. For a second time, we see this parent lavishing love on another of his children. And we hope repair can begin for this family circle.
“Reconciliation is a journey toward and through conflict”, writes the global peacemaker and author, John Lederach. It involves reconciliation and healing the web of torn apart relationships where and when we encounter them. For the brothers in our text, one may be wading through regrets and shame, while the other sibling has anger grounded in a profound sense of injustice. Both, however, are met with a deeply loving response.
Jesus provides us a living example of compassion, person by person- the core of the Good News. We too, are called into living into that quality of presence, pushing beyond the boundaries we erect for ourselves and place around one another so that we might meet the other with arms full of grace.
This narrative is one that invites us to keep imagining ways forward into community building with other another. Watching the horizon for those who will need shelter, need a chance to start over again, seeking conversations that lead one home to “the place of true meeting” (Mark Nepo)
It takes courage to journey on. Effortful and daunting as that journey often is, the promise of healing and new life has the potential for making us all whole and wrapped in joy.
Jacqueline Woodson in her book, Harbor Me, wrote “We are all the dream come true of the people who came before us…” Amen!
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(Walk down to altar table for lighting of remembrance candles)
Jacqueline Woodson in her book, Harbor Me, wrote “We are all the dream come true of the people who came before us…” In the light of all of our ancestors who have come before us along with that great cloud of witnesses, souls and saints, we’d like to honor now those who have died. I invite you to come forward and light a candle for someone who has died or someone in need of more light for their way home…As you light the candle, I invite you to say their names aloud as you wish.
Let us pray: A blessing by Jan Richardson (whose artwork graces our cover today)
Blessing the Way
With every step you take,
this blessing rises up to meet you.
It has been waiting long ages for you.
Look close and you can see the layers of it,
how it has been fashioned by those who walked
this road before you,
how it has been created of nothing but
their determination and their dreaming,
how it has taken its form from an ancient hope
that drew them forward and made a way for them
when no way could be seen.
Look closer and you will see
this blessing is not finished,
that you are part of the path
it is preparing,
that you are how this blessing means
to be a voice within the wilderness
and a welcome
for the way.
—Jan Richardson