SCRIPTURE READING Luke 15:11-32 11 Jesus said, A certain man had two sons. 12 The younger son said to his father, Father, give me my share of the inheritance. Then the father divided his estate between them. 13 Soon afterward, the younger son gathered everything together and took a trip to a land far away. There, he wasted his wealth through extravagant living. 14 When he had used up his resources, a severe food shortage arose in that country and he began to be in need. 15 He hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. 16 He longed to eat his fill from what the pigs ate, but no one gave him anything. 17 When he came to his senses, he said, How many of my father s hired hands have more than enough food, but I m starving to death! 18 I will get up and go to my father, and say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. 19 I no longer deserve to be called your son. Take me on as one of your hired hands. 20 So he got up and went to his father. While he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was moved with compassion. His father ran to him, hugged him, and kissed him. 21 Then his son said, Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I no longer deserve to be called your son. 22 But the father said to his servants, Quickly, bring out the best robe and put it on him! Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet! 23 Fetch the fattened calf and slaughter it. We must celebrate with feasting 24 because this son of mine was dead and has come back to life! He was lost and is found! And they began to celebrate. 25 Now his older son was in the field. Coming in from the field, he approached the house and heard music and dancing. 26 He called one of the servants and asked what was going on. 27 The servant replied, Your brother has arrived, and your father has slaughtered the fattened calf because he received his son back safe and sound. 28 Then the older son was furious and didn t want to enter in, but his father came out and begged him. 29 He answered his father, Look, I ve served you all these years, and I never disobeyed your instruction. Yet you ve never given me as much as a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours returned, after gobbling up your estate on prostitutes, you slaughtered the fattened calf for him. 31 Then his father said, Son, you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. 32 But we had to celebrate and be glad because this brother of yours was dead and is alive. He was lost and is found. This ends the reading from Gospel of Luke. Thanks be to God. Page 1 of 5
There are a lot of stories of road trips in the Bible. As you know, we are people of the Exodus, which is nothing if not one very, very long and treacherous road trip to find holy land. There are also many roads in the New Testament. Rev. Sue Ann talked about the Emmaus Road a few weeks back. Last week I talked about walking through the valley of the shadow from the Hebrew Scriptures. We are going to jump around in the Bible to elevate some of these road trips. But this story of the road home, well, this story holds a special place among all stories, yes? Maybe you, like me, identify with different characters in the story at different times in your life. Sometimes you are the younger son who heads out on an adventure, sometimes you are the older son has stayed in town and chose to work for the family business, sometimes you are the father who waits and worries about those who have left the nest and throw the big bash. I have lived in California now for more than half of my life. Yet when someone asks me where I m from, I almost always say Michigan. Isn t that weird? It think that s weird. It s probably not uncommon, but it is odd to still hold my parent s house in Mt. Pleasant Michigan as if it were home. Especially now that my parent s house is only an idea both of my parents are gone and the house itself was sold more than a decade ago. But that idea of home lingers, doesn t it? I think your heart always remembers the way home. I relate perhaps a little too much to the younger son in this story. I left my parents house in 1977 as I went off to college. That lasted six weeks into the semester a horrible, depressing, frightening time that I was not ready to undertake. So I returned home. Then I left Mt. Pleasant again in 1982 when I moved to Atlanta to start seminary at Emory University. Mom, Dad and Wayne all traveled with me, towing a trailer of my earthly possessions. As we drove into the freeway loop around Atlanta, Wayne and I burst into song: Who can turn the world on with her smile? Who can take a nothing day, and suddenly make it all seems worthwhile? Well it s you girl, and you should know it With each glance and every little movement you show it Love is all around, no need to waste it You can never tell, why don t you take it You re gonna make it after all You re gonna make it after all I was in Atlanta for three years for my Masters of Divinity and then back to Michigan for my first church in Traverse City. A year later, I again used my parent s home as my in-between place after I had left the United Methodist Church (because, you know, I m gay). I packed my little Nissan Sentra with camping gear, a typewriter, a couple of suitcases and my AAA roadmaps with a route set for the West. I was leaving home once again what was this? My third time? Fourth time? I have left home so often I have lost count. Which also means I have returned home so many times I know what this feels like. Each time, I felt like a failure, a disappointment and each time I was greeted and welcomed without judgment. Each time, I was humbled and humiliated. And each time I was reminded that I belong and I am loved. I am Page 2 of 5
blessed in unimaginable ways that this is my foundation, that this is my family of origin. I am keenly aware that not everyone has this experience of home and family. It is one of the best and most terrifying days when you leave home. For some of us it happens without much fanfare. For others, it happens with the worst kind of fanfare -- with an argument and the slamming of doors and hastily packed bags of whatever you can grab. And yet for others, there is a huge scene with your mother in tears and your father giving you a hug, even though he was never a hugger before. You are taking a very big step in your life headed out to find your way, your career, your life. When the young son of our story takes this big endeavor, he asks for his father s help to set him up financially; he asks for his inheritance. Dad gives the young man money for food and clothes and rent and to set him up in business. And off he goes. Jump forward in time and this young man has lost everything. He has messed things up. Not just a little. He messed up big time. So much so that he lost his house, lost his business, took a job as a farm hand and, finally, when we realizes he is worse off than the animals on the farm, he decides to have the courage to go back home and make amends, to make it right with his dad and family once more. When everything else was lost, he still remembered the way home. With no car and no bus fare, the man walks home. As he walks over the hill, his Dad sees him and starts running toward him. You know that run. It s the one when you run like the wind with your arms spread wide and a smile on your face that just won t stop. How s that for a greeting! I ll take that. We usually only get that expression of unmitigated joy from our pets but here it is, in real life, running toward his son. From dad s perspective well, he has raised his boys and now must allow and in fact encourage them to go off on their own if that s what they want to do. Against all advice and counsel, dad gives his youngest son the inheritance he would have had years from now when the estate passed on. And now that the boy has left, he is lost to the family. No contact, no letters, no phone calls, no birthday cards or Christmas cards. Nothing. He is lost. Some of us might get mad right about now. Some of us might feel bitter and angry that our son could be so ungrateful and disrespectful. But not this dad. No, this dad goes running. Full speed. Arms open. To greet his returning boy. There is no I told you so. There is no I knew you would be back, or I was worried you were a failure with your life... or maybe a big success, I didn t know. There was no why didn t you call or write? None of it. No sign of regret or anger or pain. Just running as fast as his feet would take him and open arms. And then, a party. Crank up the barbeque, invite the neighbors, get a big bucket of ice for all of the sodas and beer. Look who has come home. This is the pure joy of God who is standing with arms-outstretched, ready to run toward you. Many years ago I read an essay in which a woman was reminiscing about her father. She said that when she was young, she was very close to her father. The time she experienced this closeness the most was when they would have big family gatherings with all the aunts and uncles and cousins. At Page 3 of 5
some point, someone would pull out the old record player and put on polka records, and the family would dance. Eventually, someone would put on the "Beer Barrel Polka;" and when the music of the "Beer Barrel Polka" played, her father would come up to her, tap her on the shoulder and say, "I believe this is our dance," and they would dance. One time, though, when she was a teenager and in one of those teenaged moods and the "Beer Barrel Polka" began to play and when her father tapped her on the shoulder and said, "I believe this is our dance," she snapped at him, "Don't touch me! Leave me alone!" And her father turned away and never asked her to dance again. "Our relationship was difficult all through my teen years," she wrote. "When I would come home late from a date, my father would be sitting there in his chair, half asleep, wearing an old bathrobe, and I would snarl at him, "What do you think you're doing?" He would look at me with sad eyes and say, "I was just waiting on you." "When I went away to college," the woman wrote, "I was so glad to get out of his house and away from him and for years I never communicated with him, but as I grew older, I began to miss him. One day I decided to go to the next family gathering, and when I was there, somebody put on the "Beer Barrel Polka." I drew a deep breath, walked over to my father, tapped him on the shoulder and said, "I believe this is our dance." He turned toward me and said, "I've been waiting on you." This is the pure grace of God who is standing with arms-outstretched, ready to run toward you. A teacher, every year in her fifth grade class, had what she called the Scholastic Olympics. She would ask each child to pick a sentence from literature, name the author and source from which it came, and then explain why this sentence could be called the most important sentence ever written. You can probably guess what some of the entries were, like "Fourscore and seven years ago," and "All people are created equal." A lot of political phrases like that. There were also a lot of literary phrases, like "To be or not to be." The girl who got the most points for knowing that "To be or not to be" was from a play got some points taken away because she said the author was a writer for The Big Bang Theory. There were fourteen entries of the same biblical verse, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth," probably because the teacher had said that was her favorite verse. You know what sentence won? It was not written by a famous author at all. It wasn't to be found in any literary source. It appeared on a postcard from Hawaii that one of these fifth grade girls received from her stepfather, who was on a honeymoon with the girl's mother. The teacher was uneasy about this, because the children were supposed to explain why this is the most important sentence ever written. But she let her speak. The girl said that until she received that postcard, she didn't know how her stepfather felt about her. The girl's entry won the prize. It was written on the back of a postcard from Waikiki Beach. It said, "Charlotte, I love you." Page 4 of 5
That's the greatest sentence ever written. There are many variations of it. This is the pure love of God who is standing with arms-outstretched, ready to run toward you. This is home calling you to remember, to know, to see and to come back. You were made knowing the way home. Hear the word of God Come home, I love you. Amen. Page 5 of 5