Reflections on Renewal - 4. Responses to Renewal

MEDITATIONS FROM ORIOLE–YORK MILLS UNITED CHURCH [website]

Lent 4 - Sunday March 14, 2010
(Based on the Parable of the Prodigal Son)

Luke 15:1-3, 11b -32, 2 Corinthians 5:16-21

Where do you call home? Is home connected to a specific address or to family and friends or to both? Our First Nations people would no doubt feel connected to the land. I personally enjoy travelling but I always appreciate returning home – to the physical place where I live and to the significant people in my life: my friends and my family.

I had never heard of the British rock band called Bloc Party until my research for today’s message [www.cardus.ca/comment/article/1514/]. They wrote an album called A Weekend in the City that reflects their experience of touring the world and returning periodically to London, England, only to be frustrated and disillusioned about the city they had called home. Their song titled "Where Is Home?" concludes with these lines:

I just sit, and I just sigh
And I pretend
That there's nothing wrong
The teeth of this world
Tear me in half
And every day I must ask myself>
Where is it?
Where is home?

To ask ourselves this question – Where is home? -- can be troubling. It may sometimes cause us to doubt and to rethink our sense of belonging, our sense of self and our very purpose for living.

This morning we heard Norm read a familiar story for many of us about a father and his two sons. Jesus always had a reason for the stories he told. He told this one because some of the religious leaders and religion scholars were not at all pleased with the company he was keeping and they grumbled about it. There were a lot of men and women with “doubtful reputations” who enjoyed listening to Jesus. They felt “at home” with Jesus -- like they were in the company of a good friend. Jesus knew that many of the Pharisees and religious teachers who heard him did not feel at home with him or his teachings. So he was speaking to them when he told his story.

The Departure of the Prodigal Son by Jan Molenaer, 1630

Underlying this story of the father with two sons is the question the rock band asked: Where is home? Another underlying question in this story is: Who belongs in this home? There was the younger son who didn’t think much of his home or his father and so he left. There was the elder son who stayed at home but as we know from the end of the story, he didn’t really know what being at home with his father truly meant. And there was the father who longed for both of his sons to come home. In fact, the story really revolves around the father whose sons – both of them -- were oblivious of the joy and the passionate love their father had for them.

Every so often we read about a younger son or daughter living in some far off country. Corey Haim was a 1980s teen heart-throb whose life tumbled downwards instead of progressing upwards. His struggle with drugs is well-documented. He died this week in his apartment in California and has been featured in the news. While it’s not clear what directly caused his death, he was taking various prescription drugs, his heart was enlarged and he suffered from pulmonary congestion with water on his lungs. So his body would have been under great stress. Apparently, his cancer-stricken mother is trying to get enough money together for a funeral here in Toronto because this was his home. But as one website noted: “Now we'll see whether his onetime fellow Hollywood stars, some of whom have battled their own demons, some of whom are still rockin' the good life, will do more than Twitter their regrets.” To Twitter, by the way, is Internet jargon that essentially means to write a brief note in 140 characters or less. [ca.eonline.com/uberblog/b171605_week_in_review_goodbye_teen_idol_corey.html]

And then I came across this article called “Postcard: Tojinbo Cliffs” from the June 22, 2009, issue of Time magazine. [Coco Masters, Postcard: Tojinbo Cliffs," Time (6-22-09), p. 6] The author of the article revealed a startling statistic: one in five Japanese men and women have seriously considered taking their lives. And each year over the past decade, more than 30,000 people have killed themselves in that country. Canada’s rates are not that high but they are significant, especially among young people and especially among First Nations youth. While the Time article talked about such troubling numbers, the author also included the remarkable story of Yukio Shige. It is because of Shige that at least 188 Japanese men and women have chosen life over death.

Every day since 2004, Shige, a retired detective, has roamed the Tojinbo Cliffs, a popular site for suicide attempts along the coast of the Sea of Japan. He looks for people who are considering jumping. If he spots someone in need, he slowly approaches them, offers a gentle "Hello" and does his best to engage them in conversation. At some point he will offer a light touch on the shoulder – a gesture that almost always causes the person to burst into tears. Shige will then softly say, "You've had a hard time up until now, haven't you?"

Shige will often take the person back to his office (which he rents for $800 a month). The author wrote:

There's no rush in Shige's office. He offers those who go there oroshi-mochi, a dish of pounded sticky rice served with grated relish. Traditionally the food is prepared to celebrate the New Year, with each family taking its own rice to be mixed with that of its neighbours. ‘When people come here and eat mochi, they remember their childhood -- father, mother, siblings, hometown. They remember they're not alone,’ Shige says.

As an intriguing aside, the ring tone for Shige's cellphone is the melody of the hymn "Amazing Grace." How significant is that! Shige sums up his mission this way:

"I want Tojinbo to be the most challenging place, not where life ends, but where it begins."

The Prodigal Son by Jan Sanders van Hemessen, 1556

The younger son in Jesus’ story found his Tojinbo Cliffs a challenging place indeed. He squandered every cent of his inheritance. Then his so-called friends left him to fend for himself. And he had to work at a very offensive job. However he slowly realized what he was doing with his life. As Jesus put it, “At last he came to his senses.” One thing he began to understand was his former home was never like this far off country – where, as the rock song put it: “The teeth of this world tear me in half.” Even his father’s servants lived very well with more than enough to meet their needs. So he decided to return to home. And as he slopped out food for the pigs and thought back to life with his father, he had to believe -- at least a little bit -- that his father would respond favourably to him. He looked at his father from a different perspective now.

The Prodigal Son, Auguste Rodin, 1894-1899

And then there was the elder son who did not leave home -- physically. But he wasn’t really at home with his father, was he? He didn’t seem to have much affection for his father but probably figured life was better at home than going elsewhere. He felt he was both obedient and a hard worker. So where was the celebration for him? Can’t you hear him: Don’t I deserve something more than him? The elder brother seemed to be emotionally absent from his father without ever leaving the farm. It makes me wonder if we can be emotionally and spiritually absent from our Father in Heaven – absent from God – without ever leaving the church.

What was going on with the older son? Simply, his heart was out of sync with his father’s compassionate and loving heart. In fact, he was sorry his little brother had come home. “Good riddance” he probably thought when the young rebel left. To his father’s face, he called him “this son of yours,” not “my brother.” Why? Was he upset his father didn’t recognize his own good performance? Did his father not see how worthy he was of a celebration that clearly his self-indulgent brother was not? After all, his no-good brother had wasted his entire inheritance on “reckless living” and now he was home again -- on the take again? The elder son did work hard but he had no idea how to enjoy a loving relationship with his father that his father obviously wanted with him. He seemed to care only about himself and the property his father had given him.

Brothers and sisters can sometimes be toxic. I can envision the older son in Jesus’ story thinking: “Instead of throwing a party for him, would it not be better if he were taught a lesson he would never forget?” Imagine what might have happened if he had met his returning brother first.

“So you’ve come back, have you? Things didn’t work out like you thought, did they? Tough! Listen, you aren’t welcome here. You broke your poor father’s heart. You’ve disgraced us all. You’ve only come back because your money has run out. If you still had some cash, you’d still be gone. At least have enough self-respect to come back when you have a job and get yourself cleaned up.”

Poet Rudyard Kipling [The Prodigal Son (see annex A)] imagined such a meeting between the two brothers. As he was leaving the encounter with his brother, the younger one says:

“I never was very refined, you see?
(And it weighs on my brother’s mind, you see)
But there’s no reproach among swine, d’you see,
For being a bit of a swine.”

Have you ever wondered how brothers and sisters get this way? I wonder if -- as time passes – they begin to imagine they are “good” compared to their siblings even as some people regard themselves as “good” compared to some other people because they have avoided the more obvious, even lethal sins. They do not regard their jealousy, pride, selfishness and judgmentalism as sins -- though they might call them faults or shortcomings. So the older brother in Jesus’ story – like the religious leaders and scholars to whom Jesus directed this story-- became critical, judgmental, unloving and unforgiving of others. Their hearts were out of sync with their Heavenly Father’s responsive heart of compassionate love. They worked hard at home keeping all the rules but failed to enjoy the joy and love of living with God. They grumbled about God who celebrates the return home of his lost children whom he loves so passionately. Jesus was saying that the religious leaders failed to understand they too were lost to experiencing the joy and love of God – just like the elder brother.

Jesus’ story is also about the father as well as his two sons. Actually, when Jesus opened his story by saying “There was a man who had two sons,” he made the father’s relationship to each of the sons the key factor to the story. This is not two stories; that is, a story of a younger son and another story of an older son. It is fundamentally one story about a father who had two children.

In Jesus’ story, being at home with the father meant being at home with God who waits and watches for all his children to realize they are lost – even if they don’t yet realize it. The younger son in the story did have a sense of being almost dead as well as being lost from his father. But we don’t know if the elder son ever did realize he too was lost to his father’s joy and love for him.

In Jesus’ story, being with the father meant forgiveness even in the face of great insult and disrespect. And being with the father meant a wonderfully unexpected and joyful welcome home – a celebration! One writer said that being with the father was the place where “grace explodes in our faces” as we watch the loving reunion of father and son.

The Return of the Prodigal Son by Jacques Joseph Tissot

In Jesus’ story, the younger son’s restored relationship with his father was not based on the son’s bargaining but purely on the grace shown by the father. In Jesus’ story, the younger brother sinned deliberately and knowingly yet he was welcomed home with grace and forgiveness. The older son claimed to have “slaved” for his father and he sinned against him with disrespect without leaving home. But the grace of the father was extended to both sons – for the father went out to look for his elder son too and pleaded with him to join the party.

Sometimes people say: “Where does God fit into the story of my life?” That is the not the best question to ask. This story about the father with two sons gives us the more accurate question to consider: “Where does my life fit into God’s great story?” That is the real question.

So we ask: Where is our home? Whether we are like the younger brother or the elder brother, our home, my friends, is with God. With God where there is forgiveness, great joy and much celebration. With God where people who were once lost are now found. But God allows his sons and daughters freedom to leave home and discover for themselves -- sometimes very painfully -- that there is no real life outside of being home with God. And home is with God who wants us to realize there are people who are desperately lost and unknowing that God loves them and wants them back home with God too.

It is significant that Jesus did not finish his story of the gracious, waiting, compassionate father. The story is left hanging. We are not told how the elder brother responded. We are not told any more about the younger son. Do you think it might be because God desires more sons and more daughters from anywhere and everywhere on the Earth to come home and be forgiven? And Jesus says God celebrates when anyone – when each one of us too! – comes home to God.

So who belongs at home with God? Your family and friends do and so do mine. Your neighbours do and so do mine. All humanity does. You do. And so do I.

May this be so for you and for me. Amen.

Rev. Chris T. Miller
March 14, 2010

Annex A

The Prodigal Son

by Rudyard Kipling

Here come I to my own again,

Fed, forgiven and known again,

Claimed by bone of my bone again

And cheered by flesh of my flesh.

The fatted calf is dressed for me,

But the husks have greater zest for me,

I think my pigs will be best for me,

So I'm off to the Yards afresh.

I never was very refined, you see,

(And it weighs on my brother's mind, you see)

But there's no reproach among swine, d'you see,

For being a bit of a swine.

So I'm off with wallet and staff to eat

The bread that is three parts chaff to wheat,

But glory be! - there's a laugh to it,

Which isn't the case when we dine.

My father glooms and advises me,

My brother sulks and despises me,

And Mother catechises me

Till I want to go out and swear.

And, in spite of the butler's gravity,

I know that the servants have it I

Am a monster of moral depravity,

And I'm damned if I think it's fair!

I wasted my substance, I know I did,

On riotous living, so I did,

But there's nothing on record to show I did

Worse than my betters have done.

They talk of the money I spent out there -

They hint at the pace that I went out there -

But they all forget I was sent out there

Alone as a rich man's son.

The Prodigal Son by Edouard Dubufe, 1865

So I was a mark for plunder at once,

And lost my cash (can you wonder?) at once,

But I didn't give up and knock under at once,

I worked in the Yards, for a spell,

Where I spent my nights and my days with hogs.

And shared their milk and maize with hogs,

Till, I guess, I have learned what pays with hogs

And - I have that knowledge to sell!

So back I go to my job again,

Not so easy to rob again,

Or quite so ready to sob again

On any neck that's around.

I'm leaving, Pater. Good-bye to you!

God bless you, Mater! I'll write to you!

I wouldn't be impolite to you,

But, Brother, you are a hound!

This is one in a series of selected sermons and speeches given at Oriole – York Mills United Church. It is offered as a public service in the spirit of sharing and strengthening our Christian faith. We hope readers benefit from these meditations and the insights they provide.