Shaughnessy Heights United Church A.H.Harry Oussoren

March 25, 2001 “The Long Road Home”

Text: Luke 15:1-3a, 11-32

Prayer:

May only truth be spoken, and only truth be heard, O God, so your Word may become flesh through us. AMEN.

How far is far from home? Lots of people have been travelling away from home in this spring break week.

For you, who are the Key Cygnatures choir all the way from New Zealand’s Auckland, you truly are in the far country here in Canada.

Let’s hope you didn’t get into dissolute living and trouble like the younger son in our story!

Whatever your experience, I don’t doubt that parents are impatiently itching to welcome you back home with open arms when you fly back to New Zealand this week.

There are many ways of being in a far country.

Even the elder son, who lived in the family house, reveals that he wasn’t really “at home.”

He was diligent and loyal, unlike the younger brother, he worked hard on the family farm.

The elder was obedient and respectful. At least he didn’t ask for his inheritance in advance.

But sadly there certainly isn’t much joy in his obedience.

The family farm felt more like a workplace,

if not the salt mines, then the assembly line,

where routine and duty keep noses to the grindstone.

For him, tt didn’t have the feel of home.

We’ve been there. We do what we are told.

We follow the rules. We don’t rock the boat.

We don’t ask for more than we need.

We’re good, but fairly bored, if not boring.

By normal standards though, the elder son does have reason to be unhappy. He has some grounds to object to the parental action.

The younger son was a reckless spendthrift – he went far, far beyond his VISA limit; he wasted his inheritance.

Really the prodigal!!

The world’s wisdom says he should be punished for his delinquency – the elder brother feels it deeply.

But in Jesus’ Way there is another kind of wisdom. Punishment doesn’t even come up.

And so the story offends our sense of fairplay.

It seems to condone irresponsibility.

And by contemporary standards, that is objectionable.

Maybe we let him back. But surely it should be on the terms he himself proposed:

Ok, he can come back into the house, but more like one of the hired hands.

After all, he not only squandered his inheritance, he blew the right to be an heir.

Sure we can see letting him onto the family ranch so he won’t starve to death.

But his status as heir – that surely should be gone.

But Jesus says God operates with different standards.

And so we see the parent in the story running to welcome the lost child with an embrace and a relieved kiss;

then provides clothing and jewelry and sandals; and

then orders a great party, with lots of food and music and dancing.

A great celebration.

[I wonder,

how listeners then and now would have responded

if Jesus had spoken of a daughter who had gone to the far country -–had squandered her inheritance – had given herself to raunchy living?

Had come back emaciated and in rags?

I wonder?]

But in our story it’s the son and a great celebration is ordered!

What’s going on here?

This waiting parent seems to have lost all good judgment.

The parent’s response is the mirror of the younger son’s irresponsibility.

To restore the prodigal as if nothing had happened seems both reckless and unreasonable by the world’s standards.

Would you or I have gone to that welcome home party Jesus describes?

I have a hunch we might have hesitated going

because of our discomfort with the younger one’s escapades,

or because of our conventional sense of fairplay for the elder son,

perhaps because of our commitment to community standards and family values.

I suspect we’d be inclined to think, if not say,

“putting on a party for such a lout really is too much.”

For most of us, it’s probably easier for us to identify with the elder son.

More of us probably see life the way he did.

Work hard. Keep things going. Be responsible. Don’t waste the family assets. Honour your father and your mother. Live in dutiful obedience to God.

Isn’t that where most of us are?

But let’s think some more about that.

Maybe we are not only the elder.

Perhaps we are also the younger.

We who live in the affluent developed world, aren’t we actually more like the younger prodigal?

Twenty percent of us take the bulk of the global family inheritance and give hardly any time to thinking about how that affects the remaining 80% of the family, who live in varying degrees of degrading poverty.

If we have money in the bank and in our wallet and spare change in a dish somewhere, then that puts us in the top 8% of the world’s wealthy.

And what has our first world affluence done for us?

Has it made us more thankful, more generous, more compassionate, more committed to justice for all.

Not really.

By and large, we’re still wallowing in greed, looking for the next treasure to gobble up, the next plunder to extract from the earth and the seas as our inheritance.

As our affluence increases, anxiety grows, generosity fades, and God is pushed further and further away to the margins.

The reality is that the quality of life has diminished – just as it did for the prodigal. We’re working more, getting richer, and enjoying it less.

Our part of the world has become that starved far country.

With the lost son, we famish for essential human qualities.

Spiritual impoverishment is not as obvious as physical poverty, but no less destructive.

It feels like home is a long, long way.

But the vision of home is kept before our eyes.

Whether we identify with the elder or the younger offspring, home beckons.

Home is that place where we are not only accepted and tolerated. But where we are welcomed back no matter where we’ve been before. It’s the place where we are forgiven, accepted, loved, and cherished as beloved heirs.

We get welcomed back just because we were moved to leave behind destructive ways, ways of death, and chose to start the journey home. –

Both sons were welcomed to be at home.

The younger one knew what he needed to do.

He went into the house for the feast – doubtless with a red face, but oh so grateful for being welcomed, accepted and loved.

What do you think the elder son decided to do?

Do you think he was able to leave behind his anger,

his desire for retribution on the younger sibling,

his penchant for doing things the conventional way?

I like to think he did go in,

because finally both his mind and his heart understood -

no - experienced the father’s boundless love.

In the end, I believe that even his anger and pride and sibling jealousy was dissolved by the parent’s outreaching love –

the divine love that frees him and me and you to be the persons we are intended to be.

Remember how this story started?

It began with people complaining that Jesus kept company with outcasts and enjoyed meals with sinners.

And with the story Jesus provides yet another glimpse into the nature of God.

It’s big time good news:

You don’t need to stay in the far country.

Welcome home. God loves you as you are.

Join the party, eat, celebrate, dance and sing songs to God.

There is a place - even for us - in God’s house and at God’s table. We can be at home!

May it be so here in Shaughnessy Heights United Church and in all of God’s wonderful world. Praise God. AMEN