Saturday of the Second Week of Lent – March 6, 2010
Luke 15:1 – 3; 11 – 32
Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, "This man welcomes sinners and eats with them."
Jesus continued: "There was a man who had two sons. The younger one said to his father, 'Father, give me my share of the estate.' So he divided his property between them.
"Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.
"When he came to his senses, he said, 'How many of my father's hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.' So he got up and went to his father.
"But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.
"The son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.'
"But the father said to his servants, 'Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let's have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.' So they began to celebrate.
"Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing. So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. 'Your brother has come,' he replied, 'and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.'
"The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. But he answered his father, 'Look! All these years I've been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!'
"'My son,' the father said, 'you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’"
This parable illumines itself. We need little prompting to identify with the characters in the story. Luke includes the story as the final part of a trilogy of stories about lost things. One question we might ask is, “Who is lost in this story?” Several threads of lostness are woven into the story.
I’m not so interested in following that track today, though. I’m thinking of the younger son and his desire to leave home, to “spend” what he had away from home until he came to nothing. In a sense, he spent what he had received from his family, from his father. The family resources sustained him for awhile, but they could not sustain him forever. At some point he had to find himself apart from his home. He had to discover the resources that were unique to his own experience and spiritual path.
Many of us don’t discover those deeper, spiritual resources within us until we come to the end of all the other resources we’ve inherited or been given or been taught through all of our years. It’s entirely too easy to rely on what someone else taught us or what we received from some significant person or life experience. We can draw on that resource and allow it to support us for a great long time, but we eventually come to the point where we’ve withdrawn from that person or experience everything it can impart to us.
At some time, we have to wrestle with God and in that struggle come to some sense of what is uniquely ours. We have to come to our own path. In fact, we may feel like we are making up a path as we go, and sometimes we are! In that struggle we begin to learn the unique shape of our own soul. We typically, though, have to come to the end of ourselves before that happens. We come face-to-face with our own emptiness.
When I come to this place – often! – in my life, I sometimes verbalize it to God as, “I’m so tired of myself!” That is, I feel worn out trying to live an illusion or attempting to do life with tools that no longer work. For me, it is a statement of surrender that indicates I’m at the end of me and ready to be, once again, at the beginning of God.
The younger son in the parable, far from being a disreputable role model, actually models the journey to wholeness very well. He takes what the family has given him, spends it, finds that it doesn’t buy happiness, comes to himself, and finally goes back home as a different person.
That’s a pretty good model for wholeness to consider during Lent.
Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, "This man welcomes sinners and eats with them."
Jesus continued: "There was a man who had two sons. The younger one said to his father, 'Father, give me my share of the estate.' So he divided his property between them.
"Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.
"When he came to his senses, he said, 'How many of my father's hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.' So he got up and went to his father.
"But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.
"The son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.'
"But the father said to his servants, 'Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let's have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.' So they began to celebrate.
"Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing. So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. 'Your brother has come,' he replied, 'and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.'
"The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. But he answered his father, 'Look! All these years I've been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!'
"'My son,' the father said, 'you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’"
This parable illumines itself. We need little prompting to identify with the characters in the story. Luke includes the story as the final part of a trilogy of stories about lost things. One question we might ask is, “Who is lost in this story?” Several threads of lostness are woven into the story.
I’m not so interested in following that track today, though. I’m thinking of the younger son and his desire to leave home, to “spend” what he had away from home until he came to nothing. In a sense, he spent what he had received from his family, from his father. The family resources sustained him for awhile, but they could not sustain him forever. At some point he had to find himself apart from his home. He had to discover the resources that were unique to his own experience and spiritual path.
Many of us don’t discover those deeper, spiritual resources within us until we come to the end of all the other resources we’ve inherited or been given or been taught through all of our years. It’s entirely too easy to rely on what someone else taught us or what we received from some significant person or life experience. We can draw on that resource and allow it to support us for a great long time, but we eventually come to the point where we’ve withdrawn from that person or experience everything it can impart to us.
At some time, we have to wrestle with God and in that struggle come to some sense of what is uniquely ours. We have to come to our own path. In fact, we may feel like we are making up a path as we go, and sometimes we are! In that struggle we begin to learn the unique shape of our own soul. We typically, though, have to come to the end of ourselves before that happens. We come face-to-face with our own emptiness.
When I come to this place – often! – in my life, I sometimes verbalize it to God as, “I’m so tired of myself!” That is, I feel worn out trying to live an illusion or attempting to do life with tools that no longer work. For me, it is a statement of surrender that indicates I’m at the end of me and ready to be, once again, at the beginning of God.
The younger son in the parable, far from being a disreputable role model, actually models the journey to wholeness very well. He takes what the family has given him, spends it, finds that it doesn’t buy happiness, comes to himself, and finally goes back home as a different person.
That’s a pretty good model for wholeness to consider during Lent.
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