Don’t miss the party: Sermon for the Fourth Sunday in Lent (March 30, 2025)
Sermon for the Fourth Sunday in Lent (March 30, 2025) at St. James’ Episcopal Church in Hyde Park, NY. View the scripture readings and the Collect of the Day.
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Transcript
May truth be spoken here and only truth be heard in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Please be seated.
Okay? Who knows the name of this parable that we just heard? What's the name of it? Yeah, it's the prodigal son. So did you know that Jesus did not say, and now I will tell you the parable of the prodigal son. Jesus just says, here we are in this situation together. The situation that he happens to be in at this moment is he's with some scribes and some Pharisees and they are grumbling. Why are they mad at him this time? He eats with sinners gross. He eats with sinners, with tax collectors. He's keeping bad company again. And Jesus hears the grumbling and he says, let me tell you a story. Now, the stories don't come with titles, but we give them titles over time, right? If we call it the Parable of the Prodigal Son, then who's the focus? The prodigal son, the one who is a sinner and needs forgiveness. What if I said to you, what if you opened your Bible and you opened it up and it said, Jesus tells the parable of the diligent and resentful brother. It's a different story. What if you opened your Bible and the headline was Jesus tells the story of the loving and merciful and open-hearted Father. It becomes a different story again.
So I want to look at it from all these angles. And when Jesus tells a story, he's inviting you in. He's inviting you to see where does your heart sort of get tugged? Who do I feel like today? Do I feel like that bad little brother no good for nothing? Or am I the very, very hardworking brother who never gets any appreciation or am I this openhearted icon of love? I can be any of those three, depends on the day. The little brother says to his father, Hey, one day you're going to die, right? Yes. Well, when you do, I'm going to get half your money, right? Yes. Can I have it now? ‘Cause there’s some things I'd like to do.
Now, how would you feel if this happened to you? Right? But the father says, seems like he doesn't even think twice about it. He just says, okay, let's divide up everything I have. God bless you. And the brother takes the money. He's set for life and he immediately moves away to a foreign country and he has a really good time for a while, but before very long the money runs out. That's what it does. And then there's a famine in the land. So the economy crashes and then he has to get a job and not just any job, but he gets what for Jesus' audience would be I mean, this is a bad job. This is like feeding pigs, feeding these unclean animals for foreigners, feeding foreigners’ unclean animals. This is not good. And he is so hungry that he wishes. He says to himself, I wish that I could eat the unclean food that's being fed to the unclean animals by the unclean people. And while he finds himself in this state, it says he realizes, he comes to himself and he says, the people who work for my dad, they're doing pretty good compared to me. I mean, at least they're getting these meals. They have more than enough. They even have enough to share. So what am I doing here? But how can he possibly go back after everything he's done? He took all that money and he has nothing to show for it.
Why would his father let him come back? And so there in the pigsty, he says to himself, I am going to need a really good and convincing speech. He says, I know what I'm going to tell him to convince him to feel sorry enough for me that he'll let me back in the door. And that's all I need is a little toehold. Get my way back into the family. So he says, this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to crawl up there on my hands and knees and I'm going to say, father, I get it. I have sinned before heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me like one of your hired hands. That sounds pretty good, right? His father's going to feel sorry for him.
So all the way back home on the long journey, he practices this. Father, I have sinned before heaven and before you. I'm no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me like one of your hired hands. And like many things we say to ourselves and rehearse, the more he says it, the more he believes it. So by the time he finally gets to his father's house, he feels that unworthiness very deeply.
He doesn't deserve to be a son anymore. He's done wrong. Does he get a chance to say his speech to his father? He doesn't even get to get all the way to the house. He doesn't get to knock on the door. He never gets to fall on his knees, right? Because even while he's making his way home, I have sinned. I'm not worthy. I don't belong. I'm not wanted. His father has been standing outside and sees him from a long way off, runs to him with his arms wide open and wraps him in his arms and kisses him.
And you know what happens? I don't think the son can even feel it because what does he say as he's being crushed in that embrace? Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you, I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Does he even know how much love is being poured out on him in that moment? Can he even feel it or has he become so wrapped up in his own sense of unworthiness and not belonging, that he misses the embrace, that he misses the fact that his father ran to him before a word came out of his mouth. I don't know if he feels that beautiful robe being wrapped around him or if he can taste that meal that is set before him. Or is he sitting in that middle of that big party saying to him himself, I shouldn't have done it and I shouldn't be here and I'm not worthy.
Now along comes the dutiful brother. He's coming home from work where he belongs, and he hears the sound of this great party, right? This is a party that is so excellent that you can hear the music and the dancing from outside the house and the house is bumping. So he pulls one of the servants aside. He said, what is going on? Well, your brother has come home and your father is throwing this party. The older brother can't believe it.
Now, if he had gotten a chance to hear his brother's speech, father, I have sinned against heaven and before you, I am no longer worthy to be called your son. He would've been like, that's right, that's right. And in fact, that's just what he says. His father comes out, he's coming. He says, we're having this wonderful party. Come on in. And the big brother says, I'm not going to go to that party. You're throwing a party for him after everything I have done for you. Listen, I stayed here. I did everything that you told me to do. I have worked my butt off and what have you ever given to me? And now you're going to throw a party for him.
And the father says, look, everything I have is yours. And that is true. He has been there all along. But just like his little brother in the middle of the embrace, somehow he misses out. He's so caught up in the idea that he needs to have earned his keep, that he deserves everything he has and that other people don't, that he can't enjoy his life with his father, with his family. Just like his little brother held in that embrace, unable to feel it, the big brother right in the middle of the family, unable to experience the love and both of them unwilling, unable to enjoy this fabulous party that they are both fully invited to.
Who here hasn't sometimes missed out on something beautiful and glorious that is happening in your life because you're so caught up in thinking, oh, I should have done that better. Oh, I messed that up yesterday, 10 years ago. I’m not worthy. Somehow I don't belong. And who among us hasn't thought that about somebody else? What are they doing here? Why do they get to enjoy such and such and not me? These two brothers live in both of us, these two extremes, right? The brother who is so caught up in his own unworthiness that he can't feel the love that surrounds him, and the brother that is so determined to earn that love that he can never take a break to enjoy it. So determined to work hard and be good that he can't realize that he already has it.
And then there's the father, two brothers who can't enjoy the party. Who is enjoying the party? The father. He is having an excellent time. He has got his son back. There is music, there is dancing, there is joy. What has been lost is found. What was dead is alive again. And he has his family with him. And I think we think of this and rightly so, the one running to you with their arms open. So glad to see you. Thank God you're here. Of course, that's God. That is one of our most beautiful icons of God.
But it can also be us just like the little brother can be us and the big brother can be us. We can be the ones who after everything are running with open arms to one another Thank God you're here! There is not one of us who doesn't know how that feels. Right. You don't have to be a parent to know what it feels like to be so glad to be with someone, to see someone that it feels like your heart could just burst. And all you want to do is open your arms and open your heart and it doesn't matter if your heart has been broken before.
It's a miracle we actually know and have ourselves participated in the love of God because that is what God's love is like. That is what God's love is. And you and I have felt it for one another on this earth. You feel it. So that's how God feels about you, but it's who you can be. The love of God has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, which has been given to us. It is that love that we know and participated in, do participate in, which causes us to open our arms, to say to one another welcome home!
The poet Mary Karr talks about going to a church and being greeted by the usher. And the usher says, welcome to Saint Swithin's. All sinners are welcome here. Do you think that will work for us? But the idea is everyone is welcome here. Everyone belongs. Everyone matters. There is no one standing here at the gate saying, this party is not for people like that. And there's no one who needs to come in here on their hands and knees saying, I am not worthy to be called a child of God because we are already running out there with our arms open. We are so glad to see you. We know that God is too. When we come here, we don't walk in like own the place, and we don't walk in on our hands and knees. We walk in with full hearts, received with full hearts. You belong here. It is God who called you here and you matter here. And in here, we learn how to take those open hearts and open arms, open hearts and open arms, and go right back out to embody that love in every place that God's children are. Here at home and in a distant country. You belong here and you matter to God. And the love of God is being poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, which has been given to us, so that we can tell the world you belong. You matter. Amen.