Homily prepared and presented by Gwin Hanahan

(at the request of the Rev Wayman Henry)

The Fourth Sunday in Lent

March 18, 2007

Texts for this day:

Joshua (4:19-24);5:9-12

Psalm 34

2 Corinthians 5:17-21

Luke 15:11-32

Robert Frost said, “Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.”

That sentiment about home has perhaps served some of our relatives well…perhaps it has served us well at one time or another. Because we know home can represent a haven and a place where we matter enough and belong enough that whatever weaknesses we have, we can still be accepted, even forgiven in that proper place called home.

We hear about home among today’s Scripture Readings and in these Readings we see a central act of God in Christ which is God’s redeeming forgiveness of our sins…forgiveness which is so powerful and complete and unconditional that we are released from guilt, and further, we are by God’s power of reconciliation, brought home, restored to a proper place. All we need to do is to be honest with God about our sins, to ask Him for forgiveness, and to BELIEVE—to open the door to Him! In effect God embraces us prodigals in love and welcome and forgiveness and in bountiful restoration to our home in Him. In the Gospel story, the word “prodigal” means squandering one’s riches. For us, “Prodigal” means a wasteful misuse or disregard of our own God-given “riches”—God’s many gifts and blessings to us—not using them and us to their full potential and sometimes not honoring these gifts at all. This prodigal nature of all of us, lay and clergy alike, is what makes God’s redeeming forgiveness so necessary, and so meaningful, and, yes, so powerful.

In the first Reading, from Joshua, God redeemed the tribes of Israel at Gilgal. These tribes were continually stumbling into sin and continually brought back and reconciled to God. “This day I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you.” I release you (again) from blame and I restore you (yet again) to your proper place. God says, I bring you home and I feed you “the produce of the land” and “ the fruit of the land.” Released, restored, forgiven, fed. It’s unbelievable such repeated loving redemption. But it is offered. Just “Taste and see that the Lord is good,” reads the Refrain.

In today’s second reading, in his letter to the Corinthians, Paul describes the reconciling, i.e., restorative nature of Christ in God. “In Christ, God was reconciling the world [us] to himself, not counting their trespasses against them.” Paul teaches here that the unbounded love of God has been manifested in Christ and it is the unbounded love of Christ symbolized by the shedding of His blood that has reconciled Christians with God. Now THIS is grace. We are redeemed and reconciled by the grace of God. And this grace is much more than an admittedly enormous gift from God. This grace by which we are released from guilt and blame and by which we are restored to proper harmony with all creation is nothing less than a direct and personal confrontation with the living God and us, his children. We are not forgotten and abandoned as orphans when by our sins we fall so far short from our inner good intentions.

Here again is that message written in Luke’s Gospel reading of today, Jesus is telling us how far we can fall and still taste God’s savory grace (that fatted calf was GOOD, especially since the prodigal son was back home). And he had certainly fallen far- “famine arose…he began to be in want. No one gave him anything.” Not even the swine’s husk. “I perish here with hunger!” How far did he stumble and fall? He saw himself as so far short of what he had hoped to do on his own, that he saw himself as no longer even part of his family, “no longer worthy,” he says, “to be called your son.” Really he said to himself, I am not even able to go all the way home, just partly, just to servanthood if they will have me. But that is not how his father saw him. And it’s not how our Father sees us.

An important twist from today’s Gospel is that, while, we Christians are certainly prodigals, we are also called to be the Prodigal’s father, merciful and welcoming the stumblers back home when they come to us asking. In fact, Paul says this in the second reading: “God is making His appeal through us. Entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.” Our charge is to love God and love our (stumbling) neighbors.

And there is another useful parallel in today’s Gospel about the “good son”—the son who was both dependable and unforgiving. Remember the good son’s judgment of his father’s joy? “But he was Angry and refused to go in.” And he spoke harshly to his father about the father’s decision. But we Christians know that it is not the good son’s place to judge the father’s joy and his decision to forgive. Likewise, we should not question God’s gifts of forgiveness and reconciliation to us, and his overwhelming power to do so, especially at this altar—this place of reconciliation.

Finally in the Psalm for today, the Psalmist says, “taste and see” in verse 8. This Psalm was known to Jesus and His apostles, and it may have been on our Lord’s mind when he told the Prodigal Son parable that Luke recalls. In those middle verses we read what the prodigal surely felt, “my terror, my affliction, all my troubles.” But then the Psalmist stood before his father and asked, “I sought the Lord and He answered me. I called, and the Lord heard me and saved me.”

But there’s more. In verse 7 we are promised not only deliverance, if we accept God’s grace, but also we will be “encompassed” by the angel of the Lord. “Encompassed”, enfolded… as in the arms… the arms of a loving father and reconciled…restored to a loving home.

If you see yourself as God sees you, you know that He has given you and me all these wonderful gifts, and you know He knows that you and I have squandered some of our gifts. The message of this Gospel of the Prodigal Son is a message to us in this room. And it is this, keep trying to get back home. Home here on earth, home in God. So, even when we stumble and fall…keep trying. Keep trying to get back home.

When I look at our altar, I see “the way back home.” I see the arms of the cross that encompass us at this place of reconciliation. Within the arms of the altar at the Eucharist, we are released, restored, forgiven, and fed the bread of life in the body and blood of our Lord Jesus. When we stand before our Father here and ask…( for God to forgive us and save us and others. Where we ask for God to nurture us)…the response is take, eat, taste and see that the Lord is good.

Everyone is both the good son and the prodigal son and therein lies the power of God’s reconciliation… within us and between us and all those other poor flawed creatures who are very similar to us. We are all of us invited home here at God’s table, because reconciliation is one of the greatest works we can attempt. For from it flows Christian love, a fortress against Evil and a wellspring of God’s mercy, peace, and hope which we may share with the world. I believe God is doing a new thing in the world, lovingly teaching us Christians to be MORE reconciling, more accepting of His people. He is teaching us to be new. Where better to learn something new from God than at His altar?

We come to the altar sometimes in great joy and gratitude, sorrow or confusion, or with many another feeling, but we come as ones who are called home. My own persistent and profound call from God to the ordained ministry in the Episcopal Church is a call to come home. I am drawn to this ministry of the altar, to the Holy Eucharist… for this is my altar-home on Earth. Here, by God’s grace, I, a stumbling, repentant sinner, am reminded that I am God’s beloved and forgiven child. We all are!

As one Episcopal bishop said, “ I’m probably not going to get there before I’m dead and gone, but what I can be assured of is that God will come running toward me with His arms outstretched, and before I can utter, ‘I’m sorry,’ God will be putting a robe on me and a ring on my finger and ordering up a party. I believe without any shadow of a doubt that I’m going to Heaven. My salvation has been won for me. All I have to do is accept it, [repent] and then do my best to be God’s hands and feet in the world.”

You see, all of us are prodigal sons, and God is the Master of the house waiting to welcome us all home!!