Generosity and Our Spiritual Paths
DATE: June 28, 2009
Scripture: Luke 15:17-32 (NRSV)
In preparing this sermon I fell into the trap of most new preachers — cramming in too much. So I'm not going to use the Second Corinthians passage, which is in today's lectionary and in your bulletin. And, as co-chair of the Stewardship committee I heartily recommend your reading Second Corinthians 8 before you make out your pledge next year.
Since I want to focus on generous living, which includes and transcends generous giving, I'll read passages from Luke — portions of Jesus' parable of the Prodigal son. I'll add some editorial comments, as I read.
You all know the story. The younger son has asked for his inheritance early, which, in the culture of Jesus’ time, was the same as wishing his father dead! This was a huge offense. In his generosity, the father doesn't take offense. He gives the young man his share of the inheritance, and the fellow goes off and spends it all in riotous living in a far country. A famine strikes, and the son is starving and decides to come home. I'll pick up Luke's story at this point in Chapter 15, verse 17.
But when he came to himself… Let me reread this, because Jesus, is implying this is a crucial step in the younger son's spiritual journey.
But when he came to himself he said, “How many of my fathers hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.
Doesn't this sound like the fifth step in a 12 step program: Admitting to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs?
Luke continues the story:
So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him, and was filled with compassion. He ran and put his arms around him and kissed him. Then the son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against God and against you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” But the father said to his servants, “Quickly! Bring out a robe, the best one, and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.”
How is that for generosity? You know what comes next. The elder son, who had stayed home on the farm and worked his fingers to the bone doing everything that had been expected of him as a dutiful son – the elder son heard the festivities, became angry and refused to join the party. He says to his father, in verse 29:
Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!
Then the father said to him, “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and come to life, he was lost and has been found.”
Let us pray. May the Lord bless this reading of the Word — and help us take it in. Let it resonate in the living of our lives and guide us on our path.
Sermon:
The Father in Jesus' parable lives a life of amazing generosity. He is generous to the younger son, when he breaks taboo and asks for his inheritance. He is generous to the judgmental, self-centered older brother, as well. The older son is a good boy, a good man. Truly! Yet he lacks the father's spiritual maturity.
If you were to take the elder brother to breakfast at the Sherwood Diner, you would come away thinking he was a responsible hard worker – a solid citizen. But you wouldn't come away feeling as uplifted as you would spending only a few minutes with one of the saints among us at Saugatuck during coffee hour. Dorothy Bryce, when she was still alive, is a good example. Dorothy was far along on her spiritual path, and you could sense her love and her joy whenever you were in her presence. That is why SO many people came to her funeral!
The elder brother has yet to attain her kind of spiritual maturity.
Notice: in Jesus' story the father doesnt admonish the son for his outburst. He doesn't chide him for his self-centeredness, or comment on his lack of spiritual maturity. Instead, he pours out his generous love toward him. He says, “All that is mine is yours.”
Commentators believe this parable sums up most if not all of Jesus' message. It is the story in which Jesus tells us what his experience of God is like. He wants us to come home to God.
I believe this is what each of us as Christians strive for as the end or goal of our spiritual journeys, consciously or not so consciously We want dwell in God as Jesus does — to become spiritually mature like the father in the story — to live lives of loving generosity. Jesus has shown us in the parable of the Prodigal Son what God's love is like. He calls us to be disciples, to follow him and become spiritually mature so we can be generous in the same way God is generous to every living thing on this planet.
The question you may be asking is the same question that has led me to seek ordination 42 years after graduating from seminary. How do we become spiritually mature, become generous in our loving rather than judgmental? What is the path? How do you get there?
Let me tell you how one of my heroes describes his path to maturity as he reflected on this parable. Henry Nouwen was a Catholic priest; for a time a teacher at Yale; a mystic; and the author of 40 books on the spiritual life. He describes his spiritual journey in a little book, The Return of the Prodigal Son. [I'll hold it up.]
Nouwen became fascinated with reproductions of what is probably Rembrandt's last painting by the same name, “The Return of the Prodigal Son.” It's on the cover of the book. Through a friend, Fr. Nouwen was able to spend an entire day in the Hermitage Museum contemplating the original painting. In the book Nouwen describes how the painting stimulated important insights and growth in his own journey.
He first identified with the younger son. That was his original emotional attraction to the painting. Like the younger son, Father Nouwen talks about “coming to himself.” As he contemplated the painting, came to understand, in his words, that
“Faith is the radical trust that home has always been there and always will be there… that I have fled the hands of blessing and run off to faraway places in search for love. This is the great tragedy of my life.…”
In the second section of his book, he writes how a friend gave him some feedback that he didn't like hearing, “There's also a great deal of the resentful, judgmental elder brother in you, Henry,” said his friend. He goes on to write:
Looking deeply into myself and then around me at the lives of other people, I wonder which does more damage, lust or resentment? There is so much resentment among the “just” and the “righteous.” There is so much judgment, condemnation, and prejudice among the “saints.” There is so much frozen anger among the people who are so concerned about avoiding “sin.”
In my journey I am coming to see that I'm a lot like Henry Nouwen here. Both of us are like the elder brother. I am SO responsible! And I can get SO critical, especially when I'm tired. It really comes out when I read the newspaper and think about all those prodigal sons out there screwing up our economy and wrecking our planet, leaving trails of misery, poverty, and injustice. I can do a terrific elder brother scowling act! It happened again two weeks ago. The stern, resentful side of me got me in a lot of trouble with a family member.
In the third section of his book, Henry gives you and me a path that can lead us beyond those resentful, judgmental, aspects of our lives. We can identify, not with the younger son who looks for love in all the wrong places, not with the elder son who tries to get love by being good. We can identify with the Father who gives love, rather than with the sons. We can find our identity — our true selves — in the Father and/or the Mother.
“Mother” belongs here, as well. She needs to be spoken. Nouwen says an art critic, noticed something very important while studying the two hands Rembrandt painted on the shoulders of the younger son.
[Gesture to show how the Father places his hands on the kneeling son's back]
One of these hands is identical to a female hand in the portrait of a woman Rembrandt had painted a year or two before this masterpiece. Rembrandt seems to be consciously painting a picture of God, Nouwen, says – of both the feminine and the masculine sides of the Divine.
Back to my question — perhaps your question — as well. How do we get past the elder brothers and sisters and the prodigal sons and daughters in our psyches? How do we stop looking for love in wrong places?
Nouwen gives us a strong suggestion about how we can progress along our paths to become less busy, less tired, less resentful and judgmental:
We must become like God. We must let go of our fear and let the image of God grow in us. We must come home like both sons in the parable — home to dwelling in God. He writes:
Perhaps the most radical statement Jesus ever made is: “Be compassionate as your Father is compassionate. God's compassion is described by Jesus not simply to show me how willing God is to feel for me, or to forgive me my sins and offer me new life — but to invite me to become like God and to show the same compassion to others as he is showing to me.
This is pretty radical. Is it possible that we could become like the Father in the parable and Mother/Father God in the painting? Is it possible we can find in ourselves what Paul calls the Christ within? How is that possible?
Listen to Nouwen's answer:
Grief, forgiveness, and generosity are the three ways by which the image of the Father can grow in me. They are three aspects of the Father's call to BE home. As the Father, I am no longer called to come home as the younger or elder son, but to be there as the one to whom the wayward children can return and be welcomed with joy.
But how do we actually do what Nouwen is suggesting? How is it that generosity, for example, can enable the image of the Father or the Mother to grow in us? I believe one important spiritual discipline is to practice being generous. What you practice you become.
Practicing being generous is a hugely important way of becoming generous becoming like Mother/Father God.
Here's a practical suggestion: An easy way to practice being generous is to listen. We can do it every day. Giving another the gift of your full attention is the height of generosity. You can do it at coffee hour in the next few minutes.
Sit down with someone you don't know. Ask a good question or two, like “what is it that attracts you to Saugatuck.” Then listen generously. Generous listening takes practice. It's a real skill. Invite some of our members and guests to breakfast, one at a time. Spend time listening to someone you don't know at coffee hour.
My hunch is you'll be amazed at the richness you'll find. When you get to know them, Saugatuck members are fascinating people with remarkable faith journeys. As Paul tells members of the Church at Corinth in the scripture passage I didn't read, “You are so rich!” Yes, we are so rich at Saugatuck. God has been so very generous to us.
Holy One we thank you.
Amen.
Frank Basler