Photo by Febiyan on Unsplash
Karen Hollis | March 30, 2025 Lent 4
Luke 15: 11b-32 NLT “A man had two sons. The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons. “A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything. “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.”’
“So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.’ “But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began.
“Meanwhile, the older son was in the fields working. When he returned home, he heard music and dancing in the house, and he asked one of the servants what was going on. ‘Your brother is back,’ he was told, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf. We are celebrating because of his safe return. “The older brother was angry and wouldn’t go in. His father came out and begged him, but he replied, ‘All these years I’ve slaved for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to. And in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends. Yet when this son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the fattened calf!’ “His father said to him, ‘Look, dear son, you have always stayed by me, and everything I have is yours. We had to celebrate this happy day. For your brother was dead and has come back to life! He was lost, but now he is found!’”
This is a big story – the Prodigal Son – it’s so deeply resonant that many people have explored and unpacked and prayed with and written about this parable. There are so many threads to pull in this story . . . let us pray and prepare to explore a few of them.
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be reflections of your word to us today, in Christ’s name we pray. Amen
Good God, if it’s the end of the world, tell me it is also a beginning.
Oh, Let your love reveal what is at the heart here for learning.
Family can be tough. When families fracture, it can feel like the end of the world. When your child demands their inheritance and leaves home, so much is lost. Perhaps this parable is so relatable because everyone has a family story, and everyone’s family story – whether it is family of birth or chosen family – winds on through the generations with moments of great celebration and heart, and great crisis and loss.
My family is no different – the foundational story told in my family begins with the 1918 pandemic, which took the life of my great-grandmother. My grandmother was just 11 months old. She was raised by her grandparents and her father, who traveled a lot for work. While all of her physical needs were met, the mother-shaped hole in her never healed. In those days, the family didn’t talk about those who had passed on. They never shared stories or memories, and one was not to ask questions or express grief. So, the hole in my grandmother remained unexamined as she grew . . . the hole was there when she became a mother and tried to give what she had never received. My mother used tell me that if my great-grandmother had lived, grandma would have known how to mother, and everything would have been different.
Our family is many families who somewhere along the way, experienced the tragic loss of a parent . . . and somehow, the family story continues on without them. Families are living systems and therefore dynamic . . . change is always going to happen, whether tragic or planned. Even when the family is in a bit of a state, when sons leave, when relationships are broken, that moment may be marked in memory, but the story never ends there.
In the United Church of Christ, the denomination I grew up in and sister-denomination to the United Church, there is a saying: never place a period where God has placed a comma . . . God is still speaking. Our faith tells us that this is never the end . . . the story of God’s love is always unfolding. In family stories, work stories, relationship stories, we can place a comma, and proclaim in faith that the story is not over, even if the way forward is still a mystery.
I think a lot these days about our family of creation, our global family. We are more consciously connected than we’ve ever been and especially in times like these, we are all in this together, the aching, beautiful, messy, and life-filled bunch we are. I invite us to dip into our collective story this morning as we explore this parable, which opens in a relatable place –a moment of disquiet. The young son has made a terrible request and gone on his way, leaving the family surely stunned and reeling in a kind of in-between space.
We wonder with them how we got here, running the events of the previous years in our minds, looking for clues as to how change brought us here. I wonder about the families (including parts of mine), who struggle to even talk to one another about what’s happening, because of perspectives that seem to only grow further apart. Not wanting to start arguments, we choose our words and topics mindfully.
In this space of disquiet it’s easy to get wrapped up in worry . . . about the implications of unraveling of norms. We might worry about the pain and suffering of people we know and don’t know. We might wonder how we will navigate now broken relationships. We might wonder how to sit day after day with the things we cannot believe are taking place. We might wonder if this can ever be healed.
In this in-between space, it is also natural to grieve. While these moments aren’t written into the parable, we can infer their flavour from our own experience as children, parents, and humans. Moving through the stages of grief, through denial, anger, and so on, we are gifted at the end with clarity about what is. Doesn’t mean we like it or are ok with it, rather we accept reality for what it is.
In this in-between space, we are courageous to hope. Perhaps we still hold on to the tension of hope that is awaiting God’s action. Perhaps, as we hold the tension of hope, we wait, like a father watching for his son . . . holding onto hope as a man who was also once a young son. Perhaps, as we experience an ending, we are also watching in the distance for the promise of a beginning.
Crunchy seasons of change are inevitable, it’s how God’s world works, AND, they can make a way for incredible opportunities for healing. The tension of hope holds the promise that God’s love transforms all things. Perhaps the father holds the tension of hope, and when his son appears in the distance, the release of tension propels him into a run.
Even as the reunion celebration ensues, the story does not end all tied up neatly in a bow. In the midst of healing and reconciliation, there is yet another layer of hurt coming to the surface and an older son just beginning his own journey of truth and healing. Many have wondered what becomes of him, whether he will eventually find his way to the table . . . and by what path. The story ends with a comma, an affirmation that there is always more to come in God’s story.
We pray in faith this morning that in the ending we currently experience, there is also a beginning. We pray that in the events of these days is a pathway God is creating for this generation to actualize more of God’s story of love.
Let’s prepare to move now into open space. There are candles to be lit, rocks and water, I have copies of this morning’s text if you feel moved to write a continuation of the story. I’ll be in front with oil, anointing for healing. There are questions up on the screen. You can also sit and listen to Gloria play. When you’re done moving around the space, you’re invited to return to your seat for reflection.
Open Space Questions:
Which character(s) do you resonate with? Why?
What is your relationship with endings and beginnings?
In which story in your life might you remove a period and put a comma?
8 min, this time is yours.