March 31, 2019: 4th Sunday Lent C

March 31, 2019 4th Sunday Lent C

(Audio Homily) https://oembed.libsyn.com/embed?item_id=9220799

Mary Hudson is a gifted preacher and a mentor to many Christian women. But she’s also the mother of Katy (Hudson) Perry--one of the most famous pop singers in the world. When Mary was pregnant with Katy, a minister prophesied that her child would stand before kings and presidents. As a young girl, Katy wrote worship songs and performed them in church. People in church would weep when Katy sang. However, Katy abandoned her Christian faith and scandalized her parents with her provocative and shocking music videos. Christians would ask Mary and her minister husband Keith, “How could you have a daughter like that?” Despite criticisms, Mary and Keith have chosen to love Katy no matter what. They stay in close contact with her, and Mary sometimes takes calls in the middle of the night from Katy because of her non-stop concert schedule. Mary advises other parents with children who have left their Christian faith behind. She believes unconditional love and support is essential—not judgment, anger or estrangement. “It’s only the love of God that will bring them back,” she says. “Don’t cut them off. You have to rise above your feelings. You must stay in communication.” In Katy’s parents’ unconditional love for her, we see a glimpse of the Heavenly Father’s merciful love that is revealed in the Parable of the Prodigal Son. 

In today’s Gospel, the Pharisees and the scribes resented Jesus for welcoming tax collectors and sinners to his circle. In their beliefs, such sinners would be shunned and cast out. In response to their resentment, Jesus uses a parable to teach of God’s love and mercy. While the Pharisees and the scribes imagine God to be stern and ready to punish, Jesus revealed God as a merciful father who waits patiently for the return of his wayward children. 

This well-known story of the Prodigal Son reminds us to ponder how we see God and how God longs for us. One saint said, “Human life is in some way a constant returning to our Father’s house...the story of the prodigal son repeats itself in our lives.” Who of us here has not experienced some kind of discontent in our lives--discontent about our vocation, marriage, spouse, children, career, our possessions--and even thought about running away from it all. Something “out there” seemed more attractive to us, so beautiful, so new, and so different from the ordinary and familiar. The Prodigal Son was tempted by such luring thoughts, yet learned the hard lesson that in the end there was no joy, no light, no peace, and no love outside of the Father’s love.  

The Prodigal Son had a great yearning--a yearning I call a thirst for love. Everyone thirsts--thirst to love and to be loved. Everyone goes in search for love, and in that search, people wander away and sin, separating themselves from the very source that can quench that thirst. Someone beautifully wrote, “The one who seeks only human love to quench his or her thirst will be thirsty always, for mere human love, especially when it is sought selfishly or sinfully, can never satisfy the depths of the human heart. But those who seek love in God will never lack, will never be empty, and will never thirst in vain.”  At times we feel stuck, stifled, and bound--in other words, thirsty. That thirst is quenched when we experience reconciliation with our God of mercy. This thirst for God’s love is a window to understand another person’s thirst to be loved. 

The older son representing the Pharisees and the scribes did not understand the younger son’s thirst, therefore he did not understand his own father’s merciful love. Merciful love has nothing to do with giving someone what they deserve; rather, merciful love is offering to another person what they do not deserve. Perhaps Mother Teresa’s words would illustrate this point, “Our aim is to satiate the infinite thirst of God, not just for a glass of water, but for souls. Souls are immortal, precious to God.” Both the Prodigal Son and his older brother needed conversion. The younger son needed to turn away from worldly delights and refocus his relationship with his father; the older son needed to realize that it wasn’t his perfection that earned his father’s love. In reality both sons were utterly poor--they were clothed, housed, and fed by their father’s generosity and love. The younger son came to his realization of his poverty through his own sinful mistakes. The older son is not there yet, but his father still hopes. 

A young woman named Charlotte Elliott put into beautiful poetry our poverty before God and how God’s mercy clothes us. Although she grew up in a deeply religious family, she abandoned her faith and enjoyed a secular life on her own terms, becoming a popular socialite. At age 33, a debilitating illness forced her to hit bottom and was isolated from her friends. A visiting minister stopped by her home and asked Charlotte if she was at peace with God. Resenting such question, she refused to talk to him. A little later, she apologized and asked him to return. She asked him what must she do to cleanse her life before becoming a Christian. The minister answered, “Come just as you are!” On that day, she committed her life to Christ. Those of us here in church may not be a Katy Perry, a Prodigal Son, or Charlotte Elliott. But we must realize that whatever our relationship with the Father, there is always a room for growth in understanding Father’s merciful love. We may be too prideful to admit that our faults are hurting others; or we are trapped by feelings of unworthiness and shame when we do not allow God to forgive us. We learn from the story of the Prodigal Son that we must take courage to return to the Father, just as we are. Listen to Charlotte’s moving poetry in the following hymn:

Just as I am, without one plea,

But that Thy blood was shed for me,

And that Thou bid'st me come to Thee,

O Lamb of God, I come! I come!

Just as I am, though tossed about

With many a conflict, many a doubt;

Fightings and fears within without,

O Lamb of God, I come, I come!

Just as I am, Thou wilt receive,

Wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve;

Because Thy promise I believe,

O Lamb of God, I come, I come