The Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost - The Rev. Lauren Flowers Byrd

 

The Fourteenth Sunday AFTER Pentecost

The Rev. Lauren Flowers Byrd

Luke 15:1-10

the Lost

“Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to Jesus. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, ‘This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.’" (Luke 15: 1-3)

You may be seated.

I am grateful this morning both for the Reverend Colette’s invitation to preach and for the warmth of your welcome. Russell and I have a plant the parish sent to us back in late June, I believe, as a welcome. And when it landed on our doorstep, it had one little leaf, and I’m here to tell you, it now has three large leaves with a fourth curled up soon to unfold.

You and I grow from the welcome of others.

Be forewarned, though: I’m a little lost these days, a sinner, not sure where I am or what I’m up to. Plus, I’m always a threat to lose things, both big things and little things. Just last week I lost my purse. For three whole days, I couldn’t find it.

I looked everywhere for it. Multiple times. And then one morning, it hit me: What about the washing machine? 

I remembered how just other day I was tidying things up, gathering laundry that needed washing along with an assortment of other things around the house. And, sure enough, when I looked down into the depths of our washing machine and started pulling up the wet clothes, I heard the clink of a lost coin quickly followed by the echoing clink of a loose key, and there at the bottom was my wet purse, and under it my wet wallet still holding on to my debit card.

All that to say, I understand people who lose things or have lost their way. They are my kind of people.

According to St. Luke, though, there are plenty of folks who don’t feel that way at all. In Luke’s telling, the Pharisees and scribes grumble when Jesus “welcomes sinners and eats with them.” They’re offended. Apparently, to their dismay, when sinners draw near to Jesus, he up and spreads a table before them in the presence of those who would trouble them.

That reality frames all that follows in our reading, and marks who was there on that day when Jesus began to teach in parables one after another. Though today we meet up with only two of those parables, the truth is that day Jesus told four in a row: a whole series! shared while feasting with sinners, within eyesight of others unwilling to join them.

And lucky for me, three of those four parables are about losing things: the lost sheep, the lost coin, the lost son, also called “The Prodigal Son.”  Those parables of loss were meant to be read all at once. Each of them begins with trouble and then lifts toward a sudden, unearned, inbreaking joy. To my mind, those stories name the hard ground of feeling lost and the reality, too, that we are unable to know joy on our own — unable to find ourselves on our own.

Very likely, we mostly remember the parables themselves and overlook the dramatic frame that shapes them. By that, I mean we forget how Jesus told those stories in the presence of sinners who drew near to him and outstanding others who were offended and decided to keep their distance.

Richard Rohr once suggested you can tell how distant you are from God’s will by how often you’re offended. I think he’s right about that. Like blame, taking chronic offense hardens the heart and lands you outside the fellowship of others, at a distance from God and from other people. It lands you among the truly lost.

Those long-ago offended bystanders apparently never found their way to the feast. St. Luke returns to them right after Jesus brings his series of parables to an end, saying, “[They heard what Jesus said] and ridiculed him. So he said to them, ‘You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of others; but God knows your hearts; for what is prized by human beings is an abomination in the sight of God.’”

When we’re offended by others, it’s easy to overlook our own offenses — our own sinfulness. It’s a terrible temptation because for a while taking offense makes us feel elevated, empowered, righteous. Plus, it’s all too easy to think knowing the worst about other people is all we need to know about them. It isn’t. For instance, you can know how often I failed as a mother. But that won’t tell you how much I loved and love my children.

And this applies to our own self-estimation. Some of us stand outside ourselves and shuffle through our many failures with self-loathing. And that, too, is an inadequate grumbling measure. We are sinners, yes: sinners graced with an abundance of gifts. And only God knows what really lives in our heart of hearts.  

We live in a world seemingly on fire, riddled with chronic offense and division: a world in need of kindness, patience, hope, mercy, justice, truth, sacrifice. And the truth is we are called to respond to that need by sharing the saving love of God with other people. We are sent out by way of our Baptism to serve the lost. And we are nourished for that service in the feast of Holy Communion.

As the Body of Christ, we are the creatures of God sent into the world to share the light of Christ. 

Yes, we are indeed sinners in God’s sight. It’s the reality of belonging to the human family. And that shared awareness is healthy. It reminds us that we are not enough in and of ourselves. We need God to see us through, and we need companions alongside us, keeping the feast of Christ in a world in need of salvation.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. AMEN.