We’re steeped in a model of scarcity. The idea that something is scarce begins from a place of limits. There’s only so much of something to go around – time, money, water, food, land, hours of work to be divvied among employees, etc.
In this mode of scarcity, for someone or some group to get more means there is less to go around, and potentially less for me, or for you.
In last Sunday’s gospel text, Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32, Jesus tells a parable of a man with two sons. The beginning of the parable is filled with division and waste. Division: the younger son asks the father to divide his estate, the father divides it and gives the younger son what he asks for; the family is divided as one son leaves; another layer of division is added as the younger son goes to a foreign land. Waste: The younger son wastes and squanders what he is given; the father, in turn, seems to have wasted the portion of the estate he gave.
The older brother, like many of us may, as familiar with the concept of scarcity as we are, views everything that takes place through this lens. What the father gives is limited, there’s only so much to go around, how can he waste it? There are only so many resources with which to throw a party, how come he gets so much when he has already gotten (and wasted) so much?
The father’s response to the older brother confounds and frustrates those of us bound up in an economy of scarcity, “Son, you are always with me and all that is mine is yours.”
I am tempted to yell back, “No it isn’t! All the things you gave and are giving to your other son aren’t mine. All the things he’s wasted aren’t mine.”
But you cannot divide infinity.
That is to say that God operates in an economy of abundance. The creative source of everything always has more. When God gives love away, when God offers boatloads of grace, there’s no less to keep offering. When your brother or sister receive the grace and love and the very presence of God, even if they “squander” it, there is no less for you or for them.
Because you cannot divide infinity and God is infinite love, grace, and mercy.
“The Lord, the Lord gracious and merciful, abounding in steadfast love.”
God’s economics deal in abundance and infinity, not scarcity.
So for you and for me and for everyone we like and everyone we’d rather not encounter, God has grace, love, and mercy without end.
And that’s something worth celebrating.
Find an image of a cross near you – it could be a picture on your computer/phone, maybe jewelry, perhaps just two lines meeting on the sidewalk.
Let this be a reminder to you of the open arms of Christ that continually offer forgiveness. Let it be a symbol of how God’s grace and love stretch on into infinity in every direction. Let it proclaim to you, and you proclaim to others, that Christ keeps on bringing life and love abundant and everlasting for the whole world, even when we squander it or when we cannot comprehend it or when it frustrates the daylights out of us.
Come to dinner (5:30pm) and worship (6:15pm) tonight as we discern and discuss what it looks like in our lives to serve all people, following the example of Jesus, which is one of our promises in baptism.
God’s grace and love for you name you beloved, remind you that you are enough, and bring you into new life.
Pastor Drew
0 Comments