March 31, 2022

Last Sunday we dwelled in the gospel reading (Luke 15) together, listening closely and trusting that God was speaking to us through scripture.

As we shared the words and phrases that stood out to us in the text, a few of them that came to mind centered on the actions of the father. When asked to give the younger son inheritance, he does. He runs to meet the younger son upon his return. He comes out to plead with the older son and delivers the beautiful line to that older son, “You are always with me and all that is mine is yours.”

Another thing the father does at multiple points throughout the parable is remind his sons who and whose they are. He gives the one son his inheritance because it’s his already – he is his father’s son. He places on him a robe, ring, and sandals clothing him as his son even when that son felt unworthy to be called his father’s child. He reminds the older son that he, too, belongs to the family when that son refused to claim his brother as his brother and was identifying himself as his father’s servant rather than his father’s beloved child.

The grace of God is so unbelievably good that we have trouble believing it. 
The younger son considers his actions as having made him unworthy of of his father’s love. When we fall short of the calling we have in Christ and fail to reflect and live God’s love in the world, we can be quick to designate ourselves as unworthy of being a beloved child of God.
The older son considers his actions as having made him more worthy than others of God’s love and is angry, defensive, and incredulous that his father would show the same love and generosity and forgiveness to the one he cannot even bring himself to call brother. When we convince ourselves that it is our works and merit that are earning God’s grace and that we are more worthy of God’s love and our identity as God’s beloved child than others, we too can get offended when someone else experiences the infinite love of God.

In both cases, we are apt to feel like we don’t belong. Like we aren’t part of the family. Either like we aren’t worthy of a party or we never had one for us and in both situations we don’t trust that we belong, that we’re God’s beloved children.

As we head to the end of Lent and look toward the cross and the empty tomb, the ultimate reminders and examples of God’s free and extravagant love for the whole world that names us and claims us as beloved children not because of who we are but because that’s who God is – love, let us cultivate our sense of belonging.

How?
Perhaps by beginning each day with an assumption that we belong. 
Maybe it’s meditating on the words of the father in the parable, “My child, you are always with me and all that is mine is yours.”
What if every morning you spoke aloud to yourself, “I am a beloved child of God,” and wrote down, “I belong. I’m already at the party. God has called me God’s child.”

Because it is then that we might as the church – the body of Christ – live God’s love and cultivate in others a sense of deep belonging and belovedness.
How?
Perhaps you take up the habit of saying in your head each time you see someone, “This is a beloved child of God.” or “This is my sibling.”
Maybe we return to and reflect upon that lesson from the story of Cain and Abel and how we are indeed meant to be our sibling’s keeper.
We dare to listen to others about what gets in the way of them feeling like they belong and we work to change and let go of those things.
We celebrate when others find the joy of their identity as beloved.

It’s easy to compare and to be upset when others receive joy and celebration of their belovedness and find out the truth that they do, in fact belong, despite being shown and told for years they are unworthy because of who they are or what they have done. Because we fear it means we no longer belong.
Can we dare to let go of fears like, “If we create a sense of belonging for LGBTQ+ persons does that mean our church will only be for queer people?” or “If we let people dare to ask their big God questions, will our church only be for those who have doubt and questions?” or “If we embrace people struggling with their mental health, will we be incapable of embracing those who are not struggling?”

Our call is to love with the same love God shows us. 
Love makes space and creates belonging.
Love runs out to where you are and doesn’t wait for you to make it to the gates.
Love clothes you and throws a party for you.
Love reminds you that you are a beloved child of God and then reminds you that so is everyone else – even the one you don’t want to look at or think about is your sibling and shares in God’s great inheritance.

Because you cannot divide infinity. And God’s love is infinite.
And it is not your own actions or inactions that make you worthy of being a beloved child of God, nor is it any part of your identity – ethnicity, skin color, language, orientation, gender. Rather, it is God in Christ who makes us beloved children and gives us a share of the inheritance. When others wake up to their identity as a beloved child of God 

Blessings,
Pastor Drew