Letting go...Moving On

What follow is the sermon that I gave earlier today.  (In a very cold church, I might add, so the "Frozen" reference was very apt!)  Please note that I deleted the full names of people that I know and mention in this sermon and instead put in only initials.  (Thanks for reading!)

Prayer:  

Gracious God, 

Spring is a metaphor for change. Some changes we eagerly await, and others we resist.  Some changes are planned and others arrive uninvited. To all these changes we ask the gift of Your perspective beckoning us toward expectation, hope, and rebirth.

May the sunlight and the rain be reminders that You are at work renewing all of Earth. As a God of Renewal, You are ever at work in our lives, too. Open our eyes and hearts to needed changes in our lives this Spring.   Awaken us to new life and new perspectives... 

Amen.  

New Testament: Luke 15

1 Jesus went on to say, “There was once a man who had two sons. 12 The younger one said to him, ‘Father, give me my share of the property now.’ So the man divided his property between his two sons. 13 After a few days the younger son sold his part of the property and left home with the money. He went to a country far away, where he wasted his money in reckless living. 14 He spent everything he had. Then a severe famine spread over that country, and he was left without a thing. 15 So he went to work for one of the citizens of that country, who sent him out to his farm to take care of the pigs. 16 He wished he could fill himself with the bean pods the pigs ate, but no one gave him anything to eat. 17 At last he came to his senses and said, ‘All my father's hired workers have more than they can eat, and here I am about to starve! 18 I will get up and go to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against God and against you. 19 I am no longer fit to be called your son; treat me as one of your hired workers.”’ 20 So he got up and started back to his father.

“He was still a long way from home when his father saw him; his heart was filled with pity, and he ran, threw his arms around his son, and kissed him.21 ‘Father,’ the son said, ‘I have sinned against God and against you. I am no longer fit to be called your son.’ 22 But the father called to his servants. ‘Hurry!’ he said. ‘Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and shoes on his feet. 23 Then go and get the prize calf and kill it, and let us celebrate with a feast! 24 For this son of mine was dead, but now he is alive; he was lost, but now he has been found.’ And so the feasting began.

25 “In the meantime the older son was out in the field. On his way back, when he came close to the house, he heard the music and dancing. 26 So he called one of the servants and asked him, ‘What's going on?’ 27 ‘Your brother has come back home,’ the servant answered, ‘and your father has killed the prize calf, because he got him back safe and sound.’ 28 The older brother was so angry that he would not go into the house; so his father came out and begged him to come in. 29 But he spoke back to his father, ‘Look, all these years I have worked for you like a slave, and I have never disobeyed your orders. What have you given me? Not even a goat for me to have a feast with my friends!30 But this son of yours wasted all your property on prostitutes, and when he comes back home, you kill the prize calf for him!’ 31 ‘My son,’ the father answered, ‘you are always here with me, and everything I have is yours. 32 But we had to celebrate and be happy, because your brother was dead, but now he is alive; he was lost, but now he has been found.’”

Sermon Letting Go…Moving On

I'm sure you all remember the above parable.  How many times have we heard it before?  Who loved to tell this story?  (Pause...).  Yes, it was one of E's favorite passages.  Did anyone keep a count of how many times he preached on it?  Does anyone remember the first time he gave a sermon on the prodigal son?

I don't remember how many times he preached it or when he first did, but I do remember the exact date when J was ordained.  It was Sunday, September 15th, 1996.  And although I was her session liaison, I was not here that Sunday to see her ordained.  I consider J to be a member of my extended family and yet I wasn't in this church on what must have been one of the most important days in her life.  Why?  Because two days earlier, both she and E had presided over my wedding to Steve Shorten and on that Sunday we were both on our way to sunny Florida for our honeymoon.  So I remember the date, but because I wasn’t here I don’t have a memory of the event like many of you may have.

A was the one who drove us to the airport.  I can't remember any time when A HASN"T driven my family when we needed to go to the airport. I'm sure many of you can say the same. Whenever I think back on our vacations to Florida; they always start out and end with A. How many of your vacation memories begin and end with A being there?

  

Memories are important...both the good and the bad.  The good ones we should treasure and reflect on.  The bad ones we should let go off.  Easier said than done, but why revile in anger? We cannot live in the past; what's gone is gone and what's done is done.  As Princess Elsa says in "Frozen"  "Let it go, let it go. Turn away and slam the door" Don't force me to sing a verse here.   Take a deep breath and let it go.  We cannot dwell on what has come before.  As it says in Isaiah:  Do not cling to events of the past or dwell on what happened long ago.  Watch for the new thing I am going to do.

As a church that's what we always need to do:  we need to let go of the past and move on into the future.  I have said before that the church is about change. Just think for a moment of all the changes Christ's ministry brought about.  Christianity is based on change.  But we can't just talk about change; we need to act upon it. Many times we have acted; many times we have changed because we had to. A prime example is the choir here.  We’ve had to adapt to not having C lead us anymore.  We’ve had to adapt.  We’ve had to adjust. We’ve had to accept change.  Because change comes whether we like it or not and we can chose to move forward with confident anticipation or we can allow ourselves to close ourselves off.  As the Easter hymn “Come Ye Faithful Raise The Strain”, which we just sang just last week says:  God has brought forth Israel into joy from sadness.    God takes us from sorrow to joy; from death to life.  If we allow him, God shows us what joy there is to come, IF we allow ourselves to see it; if we are willing to move forward down the path that Christ has shown us.  But God has given us free will.  The choice is ours.  Which one do you think we should opt for?

It is my opinion, that as a church we can and should remember what is past, but we cannot dwell on what we USED to do or how it's always been done. In order to continue as a church, we need to move forward.  As it said in the first hymn:  "Every day's a resurrection day, the past is over and gone."  Think about this, it's important to remember the events of Good Friday as without Good Friday we cannot have an Easter, but  do we want to focus on that or on what is to come?   Do we dwell in the death of Jesus or rejoice in the resurrection that comes and will come again?  Jesus urged his followers to give up their pasts and follow him; shouldn't we do the same?  The past is past; the resurrection offers us a future.  And that future is one of hope and opportunity.

Now I have to admit that I am not a fan of the prodigal son parable; most likely because I see myself in the role of the older, more responsible son.  But I chose it to make a point and in doing so I found new insight into the tale.  The older son is angry; but his anger resides because he is stuck in the past and cannot see the future.  He does not celebrate the coming home of his brother, but is stuck in the way that it always was. He cannot move forward.  Instead he focuses on the past and what he perceives as always having been.  ‘Look, all these years I have worked for you like a slave, and I have never disobeyed your orders. What have you given me? Not even a goat for me to have a feast with my friends!30 But this son of yours wasted all your property on prostitutes, and when he comes back home, you kill the prize calf for him!’  He clings to what has gone before and will not see what could be. His life is as it always was and he doesn’t even see what might be.  He focuses on the negative past; instead of seeing could be.  In short he kind of comes off as a whiny brat.

As much as I may identify with the older son, I don't want to be a whiny pain, stamping my feet and saying "I've always done this and I've never gotten anything for it."  I've always done it this way and yet I've never gotten a "reward."  Perhaps it is time to change?

Re-reading this passage also made me realize how much I should focus on the father and not the sons.  It is the father who reminds me that we are not lost.  We are found in God's love.  God who is there for us in all times.  God is of our past AND is our future.  As we move forward, we may be unsure of what God has in store for us.  We need to let go of the past.  We need to move on with the confidence that God has great things in store for us.  We need to continue to work together to that future.  With this faith and trust, we can move forward into a future that God guides us to.

As we move forward in faith, we will have to think outside of the box, as it were.  Christ challenges us, as he challenged his disciples.  That’s why as our last hymn today I chose “Joy to the World,” a traditional Christmas hymn.  You might have thought it was a mistake in the bulletin or that perhaps I was a little crazy.  Maybe I am. However, the choir chose to sing one of the verses as after the benediction last Sunday, Easter Sunday.  So maybe we are all a little “off”.  However, I think we are on to something.  Think of the lyrics:   No more let sins and sorrows grow nor thorns infest the ground.  It is time to let  go of the negative.  In this new world of joy that Christ has brought to us with his resurrection there is no time for thorns.  It is time to celebrate the new.  To move forward with hope and anticipation. Joy to the world! The Lord is come let earth receive her King! Joy to the world! The Savior reigns Let men their songs employ while fields and floods, rocks, hills and plains repeat the sounding joy

Why shouldn’t we sing and proclaim our joy this Easter time?  It is time to let go of the dark past and move on to a brighter future.  A future that may be different from what has been before, but we know that God is always at our side.  Let us rejoice today. Christ is risen!  Alleluia!