Community Church Sermons
September 28, 2008
Pentecost
20
Matthew 21:28-32
Whenever I read the parable of the two sons, I remember a time growing up. It was a cold winter morning, and my mother’s voice from the bottom of the stairs called us children to get up. It was morning. Time to get ready for school. Breakfast was on the table.
I could hear the sounds of my sister and brother responding to the wake-up call. But I – well, I was having SUCH a nice dream about Maryann Sullivan, my grammar school heart-throb, and it was warm there in my bed – so I rolled over and drifted back to sleep.
My mother did not give up, though. In a while, she again came to the bottom of the stairs and shouted toward my second floor bedroom, “Butch! It’s time to get up! Your breakfast is getting cold!”
“Okay…” I muttered, listening all the while for my mother’s footsteps to walk away. And when they did, I pulled the covers up over my head and went back to meet Maryann in dreamland.
But she was relentless, my mother was. “It’s almost 8 o’clock. You’re going to be late. Now get up and get going!”
“I AM, Ma! I’m getting dressed!”
But, of course, I wasn’t. I cupped the pillow around my head to drown out all other sounds, and tried to recapture the dream. Maryann and I were in a meadow full of daisies and we saw each other from a distance and started running toward each other – in slow motion – and finally we met – and Maryann reached out her hands to me – AND PULLED ME OUT OF BED! Maryann had somehow suddenly turned into my father who shouted, “YOUR MOTHER SAID TO GET UP! NOW GET UP”
Yes, siree!
So whenever I encounter this parable, I see myself in the son who said he would get up and go to work but didn’t. And I see myself in the son, who didn’t want to go work in the vineyard, but for some reason changed his mind, and eventually did.
Can you see yourself in these two kids?
Part of the genius of Jesus is his ability to understand human nature. And as a brilliant observer of people-as-we-are, Jesus uses stories like this one not to accuse us, but to teach us how to become better people and live better, happier lives. So the question before us today is not, “Which kind of person are you – the kind that says you won’t, but do – or the kind that says you will, but don’t?” No, that’s not the point of the story. And besides, if you are like me, there’s a little of both those kinds of kids in you.
I think the key verse in this parable – and a real key to successful living – is found at the end of verse 29: “I will not,” the son answered, “but later he changed his mind and went.”
He changed his mind.
Following Jesus Christ requires us to change our minds. You and I, as we grow, are indoctrinated into ways of thinking that are not helpful to us, to others, or to God. And part of growing as a Christian is being able to step back and think about some of these ideas through the filter of Jesus Christ.
I grew up in a neighborhood that was predominantly Roman Catholic. I think I’ve told you before that one of my favorite things to do back then was to sit with the Catholic kids under the maple tree in our front yard to help them make up sins to bring to confession. And we came up with some doozies. Some of those kids are STILL doing penance!
Now I was a Protestant and proud of it. And I just couldn’t understand the Catholic thing at all. Go to confession? Not eat meat on Friday? Never go into a Protestant church even to play basketball in the gym because lightning will strike and you’ll go to hell? I wasn’t anti-Catholic. I just couldn’t figure out why anyone would want to BE Catholic.
Until I fell in love with Maryann Sullivan – you know, the girl of my winter morning dreams! Somehow, Maryann made me forget all about the Catholic stuff I couldn’t figure out. I would be willing to convert to Catholicism for her! I would be willing to become a priest, although on second thought I realize THAT wouldn’t have worked. Somehow, in the throes of infatuated adolescent hormonal ecstasy of this relationship with Maryann…I changed my mind.
Just like that first son in Matthew 21 changed his mind.
This is how life is! We may grow up with all sorts of ideas, attitudes, and a definite sense of how the world should be ordered, but sooner or later, we’re going to have to change our minds.
In fact, this little story about my boyhood love life – which was much more in my MIND than in REALITY – is a parable in itself because, you see, it was in coming to know and love someone who was different than me…that my mind about Catholics and Catholicism was changed.
David and Beverly had to change their minds about gay people when their own son came out of the closet. Bev told me that she had always looked with scorn upon other parents whose kids were gay. She said she thought the parents must have messed up – maybe didn’t get the kids involved in sports and other “more manly” things. But when her own son came out, Bev had to change her mind. About a lot of things.
Isn’t this true of you? You start life with a certain set of ideas – rules – guidelines – principles – values – but as you experience more and more of life you soon discover that some of them need to be reexamined. And sometimes, you have to change your mind!
So the question becomes, “Is there something that can guide us as we face the challenge of growing up into a world that oftentimes does not fit our predetermined categories?”
In this passage, Jesus offers us some help.
His listeners, of course, are well able to figure out which of the two sons eventually obeyed the father. And with that, Jesus gets to the heart of the matter. He compares the first son to the tax collectors and prostitutes following him who – though they started out in the wrong direction – turned around. And he compares the second son to the religious crowd of the day who cling to their oldtime religion but are missing out on the kingdom of God.
And this is what makes the difference, Jesus says: “For John came to show you the way of righteousness and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and prostitutes did.”
Do you remember that wonderful prologue in the first chapter of John? “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was…?(with God), and the Word…(was God).” See, you know it by heart! And a few verses later it says, “There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He was not the Light, but came to bear witness to the Light. The true Light that enlightens humankind was coming into the world.”
The way of righteousness – the Light that illumines the way for us according to John - is Jesus Christ.
What was it that tax collectors found in Jesus? What was it that prostitutes found in Jesus? What is it that YOU have found in Jesus?
Unconditional love. Mercy. Forgiveness. Acceptance. And a calling – to love your neighbor as yourself.
And that’s what you and I have to change our minds about!
Why did the first son change his mind? Because he decided it was more important to love his father and do what was right than to roll over and go back to sleep.
Why did the second one refuse to go? Because he chose to put himself first.
I was at a restaurant a little while ago and I witnessed a group of people at a table where things had obviously not gone well and one of the people at the table was taking it out on the waitress. She was just about in tears. And I found myself wondering why someone would do that. Oh, sure, sometimes you need to point out where someone’s work or service is not satisfactory, but you don’t have to be cruel or mean about it. What that person was expressing would accomplish no good purpose other than to make the poor kid feel bad. And I found myself wondering whether that conversation arose out of that person’s love for neighbor, or love for self?
The one son changed his mind. The other did not.
Following Jesus requires us to change our minds about a lot of things: Jesus shows us that our families are more important than our careers – that forgiveness and reconciliation are more important than animosity and resentment – that it is better to give than to receive – that welcoming the stranger is better than building walls along borders – that it is far better to use your words to build up people than to tear down people whether face-to-face or behind their back – that God loves people of other races, religions, and backgrounds just as much as God loves us – and that we have far more in common with those who are different than we realize.
Christianity is a religion of second-thoughts provoked by the Good News of Jesus Christ.
You know, every Sunday all across the world, people go to church. And at the end of our worship services we make commitments of our lives. Sometimes it happens in the form of an altar call, or a baptism, or just a unison prayer of dedication like the one we use.
Every week we live this parable! Our Father comes to us and asks us to go work in the vineyard.
Some say, “Yes!” to God, but then roll over and go back to sleep. I know I do that a lot!
Others struggle with what God wants us to do, and we say, “No.” I do that a lot too!
But when we bring Jesus and all he means to us, and stands for, and teaches about healthy, successful living into the center of our lives, we cannot help but have second thoughts…
And then, like the first son, we can change our minds!