March 27, 2022: Sunday Sermon by the Rev. John Kennedy

The Rev. John Kennedy preached at our celebration of the Holy Eucharist on the Fourth Sunday in Lent. To learn more about St. Paul's, visit our website: www.stpauls-church.org Excerpt: Today is Laetare Sunday, the fourth Sunday of Lent. Traditionally, this is a day of celebration that punctuates the austere season of Lent. “Laetare” is Latin for “rejoice.” It is fitting, then, that we have the parable of the Prodigal Son as today’s Gospel, a parable which has been called “The Gospel in miniature.” This story is cause for rejoicing indeed, but, as usual with Jesus, it is not without its challenges. Jesus begins the story: “There was a man who had two sons. The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.’ Jesus’ audience would have been amazed by this. In the ancient Middle East, a man’s property would only be divided among his sons upon his death. But the younger son here is asking for this to happen now, and so his request is basically to wish his father dead. As the writer Tim Keller put it, whose book The Prodigal God provided much of the material for this sermon, the younger son wanted the father’s things but not the father. But what’s perhaps even more amazing than the son’s behavior is the father’s. See, an ancient middle eastern patriarch would have been expected to drive this son out of the house with shouts of condemnation, if not outright violence. But instead: “He divided his property between them.” The Greek word here for “property” is “bios,” which means “that by which life is sustained.” So, the father divided, or tore apart, his life. In this culture, one’s identity was tied to land. If you lost your land, you lost yourself; you lost your status. So, indeed, the younger son is asking his father to tear his life apart. And the father grants this request, and the son sells his inherited land.