The Prodigal Son

I spoke in the pulpit this past Sunday.  Now before you go thinking I’m making a move to a new field, it was as a spokesperson for the committee I’m on at Highland Park United Methodist Church.  The committee is called the Violence Intervention and Prevention Committee, also known as VIP.

Anyway, VIP is doing a drive to collect diapers and snacks for our kids at Community Partners of Dallas for the next few weeks, so I got to do the pulpit announcement in the sanctuary.  At all three services.  So I enjoyed the service – several times.

Now speaking from the pulpit is another blog altogether – yes, you do notice who is asleep and who is picking their nose – but that is not what this post is about. 

The scripture verse for the day was from Luke 15: 11-24 – the Prodigal Son story.  I imagine that most of us know the story:  Boy asks dad for his inheritance, gets it, spends it all on riotous living, returns home broke, and dad takes him back.  Just like God does for all of our sins, the father in the story forgives his son.  My favorite line is when the son is filled with shame and walking to home his father sees him:

But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him.

The father tells everyone to prepare a big party and kill “the fatted calf” (aka Al Biernat’s prime NY cut meat – yum) and says:

…let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!”

Of course Mark Craig did a great sermon on grace from this – I’m sure you can listen to it by visiting www.hpumc.org – and I promise that I was not day dreaming during your sermon, Mark – but it did get me thinking about how much most parents love their kids.  They can forgive anything, sacrifice their own happiness, toil all day to make a living, etc. – all for their kids.

But of course, there are parents who don’t do this for their kids.  They do the opposite.  Why do some kids get dads like the one the Prodigal Son has and some get the opposite?

I don’t know the answer, but I do pray that the kids who don’t have those dads find someone else to emulate or the cycle will continue.  We live what we learned.

Throwing Away the Negative

Recently Mark Craig gave a sermon that I keep thinking about.

Mark is the Senior Minister at Highland Park United Methodist Church and when he first started working for HPUMC in 1995, he came into the job knowing that many of his friends and colleagues had wanted the job that he ended up getting.  He also was told that he was not the first choice.  He also knew that he was coming into a congregation that had enjoyed a long-time well-loved minister.

So, here Mark was – starting a job that is considered one of the “plum” jobs in Methodism – but he certainly wasn’t feeling the love.  You might expect that friends and colleagues would have sent congratulatory notes and cards, but no.  Instead he got a letter signed by several people asking for his removal. 

His only letter of congratulations came from someone he didn’t even know, someone from another faith.  It was from Dr. W.A. Criswell, the leader of First Baptist downtown – and one of the most important leaders of Christianity in the country.  Mark still has that letter.

Mark went on to say that he learned something from that experience.  First, that he keeps a folder of nice and encouraging letters that he can pull out whenever he likes.  Second, that when presented with something negative, he deals with it, and then throws it away.

When I heard Mark give this sermon it really hit me.  It hit me because I tend to do the opposite.  Yes, I’m a positive people person who loves to laugh, but I don’t have a folder of encouraging notes and cards (although I am lucky enough to have been the recipient of some).  I have a folder of doomsday articles from The Dallas Morning News and others about the state of the economy, why charitable giving is down, and stuff like that.  It also includes some emails that were written about me by fired employees – written after they knew that they were going to be fired, so as you might imagine, the emails are not flattering!  This is the crap I have been keeping – not the good.

I am confessing this to you to be held accountable.  I’m throwing away the negative and starting afresh.  Keeping the positive, the encouraging, the kind, the good. 

Will you join me?  And if so, will you send me a note for my folder?  I’ll return the favor.

My thoughts on 9-11

I was in church on Sunday, 9-11.  The ten year anniversary of the tragedy.  Some people said they weren’t going to church that morning because they were afraid that our church might be a target.  
 

NOTE:  If you have to get bombed (not the drinking kind, but the terrorist kind), where better to be than in church, I ask you?

But my mom and I went right on over to HPUMC to the main sanctuary for the 9:30 service.  I ushered – even got to do the collection in the main aisle (for those of you who don’t know, this is prime real estate in the ushering game), took off my carnation and nametag, then found my seat next to mom in our regular seats.

NOTE:  Why do regulars always want to sit in the same spot at church?  Does it have something to with assigned seats in elementary school?  Some people really get their bibles in a wad when someone new is in “their” seat.  Remember, I’m an usher, so I am an expert in all things ush. 

While I was sitting there I started to think about what I would do if the church did get bombed right then.  In the pew in front of us was a small family – mom, dad, and 2 little kids, one boy about 5 and one girl about 3.  Mom and I had already punched each other and remarked about how cute they were, etc.  Anyway, I just knew that if the church was bombed right then, even though my mom was sitting next to me, I would have tried to protect those children.  Covered them and their parents with my body.  Tried to help them out first. 

You know.  You would have done it too, unless you needed to protect your own kids.

Contrast this with the 22 year old mom whose two year old daughter Joselyn was on life support this past week.  On Friday, The Dallas Morning News reported that the little girl’s mother had kicked her in the stomach, hit her with a milk jug, and glued her hands to the wall.  The police record stated that “Glue and paint were stuck to the palms of the hand with skin torn away where the glue is absent.”

How does this happen?  Why would most people I know protect an unknown child over their own life, but Joselyn’s own mother did what she did to her own precious child? 

I don’t have the answers.

When we got in the car to drive home, I told mom what I had been thinking and she said that she had gone through the same exercise that I had in her mind – if the bomb had hit, she was going to stay put in the pew, pray, and let everyone else out first.

And I think I have my answer.

P.S.  Mark Craig, if you are reading this, please know that our minds wandering had nothing to do with your sermon.  You rocked.

P.P.S.  Joselyn was released from the hospital this afternoon!  Read about it here:  http://www.myfoxdfw.com/dpp/news/091411-beaten-toddler-released-from-hospital