Grace and peace
are already ours for we belong to the family of Jesus the Christ. A description
that I like best about the bible: it is
a book of sacred stories. We will consider briefly three stories from Luke
Ch.15 and examine its mystery. What is a mystery? According to Webster dictionary,
a mystery is something incomprehensible by nature. Any event concealed or
unexplained, if it evokes excitement, awe and curiosity, it is a mystery. We
have seen mystery movies. We have read mystery novels. We have enjoyed mystery meals.
We have received mystery gifts. I am asking you today as to why we can’t
conceive God as a mystery. Whenever I receive an e-mail from your Pastor she
would say at the end, “may the force be
with you”. I thought about that
expression many times ever since I came to Fairport. We have been conditioned
to think of God in an anthropomorphic way; God as a caring, loving and a giving
person. Here is a reference to a saint and a sage from the Indian subcontinent
by the name Tagore who conceives God as a mystery. Tagore received the Nobel
Prize for English literature about 65 years ago.
He said when the leaf smiles it becomes a flower and when the flower worships it becomes a fruit. Tagore didn’t need the
botanical terms of germination and cross pollination to explain how God is at
work. Another well-known mystery novelist of our time was Agatha Christy, who wrote
some great stories on British crimes and she died about 50 years ago. Her
second husband was an archeologist by the name Sir Lord Mallowan. When someone asked her what it was like being
married to an archeologist she responded “it’s wonderful for the older I get
the more interested he is in me”.
In the story of
the shepherd and his flock of 100 sheep, after the whole day of wandering the
valleys and the mountains suddenly he realized there was a missing sheep. So he
took a big risk left behind the 99 and ran tirelessly and searched in every
nook and cranny. On finding the staggering and the stranded sheep, he
celebrated the event with a party. What a mystery it is for a shepherd risking
his life and searching for a dumb sheep. Sheep by nature are prone to get lost
no matter where they are. And so are we. The Psalmist says (Psalm 8) we are
made a little lower than God and crowned with glory and honor. What has
happened to our glorious status? Perhaps day by day and year by year we are
losing it. Have we made our marvelous world a mess? The number of homicides and
genocides and suicides are ever on the increase. When I go to bed in the night
I hope and pray that a war will not erupt in the morrow.
Whether Iran or
Syria, what affects one country in the world affects all of us. Our population
of this country is only about 3% of that of the entire world. It is a very
insignificant number in proportion. The prison population however is about 20%
of the prison population of the entire world. And that number is incredible.
Friends! Human beings no matter where they are have a tendency to get lost all
the time. I have already said God is a mystery and now I say any search,
especially God’s search for the lost is a mystery.
Dr. Luke in this story is inviting my
attention to appreciate a smelly shepherded. This shepherd has a divine loving
nature. This shepherd did not belong to the cream of the society in Israel. His
name never appeared on the headlines of the Jerusalem post. He was a
marginalized working class poor man. What stands out of this shepherd is that
he never gave up on searching for a lost sheep.
Twenty
years ago I watched a TV interview between Barbra Walters and Maya Angelo. At
some point in the interview Barbra asked that nationally known poet and
Professor: Aren’t you a Christian? And she replied “I’m taken aback when people
walk up to me and tell me they are Christians. My first response is “Already”?
It seems to me a lifelong endeavor to try to live the life of a Christian. It
is in the search itself that one find ecstasy”. Any search is a mystery.
Now in the
story of the woman, her loss could be a piece of jewelry from a necklace that
her husband gave her at marriage. In that culture the loss of that coin was
significant enough to feel one’s demoralization. In her case her dignity and
her worth are all under question now. She needs to find that coin as soon as
possible. In order to regain respectability she must wear that necklace again.
So she sweeps the house, lights the lamp and dispels the darkness. On finding
that missing piece she invites the whole community for a party. As a second
class human being in that ancient patriarchal Jewish society this celebration
is important to her for with that lost coin she has gone through shame and humiliation.
The prodigal
son’s story is the third one in this chapter. Friends in all the three stories
there is a reference to joy in heaven or joy in the presence of the angels of
the Lord over the repentant sinner. After four decades of studying and
reflecting on the words of the gospels and the teachings of Jesus I can tell
you now, Jesus came not to tell us who is going to heaven and who is going to
hell, but rather to open us to the possibilities of experiencing the abundant
life here on earth. We are earthly bound human beings but we seem to have a
heavenly bound focus. There is a hymn by Fredrick Faber which should bring home
my point. There is wideness in God’s
mercy like the wideness of the sea; there is a kindness of God’s justice which
is more than liberty. (No.121)
Someone said that
one of the most tragic sentences in English literature is that they lived
happily ever after. I started my message with a reference to an Indian poet
Tagore and I want to conclude this with a reference to an Indian born English
poet. In the last verse of Rudyard Kipling’s poem “The Prodigal Son”, the younger son leaves home again with utter
disappointment. And listen to the words
of the poet:
“I am leaving Pater.
Good bye to you!
God bless you mother,
I will write to you..
I wouldn’t be
impolite to you,
but, Brother, you
are a hound!” Amen!
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