Monthly Archives: March 2025

Are You Going to the Party?

by

A Sermon for the Locust Grove United Church of Christ of York, PA

by Rev. James Eaton, Interim Pastor ©2025

Fourth Sunday in Lent/C • March 30, 2025

Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32

“A man had two sons…” I know you are all Biblically literate so I know that just this simple phrase has already set your teeth on edge. I’m sure you are already bracing for the rest of the story. Because we know what happens in the Bible with stories that begin this way. Adam had two sons: Abel and Cain, and Cain killed his brother. Abraham had two sons, Isaac and Ishmael, and the rivalry between them is used to explain the millennia long conflict that in our time is represented by Israelis and Palestinians. Isaac had two sons, Esau and Jacob and Jacob stole his brother’s birthright. King David had two sons who were rivals, Amnon and Absalom, and the result was a civil war that almost destroyed the kingdom. 

“A man had two sons.” Think how Jesus’ listeners, who knew all these stories, for whom these were family stories, must have heard these words. Think how they must have cringed. “A man had two sons.” I know you’ve heard this story before; today I want to ask you to set aside everything you know about it, everything you’ve heard, and try, like someone who has just cleaned their glasses, to see it in a new light.

“A man had two sons.” The older one is a lot like his father, must have learned from his father, as farm kids do, all the skills and patience of sowing, caring, reaping, up at dawn to feed the animals, working by lamp light when the harvest has to be gotten in. He’s grown into a sold man by the time of this story, I’m sure his father is proud, I’m sure he’s beginning to take his place in the community. He never disobeyed his father, he never asked for anything, he just worked like a slave on the farm day in and day out.

“A man had two sons.” The younger one; what shall we say about him? He isn’t any of those things I just mentioned. I think of him never quite getting farm work, never wanting to do it, avoiding it whenever he can, growing up with the farm asi a burden threatened to press the life out of him. I think of him always wanting to go to the city, eagerly listening to stories from travelers, imagining a day when he himself would see the sights.

You know what happened. As soon as he was old enough, he went to his father and asked for his share of the inheritance. You may have heard that this was treating his father like he was dead but the father doesn’t object; he sells some property and gives his son the money and the younger son takes off for the city, where he squanders all of it in dissolute living. I’m going to pause just a moment for you to imagine that. Ok, that’s enough, a little dissolute living goes a long way. Once the money’s gone, of course, he has to find work and he works for a Gentile on a pig farm. Have you ever been to a pig farm? Have you ever driven by a pig farm? A pig farm can make your eyes water. Of course, pigs are forbidden to Jews, but there’s no suggestion he’s eating pork, just helping raise it, and he’s so poor and so hungry that he wishes he could eat the feed he’s giving to the pigs. Ironically, he’s back doing farm work, and he’s doing the worst kind. Now it doesn’t take much thinking in this situation to realize that if he’s going to do farm work, he’d be better off back home.

This is all prelude, isn’t it? This is the set up for what comes. This isn’t the only son who’s ever taken part of the family fortune and squandered it. Families are full of guys like this. You probably know a family that’s dealt with something similar. What if it was your family? What if it was your kid? We all want our kids to find their way but this one has already spent his father’s trust and money. How would you handle him?

What happens is a party. Amazingly, his father goes to his son, rushes out to the son, before he even gets all the way home, greets him, gives him a festal coat, puts a ring on his finger and tells the servants to cook up some barbecue. They have a huge party, with brisket and I’m sure beer and wine and every good thing. You’d think this kid had just graduated and gotten a plum job; you’d never know he was a refugee from his own reckless, selfish squandering. 

It’s the father’s joy in finding him alive and home that demands celebrating. The family can never be complete without him. At the end of the story, the father says, “We had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.’” Wow: it’s hard to resist singing Amazing Grace, isn’t it? Well, it’s a good song and this is a good story and it might just as well end there but—it doesn’t, does it? No, this isn’t just a man and his son: remember where we started? “A man had two sons.”

The noise of the party is wafting out over the hills, the music, the loud voices, everyone is there except: the other son, the older son. Where is he?—out in the fields, working away, getting jobs done just like he’s always done. Something is growing there and it isn’t just the crop, it’s his resentment, his anger. He’s pouting. Surely he knows about the party, surely someone has told him that his brother’s back, his brother who forced his dad to sell that lovely olive grove, his brother he never really shared the work, even when they were kids, his brother who always got away with everything. Now his brother’s back and he’s not about to pretend he’s happy about it. 

So he stays in the field, works away, until finally his father finds him. His father finds him because it’s dawned on the father that he has two lost sons: one has just returned, one needs to be called back. One is at the party; one is pouting in the field, using work to express anger, his absence from the party speaking his disapproval. Absence doesn’t always make the hart grow fonder; sometimes, it just makes everyone sad.

The father goes out to find him. Because the older brother is so often treated as an after thought, we miss this detail. If you just read the beginning of the story, it seems the action is controlled by the younger brother: he leaves, he squanders, he returns. But it’s the father who is the main agent. He gives the two sons a home, he gives the younger brother what he asks, he goes out to find him when he is on the way home, he makes a party, he goes out to the field to find the other lost son. It’s the father who moves this story forward at every stage and now he does it by talking to his older son. The older son has a grievance and its foundation is the disruption of the family.

For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!’ [Luke 15:31f]

The younger son came back because in his heart he re-discovered a relationship. Remember his inner dialogue? 

I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.” [Luke 15:17-19]

He expects to be treated like a worker at the farm; the older son speaks of working like a slave. The father always has one relationship in mind: they are his sons, they are family. When the younger son realizes this,  it is the invocation of ‘father’ that causes his return. The older son has also lost his relationship.“I worked like a slave,” he says—not like a son. He’s lost the right relationship with his brother, too; he calls him, “This son of yours.”

The father’s response is simple. When the family is complete, when everyone is together, he feels joy and the party is the result. It’s the restoration of relationships that makes the joy. In each encounter, he addresses them as “son” and the party is unstoppable because it comes from the joy of completing the family. “We had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.’” Notice the imperative: “We had to celebrate”.

This story is often told as an allegory of forgiveness but that’s a mistake. He says he’s sinned against his father and heaven but it’s not his confession that causes the joy; his father has already run out to find him He is not embraced because he is forgiven but because his his father’s child, because of the father’s joy at his return. He was lost; now he’s found. That’s all that matters to the father. It’s all that matters with both sons: that they be found, that they know they are beloved children. The older brother doesn’t say he’s sorry about pouting, about his resentment. The father embraces him where he is, out there in the field, as he is, for who he is, because he, too, is a son. He embraced the younger one before he even got all the way home; he embraces the older one to bring him home.

This isn’t forgiveness, it’s grace. It isn’t about how we get to where God can love us—it’s knowing that this is what God is like. It’s part of a set in Luke. We don’t have time to explore them all this morning but here is the short version. A man has a hundred sheep, one gets lost and he goes and finds it and when he does, he’s so happy he throws a party to celebrate. A woman has a necklace with ten silver coins; one gets lost and she sweeps the whole house looking for it and when she finds it, she throws a party to celebrate. Are you seeing the pattern?

A man has two sons. One gets lost squandering his life; when he is found, his father is so happy, he throws a party. It’s imperative: he says, “We had to celebrate.” Another son is lost too, lost in resentment and rules. What happens when he is found? The surrounding context of these parables is a group of people who are just like the older brother, angry that Jesus eats with sinners, unhappy about the company he keeps. Those new people don’t know the rules, they don’t know how to behave. So they miss the party God is giving.

Are you going to the party? Paul says, “In Christ there is a new creation.” And he goes on to say that we are God making an appeal through us. This is what God is like, this is what Jesus is teaching. God is like this father who wants to embrace us. Are you going to the party?  We live in a world of boundaries and expectations, rules for what’s polite, what’s right.  All those rules keep us safe; all those walls are made because of our fears. The tough thing, the annoying thing, about Jesus is that he won’t have anything to do with our walls and he wants us to live from faith in God’s joyful embrace instead of our fearful wall building. Jesus lives in a society that is divided up, you heard it at the beginning: there’s Pharisees, teachers of the law, sinners, all these different kinds of people. And he just makes a party for all of them. 

Are you going to the party? This is an enormously loving and wonderful congregation. This is an enormously welcoming and appreciative congregation. That is what God wants and God blesses that. Maybe one more thing: realize that out there in the surrounding community there are people who don’t know that’s what God’s like and lots of people who assume that if they came here, they would be treated like people who lived dissolutely; like the older brother wants his younger brother treated instead of as beloved children. So, Paul says, “We are God making the appeal, ambassadors…” It’s up to us, each of us. If you want to see the love of God flourish here, go be an ambassador. Make this place a party where the love of God is celebrated. Are you going to that party? It’s not easy. Sometimes they play different music, sometimes they hang different banners. God just loves them all. He wants us to live like we are beloved children and his whole life is an example of what that looks like. 

I hear this story, I hear the sound of that party and I want to go. Are you going? Are you coming to the party? I want to get there; I want us all to get there. But more than what I want—God wants us, God wants you, God wants me, God wants all of us. Two Sundays ago we heard Isaiah say for God,

Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.[Isaiah 55:1ff]

That’s God’s hope: that we will all, every single one, come to the party. 

Are you coming to the party? Can you let go of everything and just come celebrate? Sing different songs some Sundays, tear up the bulletin and make it confetti, throw it, celebrate, make it the party of the reconciliation of God. When we do, the angels sing and the joy of God overflows like a wine glass poured too full. Jesus is the wine: “poured out for many,” he says. Among them are you; among them are me. Are you coming to the party?

Amen.

The Covenant

by

The Covenant

A Sermon for the Locust Grove United Church of Christ of York, PA

by Rev. James Eaton, Interim Pastor ©2025

Second Sunday in Lent/C • March 16, 2025

Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18

“After these things…” That’s how our reading from Genesis began this morning. It flew by, so I want to lift it up to make sure we don’t miss it. “After these things…” In a sense, all these readings occur “after these things”. Paul’s letter to the Philippians comes after he’s been their pastor and friend; now he’s under arrest in another city, sitting in jail. The gospel reading comes after Jesus has been teaching and healing and most of it occurs after some Pharisees warn him the Herod wants to have him killed; it’s startling when you get a death threat. The story we read in Genesis occurs after a war. Abram’s nephew, Lot, had been captured; Abram successfully led his version of Seal Team 6 to rescue him. It’s also long after Abram has felt God’s call, left his home, spent some time in Egypt and now is prospering as a leader of a tribe of herders. It’s also after Abram has felt God failed him.

“After these things…” describes our gathering as well. We’ve all lived years and years before we got here, and we’ve all had a week of doing whatever we did. Yet here we are gathered again. What did you hope when you came today? What I hope every Sunday when we gather is that we will encounter God here; that God’s Spirit will move in your hearts and mine, so that after these things, we are ready for another week, another month, another time. So today, come with me as we listen to the story of the covenant God made with Abram, the foundation of all God’s promises.

“After these things…” let’s go back and remember some of these things. Genesis starts out in what scholars call mythic time. Myth doesn’t mean it isn’t true; it means that our regular world rules don’t apply. So we have stories of creation, we have stories of how everything began, people live incredibly long lives, there’s a flood that wipes out everything except Noah and his family and God promises never to wipe out the world again. After all these things, God begins to work in history and the person God begins with is Abram. Abram is called, just like we are called, and Abram’s call is to go forth. When he does, God says, he will have unlimited generation and land and God’s presence. 

So Abram does go forth, along with his wife, Sarai, and his family. They start out in Ur, a real city, once located on the Euphrates river, in what is now southern Iraq. They end up in Egypt and later leave. Now they’re in the Kidron valley, near where Jerusalem sits today. He’s fought a battle and won; the king of the area has come offering peace. It’s been years since that original call and Abram has done well, but there is no child, no baby representing God’s fulfillment of the original promise. “After these things” is where we pick up the story.

Personally, I can’t escape the feeling that at the beginning of this section, God is gloating: “Don’t be afraid, Abram, I’m your shield…”, God says. Maybe Abram is still recovering from the shock of battle, the surprise and relief of victory. But he’s sharp enough to ask difficult questions. So he asks God, “What about the promise of a child?” He points out that God promised this and Sarai isn’t getting younger; if there’s no child, someone in his household is going to inherit everything. God’s answer is: “Come outside!—Look at creation, look at the stars!—that’s how many descendants you’ll have!” Psalm 19 says, “The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork.” [Psalm 19:1f] Abram’s been given a glimpse of the glory of God.

Abram believes God. “The Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness”, the text says. It’s such a short, simple sentence. Righteousness means right relationship, having the right heart in the moment, having the right relationship. Abram doesn’t do anything: it’s all free gift, all God’s initiative. There’s no transaction here, no pay for service. Abram doesn’t give God anything; he simply believes God. All of our reformed theology is built on this moment, this example. We believe that our relationship with God depends not on what we do, but on whom we believe. Abram believes God—God calls him righteous. What’s true for Abram is true for us, as well.  God doesn’t 

Abram also questions God about the promise of land and that’s where we learn about the covenant. Covenants are intentional promises. It’s confusing in the text: all this stuff about animals cut in half is foreign to us. When we make contracts, we often go to a lawyer’s office or a conference room, someone sits and hands us a bunch of papers to sign. But when kings in the ancient world were making treaties or promises, the question in the background was always, “Who’s going to enforce it?” So we know that ceremonies similar to this one were held at times. The point is to call down on the person making the covenant a curse if it’s not performed. What we see is that Abram prepares the covenant and guards it, but at the moment, he’s asleep. God freely makes a covenant, sealing the promise given years before. 

This is the beginning of God’s work with people that leads to us. It’s a foundation for everything that comes later. Later, Abram’s descendants will multiply. They will go into slavery in Egypt, but God will hear their cries and save them, send them on an exodus out of there and into the land promised here. Later, Abram’s descendants will demand a king and the king will do what kings do: oppress them and involve them in wars. Later, prophets will come reminding them of this covenant and still later Jesus will come. And when he’s told Herod wants to kill him, he will smile because he knows this covenant; he knows that he’s acting after these things. And he will weep over Jerusalem instead, and its history of violence and refusal to listen to God. Why is he weeping? Because of the failure to fulfill the third part of God’s promise to Abram, the part not mentioned here: to make Abram a means of spreading blessing through the whole world. What did God want? Jesus says, “How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!” [Luke 13:34b]

This covenant is what is renewed in Jesus Christ. Every time we share communion, we remember his words, how he took a cup, gave thanks, and said, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.” The covenant includes us and invites us. It is God’s promos of presence and care throughout all times, throughout our lives and the lives of our children and grandchildren. But a covenant is two-sided: God is one, we are the other. Every day asks whether we are living from this covenant or from the world’s seductive promise that we can be enough in ourselves, that we can earn righteousness and safety. Every day asks which road we will choose, whether to believe God’s care for all or to choose to divide people into categories and see some as less and ourselves as more. 

There is a famous Native American story that depicts this choice. This is the story.

An old Cherokee Indian chief was teaching his grandson about life.

He said, “A fight is going on inside me,” he told the young boy, “a fight between two wolves.

The Dark one is evil – he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.” He continued, “The Light Wolf is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you grandson…and inside of every other person on the face of this earth.”

The grandson ponders this for a moment and then asked, “Grandfather, which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee smiled and simply said, “The one you feed”.
[https://www.michelleweimer.com/blog/two-wolves]

Every day asks: which wolf are you feeding? Every day asks: are you living in God’s covenant? Every day, every one of us, answers. 

The story of the covenant began, “After these things…” Isn’t that where we all live?—after many, many things. But we also live before things and these ask: what will you choose? Which wolf will you feed? What road will you walk? This season of Lent is meant to remind us of our call and our covenant so that wherever we have been, wherever we go, we may walk the way of Christ, following him, believing God, seeking God’s reign in our lives and our world.

Amen

Remember Who You Are

by

A Sermon for the Locust Grove United Church of Christ of York, PA

by Rev. James Eaton, Interim Pastor ©2025

First Sunday in Lent – Year C • March 9, 2025

Deuteronomy 26:1-11 • Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16 • Luke 4:1-13

I’m Nobody

I’m Nobody! Who are you?

Are you – Nobody – too? 

Then there’s a pair of us! 

Don’t tell! they’d advertise – you know!

How dreary – to be – Somebody!

How public – like a Frog – 

To tell one’s name – the livelong June

To an admiring bog

–Emily Dickinson

Who are you? For most of us, the first attempt to answer that comes shortly after we’re born, when our mothers gave us a name. My first name was for my parents’ best friend at the time, a trumpet player. We haven’t seen him since about 1959. I got my last name from my dad, as most of us do. Later on I got other names: Pastor, Reverend, Parent, Husband, and so on. Who are you? It’s an important question because who we are can determine who we become.

It’s so important that all cultures have a set of signs and signals to tell people about our identity. When we are married, most of us exchange rings.We have bumper stickers that shout political and social messages. We have hats, we have clothing, we have endless ways of saying to the whole world, “This is who I am.”

That’s the point of the section we read in Deuteronomy this morning. God’s people have been welded together by the difficulty of the Exodus, of years in the wilderness. But what happens when that’s over and things ease up? What happens in the promised land? So we have this message: when you get there, when you are living in the land of milk and honey, when things are going right, remember who you are. Go take the first fruits of your success, and give it away and say this. 

A wandering Aramean was my ancestor; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number, and there he became a great nation, mighty and populous. When the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, by imposing hard labor on us, we cried to the LORD, the God of our ancestors; the LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. The LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with signs and wonders; and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. [Deuteronomy 26:5-9]

It’s stunning, isn’t it? “Ok, great, you had a good year in the fields and the olives came in just like you hoped but don’t get proud: remember who you are, you’re just an Aramean, an undocumented alien, and everything you’ve made is the God’s gift. Remember who you are.”

This is what scripture is meant to do: remind us of who we are because we have a tendency to forget. We get busy with what we’re doing, step back and see that we’ve done a good job and think, “Wow! I did that!” There’s nothing wrong with a sense of accomplishment, but we can forget in the midst of it, how we got there. A. J. Jacobs set out to thank everyone involved in providing his morning coffee.

Consider this: The coffee beans are driven to my local café in a van (I had to thank the driver). But he couldn’t do his job without the road (thanks to the pavers). And the road would be dangerous without the yellow lines (thanks to the folks who made the paint). We’re talking a boatload of people (which reminds me, the ship designers too). [https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/i-thanked-thousand-people-cup-coffee-here-what-learned-a-j-jacobs/]

My dad became a production engineer and later a lawyer; he held patents, he bought the first automated production system for cars for General Motors. He seldom talked about his life but when he did, he always began, “I came from a dirt farm”. That’s me: whatever I become, I come from dirt farmers in Michigan, it just happens that now I’m a pastor in Pennsylvania. Thanks be to God!

Scripture reminds us we are God’s and whatever we do, we do with the gifts of God. That’s the core of the story of Jesus’ temptation that we read today. Matthew, Mark and Luke all tell a story of Jesus in the wilderness before he began his ministry. They tell us about his baptism, which we read in January. There, the tradition is that God spoke to him directly, saying “You are my beloved Son.” All suggest that immediately after this, he was in the wilderness, hungry, perhaps scared, and there he was tempted. 

Whenever this part is told in movies, all the focus is on the special effects: the scary wilderness, the details of the temptations. But the real point is that there, in the wilderness, Jesus is doing what we can all do: using scripture to remember who he is. He’s hungry and anyone who’s ever been starving can tell you that just the first whiff of food is almost overpowering. So the devil offers that, according to Luke. Jesus replies with a quotation from Deuteronomy: “It is written, “’One does not live by bread alone.’” The devil offers him enormous power and influence; he replies, “It is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’” And finally, the devil offers absolute assurance of God’s presence and power: step off a pinnacle, and see if God really protects you. He simply says, “It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’’”. He’s being tested—he replies, don’t do exactly what you’re doing, devil! These answers are all scripture; these are all from our Bible.

Aren’t these the same temptations we all face?  We think we can take care of ourselves; Jesus could have fed himself. We strive for power and influence; Jesus could have ruled. We want to be certain of God instead of having faith. These temptations run through all of life, in our lives, as they did at this moment for Jesus. They come for us, as they did for him, in the wilderness places, in the places with no signs, in the places where we aren’t sure of our direction. Using our gifts only for ourselves, power and pride, tempting God: haven’t we all felt these temptations, faced them in our own wildernesses?

So it’s important to listen to this story because Jesus is showing us how to respond to temptation and the way he responds is by going back to God’s Word. There’s a reason we read scripture every Sunday, and the reason is that in that Word, we are reminded of who we are: children of God. This is God’s Word over and over. To Moses, God says, “I have heard the cry of my people.” To the prophets, God says, “How can I give you up, O Israel?” And now in Jesus Christ, God says, “You are my beloved children.” Jesus is in the wilderness but he remembers who he is because he remembers his call, he remembers God’s Word.

Who are you? Emily Dickinson was a very quiet poet and perhaps she felt she was nobody. You are not nobody: you are God’s child. Remember who you are! In this season of Lent, throughout these weeks, I want to think about that with you and what it can mean for us. I”m going to suggest a Lenten discipline: take your bulletin home, look up the scriptures we read today, read them over again, and then take a moment to ask God to show you how these words can come alive in your life. You are not nobody: you are a child of God. We are not nobodies: we are children of God. Let’s act like it. 

Amen.