Sin-Conversion-Forgiveness

 Fourth Sunday of Lent

    Right now we’re in the midst of the NCAA basketball tournament, often called March Madness.  The hard work of 68 teams throughout the regular season is put to the test, as they compete against the best teams in the nation, not just in their conferences.  In the end, one team will hold up the trophy, the physical sign that they are the best in the country.  It would certainly be easier if a team didn’t have to win the six games of the tournament to be crowned champion, but that trophy would mean a lot less, because it would not have come through hard work, good execution, and sometimes a little bit of luck.
    Just as there is a progression through March Madness, so there is a progression that we hear in the Gospel today about forgiveness as we heard the all-too-familiar parable of the Prodigal Son.  The main point of the parable is the mercy of the father, which Jesus uses to teach us about the mercy of our Heavenly Father.  But we also see how this whole process of sin, conversion, and forgiveness takes place, until the celebration in the father’s house at the son’s return.  
    Of course, the first part of this story is sin.  The son demands what is “his,” which isn’t really his yet.  He doesn’t want to depend on the father for what he needs.  When we sin, we don’t rely on our heavenly Father.  We take what we feel is ours, and we spend it on “dissipation.”  We think that we can make it on our own without God’s help.  In fact, when we separate ourselves from God, we notice how little we have, and how much like a famine it is.  If we don’t recognize how bad things are, we go from bad to worse, until we are surrounded by the mud of sin upon sin, and even hungry for the scraps that the pigs are eating, which is bad enough from our point of view, but even worse from the point of view of a Jew, to whom pigs are ritually unclean animals.
    The next part of the process in conversion is sometimes the hardest part: we recognize how bad things are.  Alcoholics Anonymous will talk about the necessity of hitting bottom before one can truly find sobriety.  The same is true with sin.  We can only truly seek conversion if we realize that we need help, and that we cannot take care of ourselves.  In the parable, Jesus refers to it as the son “coming to his senses.”  With so many sins, we tell ourselves it’s not so bad, it’s not really doing a lot of harm, and so we continue on.  Of course, when we do that, we keep ourselves away from the Father’s house.  We don’t find the way home, and we don’t really move much to get there.
    But if we do recognize the evil of our sins and the horrible effects they have on us, then we start back towards the Father.  Both the recognition of sin, and then the movement back to the Father are only possible because of God’s grace, to which we start to open ourselves.  Nothing that we can do that is good happens without God first making it possible.  As we open ourselves to being sorry for our sins, and leaving them behind, we start back to the Father’s house.  
    Part of this is being open and honest about our sins: that we chose them.  As a society, we are good at making excuses.  We’re never guilty for anything; it was always someone’s else’s fault.  Maybe it was our upbringing, or some external factor, or really anything, as long as we don’t have to take responsibility.  We don’t even know how to take responsibility in our apologies: “If I hurt you, then I’m sorry.”  A true contrition acknowledges that we have sinned, that we have done wrong, and that we have disobeyed and offended our heavenly Father.  In order to truly have the conversion that will heal us, we need to acknowledge our own role in sinning.  
    But, having come to our senses, recognized how bad things are, and started back to the Father to apologize for our sins, our loving Father runs out to meet us.  God doesn’t dangle forgiveness at the end of a line for us to try and catch, like the tricks we play with dogs and their toys as we hide it behind our backs, or keep swinging it back and forth, just out of the grasp of their mouths.  God runs to us to embrace us in love.  In the days of Jesus, no man would have run, not only because it showed a lack of dignity, but also because it was physically hard to do in sandals and a tunic.  And yet, that is what God does for us.  He cannot contain Himself and His love for us.  He cannot wait even the few extra minutes it will take for us to get to Him.  He runs to us.  

    And as He embraces us, He makes us His sons and daughters, though we are not deserving of that title.  We wasted our filial dignity, and spent it away.  But God gives it back to us, and then celebrates for and with us.  And he spares no expense.  He puts a robe around us, which is his love and our protection from the outside elements; a ring on our finger, which symbolizes our authority in the house of our Father again; and sandals on our feet to keep the dirt of sin from attaching itself to us.  
    The celebration is worth it.  But there are no shortcuts to forgiveness.  We cannot find the celebration at coming back to the Father’s house if we stay in the mire and the mud of our sins.  We cannot receive the robe, ring, sandals, and fattened calf if we do not acknowledge that we had earlier squandered our inheritance of eternal life and offended our Father, whose only desire for us is that we stay in His house and enjoy what He has set before us.  If we do wander away, though, the good news is that the love of the Father will welcome us back when we have repented and started back to Him.  If we don’t have the good sense of staying in the Father’s house, let’s at least have the good sense to come back after we’ve been away.