Making Gravy

Isaiah 25:6-9, Luke 15:11-32, How to make gravy – Paul Kelly

Some of you might be thinking this morning’s reading isn’t too Christmassy!

There are a few connections; people looking a little bit spiffy, music, dancing, and – as the song also mentioned – even a 100 degree Judean day – doesn’t stop the roast!

It’s also about a family reunion – and as can the case – a family dispute.

But the main connection is that God laying in a manger – and a dad and his two sons – and a man with a recipe for gravy - all tell us something about longing...

I heard ‘How to make gravy’ coming back from Sydney a few months ago. We’d had our usual family dispute - the back seat wanting FM and the front seat wanting AM - but I was driving and won the day, and we heard an interview with Paul Kelly explaining that he was asked to be part of a Christmas CD for the Salvos, but how the song he wanted was taken, so he wrote this... a song about a man in jail longing for his family at Christmas.

Luke 15 is also about a man longing for his family.

His younger son has cleared out – taking his inheritance (probably 1/3 of the man’s assets, as in Jewish law the firstborn received a double portion) – and moved to a distant country.

There, we’re told, he blows it all in dissolute living. We’re a little quick perhaps to assume the worst of this young man. (a little quick to believe his brother’s very colourful – and unsubstantiated – claim that he ‘devoured his father’s property with prostitutes’!) The emphasis is not on what he did – how much sex, drugs and rock n’ roll – but how recklessly and willfully he went through his money.

The result is the worst a Jewish audience could imagine. He ends up feeding pigs. But not only feeding pigs. Feeding pigs who – with their slavering snouts in a filthy trough – are better fed than he is!

But in verse 17 ‘he came to himself’! His need for food awakened his need for forgiveness – his longing for home. And on the long journey home, he works and reworks the words he will say, “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.”

“Tell em all I’m sorry I screwed up this time...”

This morning we remember a baby laid in a filthy trough – the filthy trough of our failure to love God, to care for each other and for creation – a baby who came so we could come to ourselves and know God’s longing for sinners. For, like the prodigal, we are only truly ourselves when we are on our way home.

When Aron and I were living in Japan, there was a man who got off at my bus stop each evening. And just around the corner, in the distance, we would see the man’s son, a boy with Down Syndrome, watching and waiting for him. The boy then run the full length of the lane, calling out, with his arms held out for a hug. And the Japanese father, so quiet, so unexpressive, sitting on the bus, would walk toward him, smiling from ear to ear.

The behaviour of the father in Luke is even more counter-cultural. Luke 15:20b... He runs towards his son (elderly Middle Eastern patriarchs did not run) and kisses him over and over and over...The son begins the speech he has agonised over, but is not allowed to finish. His father calls for a robe of honour, the ring and sandals that mark him as a son again, and for a celebration with all the trimmings.

“And later in the evening, I can just imagine,                                                                      You’ll put on Junior Murvin and push the tables back...”

This morning we remember that longing for sinners comes at a cost...

While we were still far off – while we were still sinners - God saw us and was filled with compassion and that God ran and put his arms around us. Christ did the most extraordinarily counter-cultural thing that God does for human beings, that Creator does for creation, and died for us.

Longing for sinners comes at a cost but creates anew a family. “My son was dead, and is alive again; was lost and is found.” says his father, “We have to celebrate!”

But what of his older son?

Now I’m an oldest child; the oldest daughter of an oldest daughter of an oldest daughter, in fact, which gave Aron’s and my pre-marriage counselor plenty of material – particularly as he’s the oldest son of an oldest son of an oldest son! It makes life interesting...it’s the dollop of tomato sauce in our marriage – mostly for extra tang!

And as an oldest child this brother’s speech sucks you in. Luke 15:29...

But there’s something disturbing this speech, about his anger, his self-righteousness, the fact he can’t call his brother ‘brother’ or understand his father’s love for either of them.

For Jesus’ audience, this son represented the Pharisees; the religious people who complain at the beginning of chapter 15 that, “this fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.” But we are all capable of making distinctions between ourselves and others, of feeling ourselves more deserving, and others less, and – in the process – terribly capable of shutting ourselves out of God’s love...

This morning we remember that kneeling around the manger – and welcomed to this great family Christmas feast - are shepherds and wise men, tax collectors, sinners and Pharisees, public servants in Canberra and prisoners in jail.

...the Lord of hosts is preparing – for all peoples - a feast of rich food, of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. God who comes to lie with us at our lowest, who runs towards us no matter what the cost, and who embraces us all.

But what about the gravy? We are also contributors to this feast. Who is going to make the gravy unless we reach out to God in return?

Praise the Baby Jesus! Have a Merry Christmas!