A sermon by Associate Minister Elsa A. Peters, March 18, 2007
Ruth 1:1-19
Luke 15:11-32
It was so strange. I was once again the world’s oldest toddler. I walked around peering down as if to look inside my stomach, as if it was one of those old-fashioned front-loading washing machines with a window through which you could see the soapy water swirling over your clothes. And I paid attention until I was able to isolate this feeling in my stomach, a gritchy kind of emptiness, like a rat was scratching the door, wanting to be let in.
Wouldn’t you pay attention to that feeling? That feeling that Anne Lamott describes as hunger: “like a rat scratching the door, wanting to be let in.” It’s gnawing. It’s impossible to ignore.
So that when we hear the younger son in this familiar parable exclaim, “But, here I am dying of hunger,” we know exactly what that feels like. It’s right there in the pit of our stomachs, erupting with load moans of longing. “Like a rat was scratching the door, wanting to be let in.” You can’t ignore that feeling. It must be satisfied.
No matter what the terms were when this younger son first left home. No matter how we understand the events that unfolded in this distant land – in that distant land where a “severe famine took place throughout the country.” It was then that the hunger pains started, “like a rat was scratching the door, wanting to be let in.” And just like that, this younger son “began to be in need.” Wouldn’t you pay attention to that feeling?
Naomi and her husband did. When famine struck their home in Bethlehem, literally called the “house of bread,” they packed their bags for Moab. Their move doesn’t make any sense. They left the “house of bread” for a place where food was not used to feed the Israelites, their people, “but for feasting before local gods.”
But, that’s the way the old saying goes, right? Feast or famine. It’s one or other. Too much or too little. And for this younger son, it was famine. It was famine that caused him to realize that he was “in need.” And then, and only then, he was able to isolate that feeling in the pit of his stomach. It was “a gritchy kind of emptiness, like a rat was scratching the door, wanting to be let in.” You would pay attention to that feeling, wouldn’t you?
You don’t have to be a refugee in Darfur. You don’t even have to be waiting in the cold outside Wayside Soup Kitchen. Nor do you have to have struggled with bulimia like Anne Lamott. You don’t even have to have been tempted to change stones into bread. You don’t have to be starving to know what hunger is. Like “a gritchy kind of emptiness, like a rat was scratching the door, wanting to be let in.”
Pause.
Wouldn’t you open the door? You would, wouldn’t you? You would welcome that rat in and bid farewell to that gritchy, empty feeling. You would do what the older son failed to do. You would be brave enough to ask. To ask to come in. To ask for that rat, scratching at the door, be let in.
To be let in as Naomi welcomed this woman from Moab into her family. Her son should not have married this woman. It’s right there in the Book of Exodus. Israelites were commanded not to marry foreign women. But, Naomi’s son not only married a non-Israelite, he married a woman from Moab. The Moabites were condemned. It was their fault. They did not offer them food or water to the Israelites on their journey out of Egypt. The Moabites ignored the growling in their stomachs.
It’s “a gritchy kind of emptiness.” But, Ruth need only ask. She need only scratch at the door with these loving words:
Where you go, I will go;
where you lodge, I will lodge;
your people shall be my people,
and your God my God.
Ruth need only ask and Naomi let her in.
Pause.
But, you can already hear the grumbling. You can hear the voices of protest – the voices of the followers of the Law, the older son, the Pharisees and the scribes. The voices of outraged villagers eager to share their hostility for this younger son – this greedy son, this rat of a son “scratching at the door, wanting to be let in.”
Both Naomi and the father in this parable need only hear the scratching – the rumble in their children’s stomachs – to know that it is time to set the table. Unlike the Moabites, they knew it was time to bring out the food. “Let us eat and celebrate,” the father announces. Let him in! Let him in! It’s time to party! Get the fatted calf! Yes indeed, “let us eat and celebrate!”
But, a party is a “risky option.” It’s the right thing to do. And as a good parent, the father knows this. But, make no mistake about it. This party is a big risk. After all, this party is not to welcome home this lost son. No, it’s a party “thrown for the villager’s benefit.” It’s a party for the honor of this family. The whole outraged village would have been invited. There would have been more than enough food for everyone. You know, feast or famine. And this time, it’s a feast.
But, there is still a gritchy kind of emptiness. Peer down into your own stomach. Does your stomach suddenly feel like one of those front-loading washing machines swirling around? That’s how Jesus wants you to feel. A little queasy. A little uncertain. Feast or famine, that’s how the saying goes. Too much or too little. But, that’s not how Jesus would explain it.
Because it’s not over. Jesus is not finished with this parable. This story doesn’t end with a grand feast that welcomes all of the villagers. It doesn’t matter how big the fatted calf was, anymore than it matters that Ruth and Naomi went hand-in-hand into the house of bread.
Instead, Jesus wants you to peer down into your own stomach. To recognize that washing machine feeling. That feeling that first disturbed the Pharisees and the scribes. That feeling that something is wrong. And Jesus wants you to isolate that feeling. This is the part where Jesus wants you to pay attention.
Because the older son is not at the celebration. That’s how the parable continues. He has ignored the scratching. He has not heard the growling of the younger son’s stomach. But, it’s the father that reaches out to his son – his son that refers to his own brother as “this son of yours.” The father goes to this son. The father leaves the party and goes to the field to say to his oldest son, “You are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.”
And even so, there is still scratching at the door. The rat still wants to come in. Even with these words, these heartfelt powerful words from the father, there is still something wrong. Peer down into your own stomach. And isolate that feeling. That washing machine feeling that something is wrong.
Perhaps it is feast or famine. Too much or too little. But, something is missing. So, Jesus urges us to peer down into our own stomachs.
Pause.
“You are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.” These are the father’s words. Not the older son. Not the younger son. Unlike Ruth, neither of these brothers could satisfy their hunger. Neither of these brothers utter such heartfelt, powerful words, as does Ruth to Naomi.
Where you go, I will go;
where you lodge, I will lodge;
your people shall be my people,
and your God my God.
In this parable, Jesus reminds us that these words must fall on our own lips. We must listen for the scratching. We must let the rat in. Then, and only then, the gritchy emptiness will stop. Then, and only then, we shall be all be satisfied – and we shall feel it in the pit of our stomachs.