It occurs to me…

“And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living.”  Luke 15:13

Conjures up a nice mental picture doesn’t it – “riotous living.”  I love the phrase, the wordsmithing — “and wasted his substance on riotous living.”  I guess those are relative terms.  One man’s riot is another man’s “party” is another man’s “just having fun.”  I have always interpreted this as meaning that the younger son blew his money on something on which the father and older son would not have approved, thumbing his nose at them from that “far country.”

In that sense I am like the younger son.  God regularly places his wishes in front of me and I have ignored them, even thumbed my nose at them.  But then I am also like the father and have been on the receiving end of the thumbed nose.  That’s the bad news.  The good news is that whether I am the offender or the offended, thumber or thumbee, there is always an opportunity for grace and/or forgiveness.    And, to quote Robert Frost, “that has made all the difference.”

“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven….”  Ecclesiastes 3:1

Last night I finished watching the Ken Burns documentary on Jackie Robinson.  Afterwards, two thoughts occurred to me.  First, I was reminded how much difference one person can make.  I am not suggesting that we can all have the impact that Robinson had, but one person, each person, can make a difference some way, somehow.  Second, I am reminded that time brings perspective in ways nothing else can.  While history is being made every day it is easy to miss the significance in the moment because things look different, or I see them differently, in the distant reflection in the rear-view mirror.  Of course I can look back now and appreciate the significance of Robinson’s breaking the racial barriers in baseball, but it takes a while to gain perspective and appreciate significance.  If one needs proof of that consider that Robinson retired in 1956, was elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1960, but was generally not even recognized by Major League Baseball thereafter until throwing out a World Series first pitch shortly before he died in 1972.  Heck, his Baseball Hall of Fame plaque doesn’t even mention his breaking the color barrier.

All of which leads to the questions – What difference can I make!  What history is being made now that I am watching, perhaps even a part of?

“A certain man had two sons, and the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth unto me.’  And he divided unto him his living.”  Luke 15:11-12

Listening to Garrison Keillor read this story today, backed up in chorus by the Fairfield Four, I again realized the beauty of this parable.  Whether it actually happened is, like most good stories, irrelevant because it is a great story, great literature that does what great literature should do – pulls me into the story and makes me think.

The heartbreak of the father must have been overwhelming, but I suspect he had been down this road with the younger son umpteen times, had this very discussion more than a time or two, and was (as my mom would say) sick and tired of the insolence of the younger son.  Stated simply, the father had finally had enough!  (Been there.  Done that.)  The father figured WTF and just let the son have his way, partly just to shut him up and get him out of his hair, but also partly with the hope/prayer that somehow (against experience, logic and reason) as a result of this “all in” bet the son would somehow “come to himself” and things would work out.  (He did, and they did, at least as far as the story goes) – but I get ahead of myself.

I suspect this scene has played out with me and God on a regular basis.  He knows what is best for me, tries to tell me, tries to point me here or there, and I just don’t listen to Him.   Stubbornly, proudly, I insist on making my own way, cutting my own path.  I am reminded here of the Bill Anderson/Kenney Chesney song, A Lot of Things Different where the singer, among a long list, laments: “I wish I’d a listened all the times they told me ‘Son, you’re gonna wish you hadn’t’ – but I didn’t.”

We are introduced to the father and the younger son, yet those who have read ahead realize that the older son must have been sitting there in the background, silently hoping that the younger son left them the hell alone and fell on his ass once he left.  (He did and he did, until he didn’t).

Next up — rioutous living.

It has occurred to me lately that we are, as a society (of which I am a member), finding it easier to be mean that to be nice, easier to be critical than to be supportive, easier to be against something rather than for something.  Though not limited to our current political vitriol, that highly visible forum seemingly legitimizes the “movement” and in the midst of the vitriol it becomes difficult at best to distinguish debate from ridicule and distinctions from prejudice.

In this I am reminded of this from Dorothy Day: “Let’s build a society where it’s easier for people to be good to each other.”  Looking at it from a technical sense, I don’t really know if it has become harder “for people to be good to each other.”  Part of me wants to believe that in the information age we have just become more aware of those instances where people have not been good to each other, and of course political candidates and the rest of us have only relatively recently been able to electronically hurl insults at a person or an entire group of people.  Regardless of the cause, there is seemingly only one cure – to strive to be good to each other.  This was, I think, the message of Max Ehrmann in his Desiderata:

“Therefore, be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep pace with your soul.  With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.  Be careful.  Strive to be happy.”  And, I might add, “be good to each other.”

I saw a bumper sticker a while back that stuck with me enough to jot it down when I next had a pen and paper available.

“Being nice to people is a really good idea.”

This is of course nothing new, as it is a restatement of the “Golden Rule” or the “Ethic of Reciprocity” that is a standard tenet of virtually every faith.  It is stated in the Bible in Luke 6:31 among other places:  “Do to others as you would have them do to you”

The language in the bumper sticker, however, seemed particularly poignant to me.  I think perhaps it is in part because it does not have the imperative nature of a “though shalt” in a commandment.   Further, it doesn’t contain a quid pro quo suggestion that I should be nice to others because they will be nice to me in return.   No, on reflection it is really just an opinion — a statement of belief that lets each of us fill in our own “why” or “because” if one is needed – though it occurs to me that the bumper sticker is complete as is.

“Being nice to people is a really good idea.”