Sunday, June 15, 2008 In Celebration of Fatherhood

I thought that I would do something I have never done before: preach on the theme of fatherhood. As a lesbian feminist, I am committed to inclusive theology and social justice. I do not, however, hate men, or my father. In fact, I believe that if we feminists were more constructive in our understanding of maleness and fatherhood, we might actually free some guys to be more whole. With that preface, here is a somewhat senitmental sermon for Sunday, June 15.

“In Celebration of Fatherhood”

Text: Luke 15:11-32(An inductive/image sermon)June 15, 2008Rev. Jennifer A. Little, M.A., M.T.S., M.Div

First Presbyterian Church of Tolono

My father taught me to sail. We began sailing when I was probably 10 or so. We took our summer vacations on a small lake in Northern Wisconsin that was nearly perfectly round. There were a few cabins around the lake, but most of it was undeveloped. On that lake I learned to water ski and I learned to handle a boat. The best thing I learned, though, was sailing. And l learned it from my dad.

He did the majority of the work –occasionally I took the sail or the rudder, or managed the jib when we came about. Mostly we just watched the water and the trees and the sky. I don’t recall that we talked much, just sailed.

One day, we set out on the lake and were having a great time. It was probably about 4. There would only be a half hour or so before the evening calming of the winds. It was rather brisk that day, and I found it exciting. In fact, I enjoyed it so much, that I was surprised when the storm started.

It seemed like all of the sudden it started raining, and the wind was blowing. We immediately started to head for the dock. The thing about sailing, though, is that you can’t go straight from one point to the other, you have to tack, go back and forth until you can be in a good position to get where you want to be—especially in stronger winds.

Then it began to lightning. One place you don’t want to be in a thunderstorm is on a lake without a motor and a tall metal mast. I was fairly scared. I looked at my dad, and I thought that he was kind of nervous, but he didn’t appear frightened, he just kept making progress. I thought, “Well, I don’t want to be anywhere else at all right now.” We were really flying. Normally my dad sailed at a leisurely pace. Not now. We were flying, and the winds were strong.

I remember vividly that the water took on a kind of green gray, and the line between the sky and the water seemed very small. I was having a great time!

As I hiked out over the side of the boat, with my feet tucked under the center strap, I trailed my hand in the water every so often to feel the water’s warmth, it was blood warm. The air had become cold and the wind was cold. I wanted to be in that water and I wanted to stay in this exciting but safe boat forever.

As the wind picked up and the lightning picked up, I began to change my mind. We were finally at the dock, taking the sails down, securing the rudder. I was freezing by now. As we climbed the steps up to where the cabin was, my dad told me that that was the best adventure he’d had in a while. I agreed.

Then when we got in the cabin, he and my mom had a few words about danger and storms and lakes and how worried they all were about us. My dad apologized and we both changed out of our soaking clothes.

Then later, after dinner, the storm had passed and there were a million stars out. I was down on the dock, seeing what the storm had stirred up in the water, looking at the stars, and I felt footsteps on the dock. My dad sat down next to me and we sat for a while. He asked me if I was scared while we were sailing. I told him I wasn’t. He said, “I was a somewhat scared, but we did it, didn’t we?”

I was shocked. It was the first time that it occurred to me that my dad could be afraid. I felt like we had not only had an adventure together, but that he has shared something important with me. I was deeply honored. Rather than making me lose respect for him, it enhanced my awe of him.

My father was a judge. And I remember his black robe, and the newspaper articles, and the dinner discussions about law and justice. I knew, even as a kid ,that a judge had huge responsibility and quite a bit of power. On weekends sometimes, when he had to go into his chambers, he’d take my brother and me. We’d play in the courtroom, but it was so formal and intimidating, we weren't quite sure how to "play." We explored.

Once my father took me with him to court, when a jury had come back while we had been eating dinner. I don’t remember anything about the case, or indeed what the jury had decided, but I do know that I was kind of scared-- I knew enough about law and courts to know that my father was involved in decisions about life and sometimes death; imprisonment and freedom; guilt and innocence.

These, then, are two images of fatherhood for me –right out of my own experience: Fatherhood, for me, is sailing and adventure and trust. Fatherhood is responsibility, and authority. Now, of course there is so much more—I am not trying to simplify things here—yet, these are the two most powerful images of fatherhood in my experience.

Growing up in the church, I heard images of Fatherhood for God. I heard stories of God’s judgement and God’s mercy. Back in the 70’s, we only heard male language for God in my church, as if God was only and of course “father” and never “mother”, so it was kind of sticky to navigate the relationships –God as father, my father but not God. God as judge, my dad as judge.

I think in our culture, many of us get confused about fatherhood and power and God. Some people have a really difficult time coming to church because they equate God with Father and their own fathers were not anything resembling a loving God. And in some situations the equation of God with father has been an excuse to see mothers and women as second class citizens. We are so heavy into patriarchal systems, that fullness of God’s parenthood gets limited to our own understandings of what a parent ought to be and actually is.

In our scripture for today, we hear the familiar parable of "the Prodigal Son.' The teaching of the story is definitely focused on what the son learns. The son appears to be the main character of the parable, and we can easily relate to the rebellious child, who wants to have it all right now and live it up!

Developmentally it makes sense: this young man is just itching to see what he can do, to experience the world and life on his own. We all have a bit of this in us. Watch any young child start to get a sense of her freedom as she runs off for the sheer joy of running.
But then what happens? The child will usually, stop, turn, and look to see where the parent is. This is called rapprochement. The child wants to be free, but also know that it is safe, that the parent is still there. Pretty soon the distance gets further and further.

Jesus’ parable is, in some ways, an exaggerated story of the child-parent relationship of we human beings to God. The young man, who ought to know better, insults his father, takes everything that he would inherit were his father dead, finds out he can’t quite manage on his own, and comes back humble and probably scared --seeking safety. This young man knows that it is within the power of his father to disown him, or worse. He acknowledges the right of his father to judge him. Yet he comes back to the whole picture of his father. Perhaps the young man doesn’t expect mercy, but his action shows us that he acknowledges that there might also be love and mercy in his father. Judgment and the forgiveness are exactly what the young man gets on his return. This is, it seems to me, a powerful image of God as father:
God welcomes us back in spite of our wrong doing. In the context of judgment, God welcomes us back --in spite of the insult, the wrong done.

As we pause to reflect on fatherhood this Sunday, I want us to remember this parable –especially the image of fatherhood here. God is powerful and awesome, loving and forgiving.

I want us also to try to keep separate our human fathers from God as father. Our father’s aren’t God. Let’s cut our dads a break, by not seeing them as God. Let’s give them the room to make mistakes, to have adventures, to be scared
Likewise, dads, I encourage you to show your families the whole you--the human you –as you are a child of God the father--both sailor, and judge, vulnerable and powerful, full of love and justice.