March 6 – Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
The Good Dinosaur – Lent at the Movies 3: The River Leads Home
4th Sunday in Lent – March 6, 2016
First Lutheran Church – Winnipeg, MB
This past week I had a dream: I dreamt I was skating!
And skating, for me, is one of the most beautiful free feelings in the world.
It represents freedom and grace and joy.
I was skating down the River Trail on the way to the Forks.
And the river, for me, always makes me think about baptism.
When I think about the river in winter all frozen over I think about all that water underneath,
still there, still flowing, even if you can’t see it.
I was skating down the river to the Forks, all free and wonderful-feeling – it was lovely.
When I got to the Forks, there was surprisingly lots of open water – but hey! It’s a dream, right?
And – to my great delight! (and this is funny)– there were orcas sporting in the water!
Playing and jumping and making big waves! So fun! Best dream ever!
But then I began to get scared – it was kind of terrifying.
The orcas were big and they were making lots of waves.
So big that a little chunk of ice I was standing on broke off and started floating away.
But just then an orca swam up underneath my ice chunk and started towing me around,
and it was wonderful, and scary, and fun!
Still the best dream ever, if filled with some fear.
When the orca finally towed me to shore I was reunited with my son and I went home.
And I was happy. So super happy. It was a great dream.
I just followed the river. And the river led me home.
In the new Pixar animated feature The Good Dinosaur,
the premise is this:
You know that asteroid that supposedly slammed into the earth and
wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago?
Well, in the film the asteroid zooms by like a shooting star and misses the earth!
The dinosaurs look up briefly at it and then, when it zooms past, keep calmly munching grass.
A few million years later they have evolved into . . . farmers! Hahaha!
They plough and sow and irrigate! The children help their parents out with chores!
A small runt of a dinosaur named Arlo has to come to terms with who he really is,
and discover what he’s made of.
He’s afraid of everything – especially the fierce scary pre-historic chickens he has to feed!
And he’s really afraid of the small, orphaned, dog-like human who is stealing corn from
the dinosaurs’ silo.
This little human is feisty and savage-like and not afraid of anything.
When Arlo and his father are caught in a storm and Arlo’s father is killed,
Arlo is swept down a swift flowing river and becomes lost.
“Where’s home?” he asks himself.
But then he remembers what his father says,
As long as you find the river, you can find your way home.
It’s a very baptismal, Christian thing to say.
The river helps you find your way home – the river helps you navigate.
Like the river in my dream that led me back home through joy and fear,
so the river in the movie leads Arlo back home through both joy and fear.
You can’t beat fear, Arlo’s father tells him early in the movie, but sometimes you have to
get through your fear to see the beauty on the other side –
and discover what you’re made of. Well, Amen to that!
Get through fear of rejection, fear of not being good enough, fear of not knowing what to do.
In his journey Arlo discovers a lot.
He discovers what he’s made of: that he can get through his fear to help others.
He discovers that he is not alone: in his river journey, he discovers that
even though he is without his birth family, he forms a new family with,
of all unlikely things, the strange, little, pre-verbal dog-like human
he comes to call Spot.
The river leads him eventually not only back home to his mother, who waits and
longs for him, but also into a wider, more expansive new family bond.
The river does indeed lead him home – into way more than he ever expected.
The story of the Prodigal Son is one of the most famous stories Jesus ever told.
It tells of a son who removes himself from his family, selfishly asking for his inheritance
even before his father is dead.
As if his father is only good to him dead.
He removes himself from his family – and is seemingly lost to them.
But the father waits, patiently, giving his son the grace of time.
Neither knows what to expect.
And I think this is where the good news in the story can be found.
I don’t know if the father really thinks the son will return: it’s not a foregone conclusion.
When we give people the grace of time it’s not a sure bet that they will come back,
that there will be reconciliation, that there will be a happy ending.
But the father stays true to the father’s identity: he waits, hopeful, scanning the horizon,
with longing and love – because that is the best chance he’s got.
And he gets more than he perhaps really expects: the return of his son.
And the son, too, gets way more than he expects – way more:
the good news for the son is that the love his father has for him is
way more overwhelming that he imagined!
The good news for the son is that while all he was really expecting was a meagre
slave’s meal, what he is treated to is a lavish banquet fit for an heir.
The good news for the son is that while all he was really expecting was to be
accepted home as a slave, he is instead run to and embraced by his father
as a beloved child and clothed with the clothes and ring of an heir.
The good news is that there is nothing the child could do, even treat his father as dead,
that could kill the love the father has for him.
The father stays true to who he is: loving and hopeful and full of grace.
And in the end, the child finds home.
The prodigal son in the story discovers he is loved beyond all imagining – that’s who he is:
that what defines him is not his failure but the love his father has for him;
he has to get through his fear of being rejected.
Arlo, too, discovers who he is – the river does lead him home.
He discovers he is capable of love, and joy, and of getting through fear.
Arlo discovers that what defines him is not his fear but his getting through his fear to
be the loving and helpful and open dinosaur he has it in him to be.
The really good news both find is they can expect much more than they expect.
The really good news is that both find they are lovable, despite neither really feeling it.
I read a review of a book this week that conjectures that what most inhibits relationships in
the 21st century is feeling you cannot be loved for who you really are.
Friendships, family relationships, marriages: if you can’t feel like you are loved just as you are,
you will never be able to feel loved and be honest and open and you will never be able to
love honestly and openly from the core of your being in turn.
You will never be able to achieve the intimacy and honesty that
human beings are miraculously capable of.
The film and the story of the Prodigal Son both end with reunion and embrace.
Both have parents who run to them, who do not know yet exactly what either has been through
but who don’t care, who are just happy to have them back.
The father in the story cuts off the son’s carefully prepared speech and orders a banquet.
He doesn’t care whether the son has learned his lesson or not: that is not a condition of
the father’s unconditional love for him.
Arlo’s mother runs to embrace him and doesn’t care whether or not Arlo has conquered
his fear: that is not a condition of her joy at seeing him.
Truly one of the greatest things we can do for one another is to be overjoyed to
see one another on Sunday, week in and week out, to do whatever the equivalent is
of running to one another and embracing each other, and
communicating somehow the joy and the miracle of one another –
whether it’s been a week or whether it’s been a year since we’ve seen each other.
Whether we have good news to share or bad.
Whether we have an accomplishment to share or a failure.
Because in God’s eyes, we are beloved no matter what – and we have been worth the wait.
The baptismal river we were baptized into proclaims us beloved no matter what.
Those we wait for in our lives: they are beloved.
Those we see every week: they are beloved.
Those we see every day: they are beloved.
The baptismal river leads us home: to who we are:
unconditionally loved people capable of bearing unconditional love to one another with
running feet and embracing arms and hands that prepare a feast for one another.
Sometimes we come home with disappointment: hurts will always sting, Arlo’s father
does not make a miraculous re-appearance, the son’s brother remains estranged from him.
And the ending of my own dream was not yet a reality when I woke up.
But the baptismal river journey promises us much and
holds the promise of helping us discover what we’re made of: which is love:
the love we receive as beloved children of a very loving God,
who are capable of sharing that same love – if imperfectly – with one another.
Who are creatures who can expect much more love than we usually expect.
So together, despite the cold, let us skate down that baptismal river together with freedom and
joy and hope, running to embrace each other – and together let us say, “Amen.”
Pastor Michael Kurtz
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