Experiencing Transformation, Inspiring it in Others

The 18th Sunday after Pentecost, Year A Sermon for September 27, 2026

Dear God, take our minds and think through them. Take our hands and work through them. Take our hearts and set them on fire. Amen.

Well, it feels great to be up here this morning. I said to Tom on the way down here, you know it feels a little strange, but what feels strange is that it doesn't feel strange.

As I was just now reading this gospel passage, it occurred to me - and you might wonder, “Why in the world did it just occur to him now?” - this would be a perfect passage to use to get into a conversation about today's political leaders, wouldn't it? I mean, how can I resist? But I'm going to resist.

This past week, I've actually been thinking a lot about free will, and to the extent that we have free will, I've been thinking about the personal and communal transformation that the simple act of changing our minds can bring about. Although changing our minds is something that we often refuse to do, and at least we have a very hard time doing it quite a bit of the time. Many of us do.

Not surprisingly, these ruminations began with my reading the parable of the gospel passage today. It's a parable that I have loved for as long as I can remember. Here, Jesus gives us what we might call a hero and a villain, personified by two brothers.

The first brother gets off to a very bad start. We probably wouldn't have guessed what comes next would come next. At first, he refuses to obey his father, who tells him to spend the day working in the family vineyard. “I will not,” he says defiantly. He doesn't even give an excuse or speak mitigating words like, “well, not quite yet,” or “maybe later I will.” He might as well have said, “go to hell, dad.” But then, to our surprise, he changes his mind and does exactly what the father has asked him to do. He becomes a good son who earns his father's favor.

Then there is his brother, whose main concern appears to be making a good impression. We certainly know people like him. When the father tells him to go to work in the vineyard, he says, “I go, sir.” But with him, it's all a show. And he ends up not going.

What comes to mind is the old proverb or aphorism that the great Christian philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard, believed summarizes this parable. You might even guess what it is. “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” But we don't even know if the second brother had good intentions.

Jesus leaves no doubt as to which son did and which son did not carry out the father's will. He addresses the religious leaders to whom he has just told this parable, making it clear which of the two brothers represents them.

He says to these obdurate souls, “prostitutes and tax collectors are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you, because your minds are so completely made up that no evidence will convince you to change them and acknowledge my legitimacy.”

As I consider this, another parable, the Prodigal Son comes to mind. Once again, it's amazing the similarities between these two. Once again, we have two brothers, two sons, and once again, one of them behaves badly, to say the least, early on in the story, while the other appears to be virtuous.

Again, the first brother, the prodigal, sees the error of his ways, and he changes his mind, he changes directions. He comes home and begs for forgiveness, which his father immediately grants. By contrast, the second brother, like the religious authorities in today's parable, remains stuck in his self-righteousness, even when the kindly father begs him to come and join in celebrating his brother's homecoming.

I said that today's gospel reading had prompted me to consider what is possible when we're willing to change our minds. But it wasn't only the gospel that nudged me in this direction. I recently finished a novel entitled That's What Friends Are For, by a popular Michigan author, Wade Rouse. Has anybody here besides me read, oh my gosh, I'm not the only person who's read it! Well, isn't that great? Good.

Well, as in life, in the book, we discover numerous examples of people changing their minds to good effect. But none of these is more poignant than what occurs between Teddy, one of the book's four, main, gay characters living in Palm Springs, and his sister Trudy, who has spent her whole life literally stuck in Ohio.

Now, I don't mean to speak ill of Ohio, but I guess as a Michigander, I can do that. Anyway, the two, the brother and the sister, now advanced in years, have lived in complete estrangement from one another, their entire adult lives. Trudy is the worst kind of joyless right-wing evangelical Christian. While Teddy is, among other things, a drag queen, yes, living in a common house, that the communal house, I should say, that the residents referred to, tongue-in-cheek, mind you, as the Church of Mary. I thought it was a little bit funny.

Their alternative lifestyle, notwithstanding, the members of the Church of Mary exhibit deep love toward one another and toward others outside their circle. By contrast, Trudy, the passionate evangelical Christian, is filled with judgment. She utterly rejects anyone who is different, and especially her brother, all in the name of her religion.

After many years, following the death of her husband, Trudy decides to pay Teddy a visit in Palm Springs. The visit begins as badly as you might imagine, and it seems headed for an equally disastrous conclusion. But just in time, there comes a moment when both discover that each, in their own way, has been terribly abused and wounded throughout childhood by their scoundrel of a father, and the two siblings fall into one another's arms and embrace.

It may be late in their lives, but Teddy is finally freed from his need to protect himself from Trudy, and she is suddenly freed from the strictures of her past and of her religion. The two embrace, and guess what? Trudy begins planning to move to California as a whole new chapter begins for both.

As many of you know, I have been deeply involved in the leadership practice known as fierce conversations. Although the practice has numerous components, its essence is captured by the following foundational principle: While no single conversation is guaranteed to change the trajectory of an organization like a church, of a relationship or of a life, any single conversation can.

We have just seen a great example of this in the exchange between Teddy and Trudy. But without denying in any way the significance of serious conversations in view of today's parable, I might alter the principle just a bit and say, while there is no guarantee of this, any change of mind or heart can transform a church, a relationship, or a life.

That's what we have seen in both the parables I've described and in the encounter between Teddy and Trudy. People changing their minds and turning loose of what they thought they had to have, what they thought was absolutely necessary to their salvation, and in the process, discovering new life-giving possibilities.

I'm sure we've all experienced this both in ways that made small differences and in ways that were life changing. When I preached here at Epiphany on this same passage in 2023 on the same day, I used an example from my own experience. It involved both a fierce conversation and a change of mind that changed me in ways I have been grateful for ever since. And I'm going to share it again with you. It happened when I was in college, so if you can imagine, about 62 years ago, I was really just a kid.

At the time, I was involved in a student organization that brought speakers to our campus for an annual symposium. Armed with a list of possible names for speakers, I went to a revered professor to seek his advice. He was more than a little put off by the document I handed him. Not because of the names, but because it was sloppy. There were typos. There were misspelled names. He sternly ordered me to take it back, make all the necessary corrections, and only then return when I had a perfect document.

Well, in my youthful arrogance - which didn't leave right away, mind you - I thought he was being ridiculous. I was furious. I left not very graciously with no intention of coming back. I did, however, change my mind. I made the necessary corrections, and upon my return, he greeted me warmly and was very helpful. In retrospect, I had been embarrassed by having shown the professor and myself so little respect. And over time, that single seemingly simple exchange has had a major effect on what I expect of myself and of others with whom I live and work.

The more I reflect on the son who said “no” but did “yes,” the more I think about contemporary people, some of them right here in this community who experience transformation and inspire it in others by daring to change their minds and do a new thing.

All around us, there are people living out this parable, moving from “I won't trust” to “maybe I can trust,” or “I won't forgive” to, “I forgive you,” from “I won't take a risk because it's too scary,” to “what have I really got to lose?”

So how about you? When in the past have you dared to change your mind? And what is calling you to do so today?

Amen.