Last night, when I couldn’t sleep, I was looking at this picture on my wall that my son Jamie painted, of the Prodigal son. The Father, tears in his eyes, is holding his son so close to his heart. It prompted me to go back and re read the story of the Prodigal sons in Luke 15 — there were two prodigals - and I was reminded afresh, what I needed to hear right now - that God loves me with a passion, a tenderness and an unstoppable power and extends his grace to me every moment of my life. Because I am both of those sons.
I didn’t know - or want to know God when I was growing up - in much the same way as the younger son clearly didn’t really know or want to know his father. Otherwise he wouldn’t have gone to him and asked for his share of the inheritance. Being the younger son that would be a third of his father’s entire estate, so it would mean his father selling his land, his animals, losing his position in the community. In effect it meant the son was saying ‘you don’t matter to me, your life is over, I am not prepared to wait for you to die!’.
And yet the father did what his son asked! Jesus’ audience would have been outraged by this - any father in those days - and maybe even today - would have sent their son away with a flea in his ear, at the very least. But God is not any father. So when his son came to the end of himself - and came back to the father - his father didn’t do what my father, and I suspect many fathers would do - and at least give him a long lecture before accepting him back to work for him and pay off his debts - his father had been looking out, waiting for him to come home, and he RAN to him - no Israeli father demeaned himself by running! He flung his arms around him, and kissed him, and threw a massive party for him. No recriminations, no lectures, no penance, just love. He was overjoyed that his son had come home. The son didn’t deserve such a welcome - I didn’t, when I finally came to any senses and threw myself at God’s feet — but God is the perfect father, a father whose watchword is grace.
God accepted me as I was - and still, after all these years, accepts me today as I AM - still a spiritual mess much of the time, with nothing to offer God but my messy self - and the amazing thing is that that is enough!
Why then am I, and I suspect many of us who have been Christians, nominal or otherwise, for many years, so often to be found taking the position of the older brother in this story? He is just as central to the story as his sibling. It really stuck in his throat that his younger, wayward, selfish brother was welcomed home with a feast, when the father had never once thrown a feast for him. He has conveniently forgotten that, as the elder son, he now has the entire inheritance - or maybe he has not forgotten, which is why he’s so miffed that the fatted calf has been wasted on his worthless brother. Everything his father owns is his - and he resents sharing even a small part of it with his waster of a brother.
Why do I think I have somehow earned brownie points with God by sticking with him all this time - when it is he who has stuck with me!! Why do I think my service in the church, my ministry, my bible knowledge, whatever, somehow makes me more worthy of God’s love and approval than the next guy?
Why do I forget that, despite all my failings and mess ups since I gave my life to Christ, my inheritance in heaven is untouched, unthreatened, undiminished by the grace God shows to anyone else?
Why do I invite people to come to Christ just as they are, and then give them the impression that now they need to change in order to be acceptable to God?
Why do churches I have been a part of give people the impression that they need to get their act together before they can be a part of the church when God’s invitation is for people who have not, cannot, get their act together?
Why, like the older brother, does the church set standards of acceptability that God does not apply?
Why are Christians too often known more for what we disapprove of than who and how we love?
Why - and I guess that’s what was keeping me awake last night - do I all too easily forget the responsibility - and the privilege - I have - of freely sharing His love with others?
Especially at a time such as this.
There are stories in the media of churches that will ‘close’ because of Covid. The church will never close! Christ’s church is not a denomination, or a building, or a set of theological principles. It is his people. Broken, damaged, fragile, sinful, hopeful, love-filled, messy people. Many said the early church would not survive because of persecution - but it turned out, as Tertullian said, that persecution was ‘the seed of the church’. As Christians fled across the Roman Empire they took with them the Good News of Jesus.
We are facing a different challenge right now - we can’t go anywhere!
But God is still at work in this world., alongside all those who are suffering, weeping with the broken hearted, giving strength to the carers and wisdom to the decision makers.
And as for me?
How can I love my neighbour better right now?
I don’t know Lord - but I want you to give me a greater love for them so that you will find new ways for me to show your love to my family, my friends, my neighbours.
In the meantime I can pray.
In the meantime I can be thankful for the gifts you give me every day.
In the meantime I can lean closer into your love.
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