Millions of children are reported missing every year. Out of these million, many of them are teen-age runaways. This sad tragedy in our society seems to me to be symbolic of another tragic tragedy in the spiritual life of many Christians. Many of God's children have run away from home. They have turned away from their Father; away from His wise guidance and presence as well as the comforting embrace of His enduring love for them.
Many of these runaways are not yet convinced that they have left home and the protection that their Father provides them. While they are running away, they are picking up speed and are running so fast that they fail to see the warning signs of what is ahead of them.
If you are running away from God, sweet friend, no matter how far you have wondered, no matter how long you've been gone, you can always come home. Has the circumstances that you find yourself currently in created a sense of alienation from your spiritual home?
When you have gone away from God He gets no pleasure out of the emptiness, alienation and lostness you experience. In Luke 15, Jesus Himself reveals the depths of the Father's heart and love for His children that leave home and run away. There is something woeful about anything that is lost and something joyful about it when it is found.
In the parable of the lost son in Luke 15, Jesus tells one of the greatest short stories ever told. It is the story of somebody, and everybody, the story of us all. In this story Jesus emphasizes on leaving and returning and being welcomed home.
In the first part of the story of the lost son, we get insight concerning how any of God's sheep could ever leave their spiritual home. The young son wrongfully understood the essence of his life and the immediacy of personal fulfillment. He had the notion of wanting his way, and wanting it now. He wanted life in its totality and its immediacy. His heart was seeking after the wrong things at the wrong time, and he was not willing to wait.
Like Eve in the garden, she could eat from every tree but one. But when tempted by satan, that one tree that she was not allowed to touch became the very one that she wanted. All of us are just like Eve and the prodigal son at times. We want what we want and we want to get it when we want it.
God did not prevent neither Eve nor the prodigal son to get what they wanted. Our free will allows us to make our own choices. However, the cost can be very great in the choices that we make and can take us down roads that lead us far, far away from our Heavenly Father's presence.
The essence of getting away from the Father is an urgency of our independence and at that point, that inward separation that has been burning inside will turn into an outward separation as well.
God's word abounds with invitations to return to God. In his trying to reach the people of God on this subject the prophet Joel said, "The day of the Lord is great and very terrible; and who can endure it?" Joel 2:11. Yet even at the last moment he assured them that they could return to God before they were devoured. As the locusts descended, God cried and said to them, "Even now return to me..."
God has and will reach across heaven to help you today sweet friend, to bring you back. You may be feeling that inwardly plague of unseen emotional locusts eating up your inner life and that green leaf of hope that you once had is fading. No matter what you are feeling, there is still good news. You can come back now. You can return, this very moment. Not because of your work or anything that you do, apart from your repentance and returning, but because of His great character that provides you the grace and mercy you need. He is the Father who stands on the porch of Heaven watching and waiting for your return. Just go!
Hold Fast,
-Bren
No comments:
Post a Comment