Grace (part 2)

I have often felt that being a father has helped me understand God more than any other aspect of my life.  The joy of granting my son forgiveness, helping his young little soul to heal, is an event from my life that brought me close to God’s heart.  He is often referred to in Scripture as our Father.  Jesus tells us a story about the kind of Father he is when he shares the parable of the Prodigal Son.  

Charles Dickens called it the greatest short story ever written. 

As the story goes, a young man is living and working in his father’s household but decides to leave.  He wants to do things his way and be rid of the oppressive life he believes he is living.  But not only does he want to leave, he also wants his inheritance before he goes.  Even today an inheritance is only received when someone dies.  The son was telling his father, “I wish you were dead.”   Now, no father in that culture would concede and give this kind of child his inheritance.  But this father is different.  His ways are different.  And he gives the young man his share of the estate. 

Immediately the son goes away and begins to live “extravagantly.”  That is what the word ‘prodigal’ means, by the way.  He is called a prodigal because he goes away and lives extravagantly.  But after going through all of his inheritance, and being deserted by his friends, he “began to be in need,” (Luke 15:14).  What an understatement!  To “be in need” is the same phrase that is translated as “fall short” in Romans 3:23, where it says we have all sinned and “fallen short” of the glory of God. 

I love how the next part of the story goes.  Jesus says, “When he came to his senses…”  Can you hitch your own horse to that phrase?  That’s when he decided that the best place for him to be was with his father.  Even more than that, he thought that if somehow his father could see past his terrible behavior then he might be able to live as one of his servants and at least survive.  What the father does in this story is beyond reason… unless you are a father. 

This father sees his son a ways away, which means he must have been watching for him, or had told his servants to be on the lookout.  He runs to greet him, throws his arm around him, puts a robe on his back and a ring on his finger.  His actions send a message to the community around him, “This is my son!  I accept him!”  Culturally, after what this son did to his father, the members of the community had the right to stone him to death.  But the father ran to him.  And his actions went well beyond forgiveness.  His actions showed acceptance.  As it turns out, it is the father that is truly extravagant.  Don’t try to wrap your mind around it.  Just let your heart be washed in it. 

Paul says that we have a ‘spirit of adoption’ that causes us to call God ‘Abba,’ which is an Aramaic word for father.  But not just ‘father,’ more like ‘daddy.’  In the culture of Paul’s time, just like today, adopted children are granted rights as though they had been naturally born into the family.  God is our father in the most intimate of ways.  And he has met many of us on the road with his arms stretched wide ready to bring us home once again.