Come home

I spent a littletime this evening reading through the parable of the prodigal son from Luke 15:11-32. It's a pretty well-known passage... probably because it parallels so many of us today. And the parallel is so frighteningly accurate sometimes.

I know more than a few people who grew up in the church, and have heard the good news preached. How well it was preached, I don't know. But the basic message had been conveyed. By the time they are in their 20s, it's been a while since they've really engaged that spiritual side of themselves. They've probably gone down some paths that weren't, shall we say, well lit.

The son in the story hit rock bottom. It's amazing to me how thick-headed we can be sometimes. Just when your decisions take you to a new low, and everyone praying for you thinks that this will be bad enough to whip you into shape, you sink even further. I've had several rock-bottom experiences. One lead me to salvation through Jesus at age 20. Another brought about a personal revival about seven months ago that may very well take me into a pursuit of full-time, vocational ministry.

Sometimes, rock bottom is where God must take us. Sometimes, it's the only way we'll wake up. The son in the story, at his lowest point, "would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the swine ate, and no one gave him anything," (verse 16). That's low!

I think rock bottom is so profound because there's usually only two options there. There's up, and there's out. You can stay there, and probably die quickly; or, you can turn upward, in the direction of God. God may have to cause us some pain to get us to the point where we our choices are ridiculously limited.

I've told a few friends before, "don't let it get any worse. Turn back now before you hit rock bottom." Rock bottom is no way to live.

As profoundly pitiful and painful rock bottom is, the overwhelming excitement of the father upon the son's return is also convicting. How often do we shake our heads when someone finally turns around and takes some proverbial "walk of shame"? I can only imagine the desperate and impassioned prayers that the father had been praying for his lost son.

Sometimes, I can tell just by looking at someone that a loved one is praying for them. I don't mean that in some voodoo-ish, mystical way. I just know that prayer in being applied in someone's life. And, really, in God's plan, very often I'm crossing paths with that person because I am one answer to those prayers.

And, sometimes, all it takes for the next prayer to be answered is to go up to that person and invite, "Come home."

I need to get better about telling people that have strayed just to come home. Better yet, I need to offer them a ride home. God so delighted in me that He delivered me from my rock bottom, and I still live today so that I can help others out of rock bottom.

The story takes the son from rock bottom to the loving, forgiving arms of the father.

From the worst feeling in the world, to one of the best.

I'm thinking of several, no, many people, that I must simply invite to come home. If at all possible, skip the arguments, skip the judgment, skip the details, skip the clean-up before you get them home and skip the demands for an apology and skip the theology battles and fundamentalist doctrine and skip rehashing all of your gripes with that person and skip the passive-aggressive games and skip the silent treatment and skip the payback and skip the "I told you so" and just

get

them

home.

And party like a madman when they get home. It's cause for a celebration. I thank God for bringing me home, and I hope and pray for a massive migration of prodigals coming back home.

It's such a glorious, safe, loving, merciful, compassionate, blessed place.