The Father Who Ran

One day Jesus told a story. Lean in close, because this one is about you.

He had just finished telling about the shepherd who carried his one lost sheep home on his shoulders. Now he told another story, one that came from even deeper in his Father's heart.

Once there was a father with two sons. The younger son came to him one morning and said a terrible thing. "Father, give me my share of everything now. I don't want to wait. I just want what's mine, and I want to go."

What that boy was really saying was, "I don't want you. I only want your things." That should have broken the father's heart, and maybe it did. But the father opened his hand and gave him the money anyway. He let him go. Sometimes love lets you walk out the door, even when it aches to.

So the boy left. He went far, far away, to a country where nobody knew his name. And oh, he had fun for a while. He spent and spent and spent. Then the money was gone, and so were the friends who had only loved his money. A great hunger came over the land, and the boy who once had everything sat in a muddy field, feeding pigs, so empty he wished he could eat the slop from their trough.

That's when he remembered home. He remembered his father's face.

"What have I done?" he whispered. "I have ruined everything. I am not good enough to be his son anymore. But maybe... maybe he would let me be a servant. Maybe there is a small corner of home left, even for someone like me."

So he stood up, dirty and ashamed, and started the long walk back, practicing his sorry speech every step. He was afraid he had done too much wrong, afraid the door would be shut against him.

While the boy was still a long way off, still just a smudge on the faraway road, the father saw him. Do you know why he saw him so soon? Because the father had been watching that road every single day, longing for the smudge that might be his boy.

And the father ran.

He gathered up his robe and pelted down the road, and he threw his arms around his ruined, muddy, smelly son, and he kissed him and kissed him and would not let go.

The boy began his speech. "Father, I'm not good enough to be called your..."

But the father was already calling over his shoulder. "Quick! Bring the best robe! Bring shoes for his feet and a ring for his hand! Let's have a feast! My son was lost, and now he is found."

And the music began.

The boy thought he had to earn his way back to being loved. But you can never earn what was always, always going to be given.

That father in the story is God. He watches the road. He longs for you. And when you turn toward home, even a little, even still covered in everything you've done wrong, he runs.

Jesus told this story to show us his Father's heart. Then he did something even more wonderful than telling it. He came all the way down the road himself, into our muddy field, to carry us home. The feast in the story? Jesus opened that door with his very own life, so that not one of God's children would ever have to stay lost in the far country.

So if you ever wander far away and wonder whether you can come back, remember this father. He is already on the road, robe flying, arms wide, running to meet you.