a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief.
We turned our backs on him and looked the other way.
He was despised, and we did not care." Isaiah 53:3
Last night we covered chapter 24 of The Story. There are so many parables and teachings from Christ within this one chapter. I will attempt to pull out just a few. First there is the story of the sower and his seeds. Which I have previously blogged about in Fertile Soil. So I will move on to the Lost Coin and Prodigal Son, these are my hearts tug this morning as my heart aches for the missing one.
"Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear."
Luke 15, “Suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Won’t she light a lamp and sweep the entire house and search carefully until she finds it? And when she finds it, she will call in her friends and neighbors and say, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost coin.’ In the same way, there is joy in the presence of God’s angels when even one sinner repents.”
Rejoice with me for I have found what I had lost. Share with me, have relationship with me. Laugh with me for what I thought was gone has been found. Lets celebrate together as family and friends... that calling, relationship.
"To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.
A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.
When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! I will go home to my father and say, 'Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.’
So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.’
But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began."
"To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.
A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.
When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! I will go home to my father and say, 'Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.’
So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.’
But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began."
So many focus on the son and what he had done. The son told his father that he no longer counted him as alive and that he was going to live with his inheritance as if his father were already dead. While this is a very strong message, the father is even more distinct in the Eastern cultures. If a son ever does this to his father and shows him such lack of respect, the father counts him as dead and will never talk to him again, but this is not what has happened. Instead, the father runs and embraces his son while he is still a long way from home, brings him back within his protective embrace. He doesn't ask for an explanation. He doesn't need to hear what has happened. He is content with his son being there and willing to love again.
God has been portrayed in so many ways. He is vengeful, jealous, condemning, the list to the outsider can go on and on. I have been the child that leaves, I have been the betrayer, but I have never experienced any of these things from my God. I know a God that only wants that relationship with us. He is begging us to have Communion with Him. That relationship that nothing else will ever fill. For without Him we are ever seeking, but never finding.
Communion with God, it is never about who I am or what I have done wrong, but about Him. That bread and wine, His body and blood. We taste, smell, touch, feel His presence. It is a moment of worship that fills our ever reaching hearts desire. Empty Stomachs that need the filling of His presence. "Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear." It is in the hearing that we are able to finally see. The depths of this simple act are more profound than we will ever truly know. The more I get to know my Christ, the more in awe I am of Him. He is richer, has more depth, is soft in the core and has every flavor the senses can reach. He is about relationship. The more I discover of Him, the more intoxicated I become. I want to smell His smell. Touch and taste His goodness. I want to sit at His feet and allow Him to be the only voice I can hear. This relationship is long suffering, but He is ever present.
He must feel like He is watching the grass grow as I work out my own insecurities. For relationships scare me. What if I give Him my heart and in the end, find I have been the fool? What if.... But my what if's, have only left me more alone and miserable than I ever want to experience again. I need this relationship. I need to have Communion with my Lord.
Every true relationship takes time, in small pieces we take a bite. If we sat at a huge banquet table and discovered that we had to ingest every ounce of the food that was present, at first it may seem wonderful, but we would soon discover that those delicacies overwhelmed us. It is in the small bites and swallows that we can better digest our Lord. For He is much too big for any of us to receive all at once.
Are we willing to give Him a second chance? He is ever waiting and watching for us. He is ever patient with us and our timing. Even if by what others perceive, "it is like watching the grass grow", for many times it is not what we can see, but what is actually happening beneath the surface. Truly wonderful relationships take time and patience. They are the ones that have our hearts. This is Communion with God... Feel, Taste, Touch, Smell, Hear, and See His Goodness.
The Glory that is Unsurpassed
It is all perspective. For God, it doesn't seem long to sit, watch, and wait for the the grass to grow.
It is all perspective. For God, it doesn't seem long to sit, watch, and wait for the the grass to grow.
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