This is the post I made on Facebook earlier that generally sums up the sappy things I feel about my father...
We spent Father's Day at home this year. While that may not sound very exciting to you, having all four of us under the same roof for any extended amount of time is kind of a rarity these days. Everyone has different schedules, so it's not very common for all of us just to have a day where we are all four working on catching up on housework and things of the sort. It was very nice. :) Dad and Michael put together a bookshelf, mom caught up on some laundry, and I tackled the dreaded task of cleaning my bedroom...
I suppose I "cleaned" my room about a month ago. I threw away the trash, put up my clothes, made my bed, etc. But today I CLEANED my room. Dusting, organizing, filing old papers, organizing the closet, organizing drawers of clothes, cleaning out from under the desk and under the bed, washing the sheets, posting things to resale sites, etc. It's still not completely done (I need to vacuum tomorrow and find a home for a few odds and ends that have made appearances after a long hiatus...) but it's way way better than it has been for the last few weeks.
While I was cleaning I logged on to a website that our church is utilizing called RightNowMedia. It's best described as "the Netflix of bible studies." You log on, find a series you want to listen to or watch, and you watch the videos in that series that would usually accompany a video study you would do with a small group. I've watched several series, and have even taught on one recently in my sunday school class, and have really enjoyed using it. Today I decided to just pick one at random that looked pretty interesting and left it playing while I was cleaning and organizing. I was really surprised at how much I got out of it...
A couple of years ago I read a book called Not a Fan by Kyle Idleman. I remember really liking how it was written, and I was thinking about it the other day, so I looked up additional studies by Idleman. I thought this one looked pretty good so I gave it a shot.
This particular series was strange at first because it was set up as an actual film in some ways. Each video was like a 30 minute TV episode that followed the lives and characters of serveal interweaving storylines with Idleman's commentary strewn in throughout. It was different, but I liked it.
The series went through the story of the Prodigal Son. You know, the one where the son goes up to his dad and says "Yo, I wish you were dead. Give me all the money that I would get as my inheritance if you die so I can go live my life." The dad gives it to him, the son goes off and blows the money on whatever it was you did back in the first century to get turnt up, loses all the money, goes hungry, and then heads back to dad's house in hopes that his father will hire him on as help so he can earn enough money to buy food to eat. Unexpectedly the father meets him and gives him a huge hug and tells him how happy he is that he has returned home, and orders his servants to make a ton of food so they can have a feast to properly celebrate the homecoming of his lost son. (MJennings Translation. Actual story can be find in Luke 15: 11-32)
Idleman really breaks down what the story of the Prodigal Son is about. (I won't waste your time summarizing each session, give it a listen sometime if you have a chance.) As I listened to each part of the lesson I couldn't help but stand amazed and think about our Heavenly Father's love for His children...
There was a child who had everything he could possibly need, but he chose to flee and try to go against what his father wanted from him.
The son hit rock bottom and had nowhere else to go other than back to his father. He expected reprimand and heavy consequences at best, but instead received grace and complete joy upon arriving back home.
Jesus told this parable on purpose as a direct parallel to our spiritual lives. We are sons and daughters of the King who is the ultimate provider. He has given us all that we need, yet time and time again we choose to flee and go against His will in our lives. We inevitably hit rock bottom and we eventually make the choice to meander our way back to the straight and narrow path in which we pursue Christ and go to ask for His forgiveness, but we do so with the fear of rejection. We're afraid He won't take us back after we try to do things our own way. Yet every time we find ourselves at the feet of the cross, there He is with open arms and tears of joy as he exclaims "Welcome home my child!"
It's absolutely beautiful, and after really listening to what Idleman had to say and studying it a little bit on my own, I think I might go as far to say that this is my favorite story in the bible. It serves as yet another example of God's provision and unconditional love.
It's Father's Day and I have been able to celebrate not only my dad's 21st Father's Day here, but also celebrated my Heavenly Father today as well. And I got a lot cleaned up and organized so win-win-win. ;) Thankful to celebrate another Father's Day and I pray that even if your earthly father's day was harder than you thought it would be or if it's just a hard day in general that you cling to the hope we have in Christ and that you remember or even realize His unconditional love for you.
I think the coolest part about the story of the Prodigal Son is that the son just got up and decided to go back home. He didn't get up and say "Ok...I need to go get a new suit. I've got to look presentable before I go back home." or "Ok...I have to find a way to come up with half of the money I took to pay my dad back." or "I need to get it together first." He just got up and went. Likewise, God isn't waiting for us to get it together. He isn't waiting for us to graduate college or fix a marriage. He isn't waiting for us to get out of debt or defeat a battle with addiction. He isn't waiting for us to do better or be better or act differently. He isn't waiting for any of that. He's waiting for us to simply make the choice to step towards Him and make the decision to come home. He'll greet us with open arms and celebrate our arrival.
You don't have to do anything to earn this love. And if you think you've lost that love and that you could never get it back because it's too far gone, you're mistaken. He's there waiting for you to turnaround and head back home. He can't wait to celebrate with you.
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