Family

There was a father who had two sons. One was good for whatever you needed and the other was good for nothing. That’s the way it seemed most days anyway. The boy's father was divided on the matter. He didn’t have to say, “No,” to one and he couldn’t say, “No”, to the other. Most people I know don’t care too much for this story Jesus told which we commonly refer to as the Parable of the Prodigal Son. They don’t like that the younger son seems to get away with murder, and they tend to sympathize with the older son who dutifully did whatever his dad asked of him season after season on the family farm. Folks are split on the father. Some see him as a bumbling, unrepentant enabler who fuels his younger son’s bad behavior to the end. Others see him as the picture of grace and mercy, the very thing they’ve always longed for in their own lives.

Parables are not static stories meant to be decoded and allegorized. They are dynamic, living things meant to be experienced in real time. If you’re open to it a parable will teach you something different every time you read it. Parables point to a depth beyond the one at which you’re currently living; they will open your mind and lay open your heart. If you’re willing.

When I let this parable happen to me today it strikes me as a story about trying to get something from your family that they are never going to be able to give. The father and his two sons are starving for God, but they don’t know it. God dwells within them; God is closer to them than their own breath. They don’t know that either. So, like so many of us, they project all their needs onto the ones closest to them, and they wind up disappointed every time. Family is not going to give you the love you’re looking for. Only God can give you the love you really want and need. This is not bad news! It’s good news. We can stop expecting so much from our families. We can let God supply our happiness needs, and then we can love our families just as they are with God’s love as it flows through us. Isn’t that a weight off? We can stop projecting all our emotional and spiritual needs onto our families! Lay all those needs in the lap of God. Then instead of looking to your family with the expectation that they will behave in a certain way you can look for the Christ presence in them and know that God’s got them just like he’s got you. If you really want to love your family and be ready to receive their love, then accept God’s love in all its fullness first. They are not set up to satisfy your needs. They’ve got too many problems of their own! The truth is they are projecting all of their needs onto you too. I am not wrong, am I? Meanwhile, God is perfectly suited to love you both. Let your family off the hook and let God love you.