My Prodigal Ways

I don't like me today...I would like to be someone else for a while if you don't mind. As the introspection continues today, I find even more undesireable traits hidden deep within my heart ready to bubble out and overflow when provoked. As I have pondered my past today, I find things resurfacing that I thought were conquered years ago. What I am coming to see is that I did conquer them on a lesser level - I think that each time God asks us to take a step up to a higher level of maturity in Him, we find some of the same struggles we faced before. As we grow, we are able to delve deeper into some of these issues. I would never ask my children to solve the national debt - however I would ask them to be responsible to spend their $2.50 wisely at the summer movie. As they reach adulthood, their ability to solve greater and deeper problems grows too!

In Luke, chapter 15, Jesus tells a story about a family. This man had two sons. The younger son came to the father and asked for his inheritance early. The father gave it to him, and the son took off to live life the way he wanted, by his own agenda. He has a bad experience and soon realizes that he made a mistake. After losing all his money and friends, he decides to return to his father in hopes that he can at least be a servant in the household. The father, who has been watching for his son's return, excitedly welcomes his son back home. He dresses the son in nice clothes, puts a ring on his finger, gives him nice shoes, and throws a party for all of his friends. He is so excited that his son who was dead is now alive again!

Now, let me start with verse 25. "But his older son was in the field; and as he returned and came near the house, he heard music and dancing. And having called one of the servant [boys] to him, he began to ask what this meant. And he said to him, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed that [wheat-] fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and well.' But the [elder brother] was angry [with deep-seated wrath] and resolved not to go in. Then his father came out and began to plead with him, but he answered his father, 'Look! These many years I have served you, and I have never disobeyed your command. Yet you never gave me [so much as] a [little] kid, that I might revel and feast and be happy and make merry with my friends; but when this son of yours arrived, who has devoured your estate with immoral women, you have killed for him that [wheat-fattened] calf!' And the father said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But it was fitting to make merry, to revel and feast and rejoice, for this brother of yours was dead and is alive again! He was lost and is found!' "

How many times do I react like the older brother towards my heavenly Father? Shamefully, it is more than I like to admit. Someone told me recently about a blessing they had received from God in an area where they had previously been disobedient. Immediately I felt slighted by my Father. "God," I complained, "Darrel and I have been faithful to You in this area ever since we married. Why don't you bless us like that?" There is a couple in our town who hurt us terribly many years ago, yet I am constantly hearing about how they are prospering financially. Why does that bother me so much? I don't want what they have - I wouldn't trade our lives for theirs for anything. I don't want to see them hurt or fail at what they pursue. I just have trouble understanding why it seems like disobedience is rewarded with blessing and obedience is overlooked or taken for granted. Now, my intellectual side knows that this is not a true statement. But my heart feels like it's true.

Let's look at what the father says to his son. The father realizes that he can depend on his older son to be there for him. The father has given him open-ended access to all that he has. He simply wishes that his older son could look outside himself for two seconds to be happy for his brother, who has had a heart change. Ouch...all my justifications for my bad attitudes seem pointless. Once again, I see how selfish I am. Only concerned about my own well-being. Can I not be happy for my brothers and sisters when they are blessed or when they have a heart change, no matter how small? Again, this is nothing new to me - I have known about this tendency in me for many years. I have repented and asked God to change me over and over again, and I believe that He has. It's just time to take it to the next level - kick it up a notch, if you will! I think what He's really asking for is a deeper commitment to pouring myself out for others. An even more passionate desire to lay my life down for my friends. A willing, ready, and able heart that has lost its life in order to find it. I believe He wants to utterly consume me - so that who I am disappears and Who He is shines through. As Warren Barfield sings, "I want to be mistaken for Jesus!"

Here are the words to that wonderful song:

I shouldn't have to tell you who I am, cause who I am should be speaking for itself
Cause if I am who I want to be, then who you see won't even be me
Oh the more and more I disappear, the more and more He becomes clear

Til everyone I talk to hears His voice, and everything I touch feels the warmth of His hand
Til everyone I meet sees Jesus in me, this is all I wanna be
I wanna be mistaken for Jesus, oh I wanna be mistaken

Do they only see who we are, when who we are should be pointing them to Christ
Cause we are who He chose to use, to spread the news of the way the truth and the life
Oh I want all I am to die, so all He is can come alive

May He touch with my hands, see through my eyes
May He speak through my lips, live through my life
I want Him to, I want Him to live

No matter how I appear on the outside or how I feel on the inside, this is my heart's cry. I hate these tendancies toward mistrust and jealousy and selfishness. Father, whatever it takes...