There are times when my son just ticks me off. If you’re a parent, you know the feeling. He’s only eight, but sometime he just pushes the right buttons. But you know what? I love him. I love him like nothing else. Just as I love my wife like nothing else, in the same way, I love my son like no other. Yet, I know, there will be times where he tests me. I know there will be times in the future that will be frustrating, where he may not make the decisions I want him to make. But I love him. Like no other.
There are times when I’m too tough on him, and my wife calls me out. There are times when after a long day, I’ve lost patience, but a friend puts things in perspective. When I read the first reading today from Exodus, I think of this.
God was so fed up! He was ready to give up and try again, and quit on His people, but Moses stepped up. He goes to bat for his fellow Israelites and pleads for them to God, asking Him to have mercy. They are His people. God backs off and relents. His people were ticking God off, but in the end, He knew that they were His. They were His own creation and He had a covenant. Part of me also wonders if this was simply a test for Moses.
So when I think of being a parent, and what I have yet to experience. Of the tests to come. It’s a challenge. It’s a challenge to raise a good Catholic man in today’s world. Heck, it’s a challenge being a good Catholic man in today’s world. And so often it’s frustrating, and you just want to lose your cool. But there are others, friends and relatives, strangers, that step up and help you to see the big picture. Often it’s subtle. And you know what? It is good. It’s all good.
But there will surely be tests in the future. My son’s only eight now, there is still an innocence. There will be years, not too far off, where that innocence will be lost. He will have to deal with real world problems. Will the boy I raise now be able to handle those real world problems, perhaps before he truly becomes a man himself?
Will he be the stable, mature, and responsible one, to stay behind and do what is expected? Or will he be the one to want to live the wild side, and squander all he has been given and fall into an abyss of darkness? Or will he be somewhere in between?
I’ve had the pleasure of writing about the Parable of the Prodigal Son twice before. The first time, I wrote about the prodigal son. Why would you not? He is the focal point of the story. The prodigal son is in all of us. The second time, I wrote about the other son. Even though he stayed behind and was responsible, he had some issues himself. He was envious of his brother, and he was filled with resentment.
So today, it’s from the father’s perspective. What was the father thinking all this time? Surely there were times with both his sons, but especially the wild one, when he was just fed up! And then when the one son asked for his inheritance and then left – the father must have felt like a failure. He must have thought, what did I do wrong? Where did I make mistakes in raising him that caused him to behave like this?
God must ask this about each of us from time to time. And so the father probably turned to the one thing that he could think of – prayer. He surely prayed not only for his son to be safe and to come home one day, but I’m sure he prayed for strength, and patience, and acceptance, and forgiveness to handle all of this. I know I would.
He must have been sick with pain and heartache. Perhaps this is how God often feels about us. He waits and waits for us to return. Just as the father did. The thing is, the father saw his son before his son saw him, and he rushed to him and embraced him. He didn’t give him a chance to explain. He just showed him mercy. The only words his son gets out is words of repentance. He’s sorry. His father didn’t need an explanation. He just needed his son, his son who was sorry for leaving, for doing what he did, for how he acted. The fathers mercy overflowed.
Sound familiar? God waits for us. He waits to see us on the horizon. He patiently waits and when he sees us come over that hill, he runs to us, and embraces us. He doesn’t want an explanation. He knows why we do things. He just wants us to ask forgiveness, and run to Him in love.
But in our own lives, we’re not God. Even God got a little impatient with the Israelites, and all too often, we lose patience with our children, our spouse, and our fellow men and women. The father in the Gospel likely was impatient with his son.
But they kept persevering. And they were surely persistent in prayer. The father went to bat for his son, praying to God, asking Him to protect him and bring his son back to him. Moses lobbied to God for his fellow Israelites.
We need to go to bat for each other, and pray for one another. We need ask God to have mercy on those near us, especially those who we may be enemies with.
And we need to let Jesus go to bat for us. He gets us. He knows what it’s like to be us, and He sacrificed everything for us. We’ve got to be thankful for His mercy that comes to us, even though we may not deserve it. The father maybe thought he did not deserve to have his son back, and accepted that he may be forever lost. And so when he saw him on the horizon, he was so thankful and joyful that his son returned. His mercy overflowed.
God’s mercy fills us when we come back to Him, and it overflows when we have mercy on others.
Whether you are the father, the one who stayed behind, or the prodigal – forgive, and be forgiven. Love, and be loved.
God loves us like nothing else. Plea for His mercy, and let it flow.
EX 32:7-11, 13-14; PS 51; 1 TM 1:12-17; LK 15:1-32
