a few thoughts i don't want to stop wrestling with

Just pondering Luke 15 a bit... we touched on it this past week, including its famous story of the loving Father, the prodigal son, and the blind brother. Check it out HERE.

• The Father is really who the Story is about - even though his rebellious offspring usually gets the headline. Without the Father's love there would be no return home, and without Father's standard there could be no rebellion (this is more than a "grace" passage - it's a holiness passage, too). In fact, without the Father there could be no sons.
  
  I wonder how often you and I forget that.
  
  
• The rebellious son squandered what he thought was freedom until he realized he was not free... quite the opposite - he was now stuck.
  
  I wonder how often you and I mistake the two.
  
  
• The blind brother couldn't see past his own story, and since no one was throwing him a party he made a little pity party all on his own.
  
  I wonder how often you and I live in small stories full of pity parties instead of larger stories full of parties we throw for other people.

So what might happen if you and I...

• Kept the Father first?
• Didn't confuse freedom with rebellion?
• Stopped letting our lives be about small stories?

Now, if you're like me you may have just read those questions and moved on to read this sentence. So I'd like to ask you instead to go back and let those questions sink into the deeper places of your mind, heart, and soul. Don't be quick to answer them with the usual reply... rather, consider what an answer to those questions might look like if you:

1. Took those questions seriously, and...
2. Let those questions take you to serious places without you getting to decide what it looks like.