I was really excited to read yesterday that my football team Cardiff City had signed Aaron Ramsey for one month from Arsenal. Ramsey is only 20 years old and started his career at Cardiff before signing for Arsenal for £5million in 2008. His career was progressing wonderfully, and he looked like becoming one of the top world players, before being dealt a severe blow last February sustaining a horrific broken leg.
He has had a long roads to recovery and has already had a loan spell at another club. However, Arsenal feel he needs more match experience before he can play for them again so have sent him to Cardiff, who happily receive one of their most talented youngsters ever.
When transfers like this happen with players going to their old club the English Press often call refer to the Parable of the Prodigal Son.
The Lost Son is one of my favourite passages in the Bible and Jesus told it in Luke 15.
Basically a son decides that he is fed up of waiting for his father to die, asks for his inheritance (a HUGE insult even now let alone back then) and wastes it on 'living life to the full'. When his money runs out and his 'friends' desert him he is feeding pigs and wishing he had what the pigs had for food. He then realises that his fathers servants have better than this and decides to go and ask if he could come back as a servant.
His father sees him far off and runs (an undignified thing to do in Jewish culture) to greet him and hug him and forgives him and throws a big party for him, restoring him to his old position.
The word parable sounds like the word parallel and just like parallel mean a double lines, a parable means a story with a double meaning. The first meaning is above, a nice story about the forgiveness of a father to his wayward son.
The second meaning is this. We are like the son. God is the Father. God has given us our lives and we have thrown His gift back into His face by our sin. Going our way, we can never be truly happy and always wish we could have what other people have. But when we return to God and ask for forgiveness, He embraces us! He runs to us and restores back to perfection before Him and we will have one big celebration in Heaven.
Please message me if you want to know more about this or have any questions about God.
Hi Mike,
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing your thoughts. I love the story about the prodigal too - it shows that no one is outside God's love. I think you can argue from it too, that God is always on the lookout for us, not ignoring us when we go our own way, but actively seeking and looking for us, ready to welcome us when we turn back.
Thanks for your comment Sian :)
ReplyDeleteI think you are right. The Father saw him from a distance, I bet he was looking out of the same window every day! This parable is one of three spoken at once by Jesus and the Parable of the Lost Coin & the Lost Sheep also show that God is always on the lookout for us :)