God Counts Different Than Us
Scripture Reading: Luke 15
Key Verse: Luke 15:10
“In the same way, there is joy in the presence of God’s angels when even one sinner repents.”
Today’s devotion brings us to the most known parable of Jesus. We call it the Parable of the Prodigal Son.
Jesus pointed to the one theme we’ve been studying by this powerful story of a father that had two sons. The younger son wanted his inheritance early, and the father granted his wish. The older son stayed with the father and help him run the farm. The younger son soon spent all his money on riotous living.
Finally, after having to get a job on a pig farm and being so hungry he was eating the pods meant for the pigs, this young man devised a plan for his recovery. He felt that he could convince his father to let him be a hired hand on his farm. He figured he would have it better as a hired hand than on his father’s farm than he had it on the pig farm. This was his plan. It was the best that he could imagine for his future.
Most of us do similar mental planning when we are up against a problem. We come up with some plans that seem to better our situation. However, our Father in Heaven, always can find a better way, even when we can’t see any way!
This younger son walked back to his father’s farm. As you probably know, his father saw him coming from a distance. The father was filled with love and compassion for his son, even though he knew that his son didn’t do what was right.
This is indeed the high point of Jesus’s parable, a father having love and compassion for a sinful and rebellious son! That is exactly how Jesus wants us to think of our heavenly Father, one who doesn’t hold our sinful and rebellious attitudes against us, but lovingly and compassionately open’s His arms to us!
Jesus said the father ran to his son before the son could get to the farm, telling the servants to bring the finest robe to put on his son and sandals for his feet. He immediately planned a great celebration for this son’s return.
Again, our Father in Heaven loves to lavish us with His love, and He loves to give good gifts to us! And, we must not forget, our Father does all this for us even though we are totally unworthy of such love, such lavish gifts! For most of us, it isn’t easy to truly believe that our Father can love us in spite of our many faults and failures. We’ll never enjoy our relationship with God until we resist the lies of the evil one and believe in God’s great love for us!
Tomorrow’s devotion studies the older brother’s attitude toward his brother’s return. This is important because many of us look more like the older brother than the younger!
Father, with your help, I will resist the lies of the evil one and rejoice in your love and grace toward me! I pray all this in Jesus’s Name, amen.