Jesus, you welcome us and eat with us even though we are sinners. You teach us and call us to do the same.
We give you good reason not to welcome us and eat with us. And yet here you are. You are so good to us. You give us so much. You give us material blessings. You give us the gifts of your holy Church. You fill us with your Spirit and guide us into all truth. It is you yourself who hold us in being. Without you, poof, we are nothing.
But somehow, for some reason, we collect our belongings and set off for a distant country. We don't understand your love and so we don't want to give you any say in what with due with our share of the estate. This is why we go to a distant country. We can't just spend the inheritance nearby. We need to be so far away that we believe you can't see us.
We may not be into gambling and prostitutes. Our dissipation may look very different from that of the younger son. But while those are extreme ways to abuse your gifts of property, intimacy, and love we too abuse your gifts. We receive your own divine life into our souls. But then we go off and live day to day with no reference to this life. You call us to generosity, to service and love, to evangelism and fervor. We know this, which is why we head to a far distant country. We put distance between the our secular lives and our Sunday lives. We come before you Sunday. We come before you at prayer time. But when we are living day to day are we not far from you?
No wonder we aren't satisfied with our worldly ambitions. Apart from you they all leave a bitter taste in our mouths because we know, deep inside our souls, that you call us to more. And we know that the more to which you call us is also much better!
When he had freely spent everything,
a severe famine struck that country,
and he found himself in dire need.
So he hired himself out to one of the local citizens
who sent him to his farm to tend the swine.
And he longed to eat his fill of the pods on which the swine fed,
but nobody gave him any.
We hunger, LORD! Teach us that our hunger is for you! And guide us to return to you. You welcome sinners and eat with us if we will just join you at your table.
So he got up and went back to his father.
While he was still a long way off,
his father caught sight of him, and was filled with compassion.
He ran to his son, embraced him and kissed him.
Jesus, you are kind and merciful. No matter the distance we put between you and ourselves we still find that you welcome us back with compassion. You pardon our iniquities, you heal our ills, and you redeem our life from the destruction toward which it spirals inevitably without you. Even though the distance between us may be great you want to put our sins even farther away.
As far as the east is from the west,
so far has he put our transgressions from us.
Jesus, teach us to treasure what we have when we are with you so that we don't ever feel the need to wander off. The older brother persists in your physical proximity but he does not know what he has in you. Just like the younger brother he is unaware of the greatness of your love.
My son, you are here with me always;
everything I have is yours
Jesus, teach us to rejoice when you rejoice. We may be near you but if we are still so concerned about what is ours we won't be able to welcome the people you want us to welcome. Our hearts won't be ready to eat with other sinners just like ourselves. You show us that we should rejoice and celebrate whenever anyone discovers the greatness of your love. We ourselves share in the greatness of this love and so every new reminder of it should bring us joy. You tell us to rejoice always (cf. The. 5:16) because the depths of your love cannot be fully known (cf. Eph. 3:19).
We are all sheep who need our shepherd. We need your staff to guide us us lest we wander off toward wolves. You want to show us wonderful signs, LORD. Renew your wonders! You want to give us the fullness of our inheritance. So let us stay near to you in our hearts and not just our bodies. As more and more people come to you may we rejoice with ever greater joy to realize just how great you are.
For as the heavens are high above the earth,
so surpassing is his kindness toward those who fear him.
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