I never related very well to the parable of the prodigal. I heard people amazed that the father ran to meet the prodigal and that the prodigal was unworthy. Those things I got, but… so? My own parents were distant growing up in some ways. I’m not sure they would have run, but they’d have welcomed me, even if through slightly gritted teeth.
But… I’ve recently become acquainted with a couple who fosters kids. They’ve had their current fosters since before the pandemic, and their fosters will be adopted soon. And the man has been crying all week. Every time someone asks how he is, every time someone asks about the kids, he chokes up. They aren’t his kids. He’s know they were only there temporarily. That they’re being adopted is great for the kids, and he has said so, but still, this has been a really hard transition for him.
I’ve watched him with those kids. I’ve watched him live in the moment with them, and watched him choke up when the kids won’t see. It’s hard for him to see them go, hard knowing they will be moving away. There’ll be an emptiness in this couple’s lives when those kids are gone, and their own grief is as real as their love for the kids.
If he were the father in that parable I would understand why he was running – not just to welcome him back, but because he missed them and he loves them, no matter what they do, no matter where they are. If this man were the father, and he saw one of his fosters – not even his own kids – coming toward him, he’d run, and no one who knows him would be surprised at that. Not at all. No matter what they’d done, no matter where they were, he’d run to them if they ever needed him, and he wouldn’t ever consider them “unworthy” (like I was taught from the story of the prodigal). He wouldn’t, and neither did the father in the story. They’d be the first to remind them of their worth, not because of what they’d done or not done, but simply because they are.
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