The Father's Love

We believe Jesus came to save us from our sins, but if we only stay focused on this, we miss the profound reason of the story of the Father’s love for us. Saving us from our sins was never His ultimate purpose. His greatest purpose was to bring us home to the Father.

The story of the Prodigal Son isn’t only about a son who sinned and required forgiveness. It’s primarily about a son who left home, took his rightful inheritance, and lived his life as if his father didn’t even exist. When he had finally squandered his inheritance on sinful behavior, the Bible states that he came to his senses and headed home.

The Father wasn’t waiting for his son with “I told you so.” He didn’t watch for his son’s return determining what would be expected of him. No! The Father had been longingly looking for his son’s return for a long time. One day he saw his son in the distance coming home. The Father didn’t hesitate. He ran to him. He didn’t walk. He joyously ran. He threw his arms around him before he could complete his prepared apology. The Father didn’t need to hear anything. The son that had been lost was now found. The son who had been dead to him now lived again.

This is the love of the Father Jesus brought to you. He’s not waiting to beat you up because you left home and squandered your life in sin. He doesn’t require for you to appease Him so you can come to him. He’s not a Father who loves you in proportion to how good you are. He doesn’t wait for you to get your life together before He comes to you. He’s your Father who sees you in the distance struggling home, and runs to you.

Many today have constructed their faith on a God who bears no resemblance to the Father depicted in this story. Instead, their faith is built on a God who judges how well they manage their sin. They see God as distant and needing to be approached carefully and in the right way. They see God’s love as just beyond reach until they have done enough to be eligible for it. God’s love is the power that casts out our fear, but this image of God produces fear and a striving that doesn’t please Him. It creates believers who are worn out from trying to overcome a separation that no longer exists. The separation was never on the Father’s side. The separation was on the son’s side. We, like the son in the story, left home, and moved away.

“If you have seen me,” Jesus said, “you have seen the Father.” Jesus died for us when no one else would. He ran to us.  Jesus mirrored the Father’s true nature. Jesus is how we can know the loving nature of our Father.

The cross wasn’t God deciding to punish Jesus so that He could finally love us. No, God has always loved us. The cross was the love of God destroying everything that separated us from Him. It was His love reaching its utmost for our lowest. It was the ultimate love of the Father, wiping out every barrier between a son and his Father. 

Coming home isn’t impossible. Jesus says that he’s the way, the truth, and the life. He’s the way home. He’s the one who shows you what home looks like, and the one who takes you there. Home is the Father. It’s knowing the Father, being known by Him, and trusting Him with everything within you. It’s trusting Him without the fear that He will withdraw His love from you. Home is resting in the knowledge that your Father sees you, knows you, and loves you, not because of what you do, but because of who you are.

Yes, Jesus came to give us forgiveness and a way to heaven. Yes, He came to give us freedom from sin, but the ultimate purpose was a restored relationship with the Father. Jesus gave us the Father Himself. The Christian life isn’t proving to God you have a reason to come home. It’s accepting that Jesus is the reason you can. It’s learning to believe that God created us to receive His love. It’s believing that His love is genuine, allowing that truth to penetrate every hidden place within us, and letting the Father to be as good as Jesus showed us He is. 

When you truly perceive the love of the Father, everything transforms. You cease striving to attain what you already possess, cease fleeing the One you were created to pursue, cease managing the distance, and simply return home. 

You run to Jesus because you know He’s already run to you.