Beginnings: God on a dirt road walking toward me
Chapter 1 completed! (I hope reading it in real-time this morning wasn't too awkward..? I for one couldn't seem to relax and just read. :-) We discussed Miller's (and our) perceptions of God; and began to compare them with the father figure in Jesus' parable of the Prodigal Son
in Luke 15 (esp. v. 20). James asked, "what does 'PRODIGAL' mean anyway?" Maybe that'll turn into another post here.
[Update Feb. 6: here's the painting we discussed, Rembrandt's "Return of the Prodigal Son" (click to enlarge); and an excerpt from Henri Nouwen's reflections on it.]
What thoughts have you found yourself chewing on as a result of the chapter or the conversation?
For next Sunday: "Blue Like Jazz" chapters 2, 3, and 4 (35pp. in all). We'll (somehow!) condense one full page of the study guide into 45 minutes of conversation.
4 comments:
Prodigal:
1.wastefully or recklessly extravagant: prodigal expenditure.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/prodigal
That's interesting. I tend to think of prodigal in terms of his coming back to the father and being reconciled, not in terms of his sins. So you can be prodigal and never go home. You can continue feeding those pigs and eating their slop.... I'd rather go home.
Thanks for doing your homework, James! Interesting. I agree with you, Suvia. I thought prodigal had much more to do with the son's return than what he did when he was away. I guess I was using "once was lost but now is found" as a sort of synonym for prodigal.
And, now, a related but sort of un-related thought that I had today...
I've been studying Yancey's "What's so amazing about grace?" and fell in love with this quote:
"God in heaven holds each person by a string. When you sin, you cut the string. Then God ties it up again, making a knot - and thereby bringing you a little closer to thim. Again and again your sins cut the string - and with each further knot God keeps drawing you closer and closer."
I like how this image augments my understanding of God's grace for his prodigal children and all of the other images we were exposed to yesterday - the slot-machine God, the toddler reaching his arms up to his father, etc.
Re James:
Definitions #2 and 3 are also quite interesting:
2. Giving or yielding profusely; lavish (usually fol. by of or with): prodigal of smiles; prodigal with money.
3. Lavishly abundant; profuse: nature's prodigal resources.
To the examples of use for #2, I could add "prodigal with love" or "prodigal of grace." For #3, "God's prodigal forgiveness"
Looking at the Rembrandt painting, "Prodigal Son," I am taken by how much of a "prodigal" the father is in lavishing his abundant love, grace and forgiveness on his "wasteful and recklessly extravagant" son who has returned to him.
This quote from Henri Nouwen's short book, "The Return of the Prodigal Son," in which he describes his observations about Rembrandt's painting, is wonderful:
"The longer I look at 'the patriarch', the clearer it becomes to me that Rembrandt has done something quite different from letting God pose as the wise old head of a family. It all began with the hands. The two are quite different. The father's left hand touching the son's shoulder is strong and muscular. The fingers are spread out and cover a large part of the prodigal son's shoulder and back. I can see a certain pressure, especially in the thumb. That hand seems not only to touch, but, with its strength, also to hold. Even though there is a gentleness in the way the father's left hand touches his son, it is not without a firm grip.
"How different is the father's right hand! This hand does not hold or grasp. It is refined, soft, and very tender. The fingers are close to each other and they have an elegant quality. It lies gently upon the son's shoulder. It wants to caress, to stroke, and to offer consolation and comfort. It is a mother's hand...."
"As soon as I recognized the difference between the two hands of the father, a new world of meaning opened up for me..."
http://www.bridges-across.org/ba/nouwen.htm
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