The Prodigal God. The Feast

 Hi everyone, Happy Thursday's Child on Sunday. I didn't intentionally decide to write this today but it seemed appropriate since this coming Thursday is Thanksgiving in the United States, and after I was freshening up on The Feast in the Prodigal Son story and the Prodigal God book, I didn't completely agree with how it was described in the book. I had listened to a couple of videos on the teachings of Edgar Casey, The Sleeping Prophet. He has very similar teachings to Paramahansa Yogananda, so my brain wasn't exactly ready write since I still needed to put my thoughts in order. The Christian community focuses on the feast as something to we can look forward to after we die. I'm sure there are some mainstream Protestant churches that will talk about experiencing God in a joyous, bliss-like, feast state of mind, but having been in a few denominations the norm is, with that story, to see us as wandering away from God, having hardship, saying to ourselves "yikes this sucks" and coming back to God asking forgiveness. I've also been in more Pentecostal type churches that are more comfortable with experiencing God than just superficially teaching about God in a history format. 

Yoganada and Edgar Casey teach experiencing God now. Have a meditation time. Be still and know that I am God. The feast is now. The Kingdom Of Heaven Is Within. We never seem to make time to sit and meditate. I've also heard not everybody is suited to sit cross legged for 10 minutes or longer. Some of us will start to focus on our legs hurting. A chair is ok, as long as the back is straight. I like to sit on the steps in our pool. Whatever allows you to let your mind drift off and dismiss the thoughts that arise is the way that works best for you. 

My partner in life Andrea started reading a book by Richard Rohr called Preparing For Christmas Daily Meditations For Advent. Richard Rohr is a Franciscan Priest in New Mexico. He also has similar teachings to Yogananda and Edgar Casey. He's a good example of a modern Christian who teaches outside the mainstream Christian cookie cutter dogma. When I read the first one the heading is "Come Lord Jesus." It talks about how people, even Christians, are living in emptiness waiting for Jesus. In Advent we're focusing on the baby Jesus when we should be looking at why Jesus came in the first place. For us to experience the The Kingdom within. We're taught to live through drudgery and suffering and in the end we'll experience The Feast. 

One of the videos of Edgar Casey that I listened to this week talked about starting your day reading Psalm 23, Psalm 19, Psalm 32 and a couple of others. Not to just read them, but read them slowly. Let the words sink in. Think about how God takes care of us like a shepherd takes care of his sheep. Though we walk all day in a world that has a lot of ungodliness in it, He because God gives us strength when we focus on Him.

My hope is that you'll start today recognizing God in the good things that happen as you go about your day to day activities, and also the struggles that help you to see the lessons you're learning that turn your thoughts to God to give you strength through those struggles. 

Enjoy the feast of the blessings of God. If you're in the United States and you recognize Thanksgiving, have a thankful Thursday. No matter where you are lets all try to remember to be thankful daily for all God gives us, even the struggles that teach us and lead us back to His Feast.

I think we'll talk more about Richard Rohr's book as well as the act of salvation that I mentioned last week. Salvation will probably be the next Thursday's Child on the first week of December, unless I get distracted with something else God shows me has a higher priority. 😊😊

Have a great week and Keep Searching,

Paul  

Prodigal Brothers: A True Older Brother

 Hi Everyone, I hope everyone has had a good week and a warm one if you're in the United States. I saw that most of our country was getting some cold weather. In central Florida it has been colder than a normal November. For us it lasted 2 days and we're already back up to 70 degree days

Lets get into this weeks Thursday's Child. 

This week we'll talk a little more about the culture of that era. First lets get into the 2 parables that Jesus told before the Prodigal Son parable. Beginning in Luke 15 Jesus tells the story of a shepherd who has 100 sheep, and one gets lost. He asks the crowd of tax collectors, sinners and remember, the Pharisees are there as well, would they go and look for the lost sheep leaving the other 99? When that shepherd finds it he calls his friends and neighbors to come celebrate with him because what was lost now has been found. In the 2nd parable a woman has ten silver coins and has lost one. He asks again, wouldn't she light a lamp, sweep the floor and search carefully until she finds it? When she does, she calls her friends and neighbors to come celebrate, because what was lost has now been found. 

Jesus intentionally put these 2 scenarios before the Lost Son Parable. The shepherd went to look for his sheep. The woman went to look for her coin. Who went to look for the rebellious, disrespectful son? No one. Should someone have looked for him? Should someone have swept the countryside searching? Jesus knew the old testament. He was teaching the elders in the temple when He was 12. He absolutely knew the Torah. The books of Moses. After Cain killed Able God came and asked, Hey, where's your brother? Cain said "I don't know. Am I my brother's keeper?" God said "His blood is calling out to you from the ground." God was telling Cain that he absolutely was his brother's keeper. Now he will pay the price for killing him. No matter what he does the ground will not produce food for him any longer.

Without coming right out and saying it Jesus was letting the crowd figure out for themselves that the older brother should have gone to search for the younger brother. Maybe if he had he could have convinced him to come home without blowing all of his inheritance. Maybe he could have caught him before he was starving. Since he didn't, the younger brother came home on his own, the father forgave him and restored him back into the family. 

Why was the older brother so angry? Yes, now he inherits even less. This shows us that forgiveness comes with a price. In the United States on the day we honor soldiers that have died in war, it is frequently said "freedom isn't free." The younger son came home, was forgiven, and reinstated back into the family. He was now free. Free from poverty. Free from hunger. Free from suffering. But at what price? There has to be a price for forgiveness. The older brother was his keeper. He had to pay the price. He was angry because he was arrogant, self-righteous like a Pharisee and didn't think he should have to pay. In all scenarios when something is broken we think whoever broke it should pay for it. Either that or we forgive them and buy ourselves a new one. No matter what, somebody pays.

In the Lord's Prayer Jesus tells us to ask forgiveness as we forgive others. Jesus says on the cross "Father forgive them for they know not what they do." They didn't know what they were doing. Jesus taught a select few how to be in touch with their God self. Buddha Nature, Christ Consciousness. Jesus was so in touch with His God Self that he truly was able to conquer death. Jesus forgave and he instructs us to forgive. It is common to hear in churches that Jesus paid the price for our salvation. We'll talk about salvation at some point, but I think it is better said that Jesus paid the price to give us a lesson in forgiveness, to show us how to forgive at all costs. If somebody does us wrong we are to forgive. We are still human so forgetting is next to impossible. We also don't have to put ourselves in situations that continuously allow people to hurt us. 

To NOT forgive can affect us physically. There are stories of people having serious physical ailments because they held on to bitterness. Once they forgave, they instantly or gradually became healed. Forgiving gives us a release we can actually feel in our bodies. Literally like a weight being taken away. If there is something you're holding onto today, or someone you are having a hard time getting over something they've done to you, take some time in a quiet space, talk to God. It doesn't have to be some formal Thees, and Thous type of monologue. King David, who wrote Psalms used to yell at God. Just talk. Tell God what's on your mind. As Children of God we have inherited the right as family members to tell God what's on our mind. That inheritance comes with benefits like feasting at His table.

Next week we'll get into the feast the Father had for the younger son, and what that means for us.

Have a great week,

Keep Searching,

Paul

 

The Prodigal Brothers: Older Brother

 Hello everyone. I hope everyone has had a good week.

Welcome again to Thursday's Child

Continuing on with the book The Prodigal God by Timothy Keller, today we're going to look into the personality of the Older Brother and the issues that he had. First though lets understand who Jesus was talking to. The first 2 verses of Luke 15 says "the tax collectors and sinners drew near to Him (Jesus) to hear Him." The Pharisee and Scribes complained saying "This man receives them and eats with them." This means the Pharisees were there as well. The Pharisees were almost always always where Jesus was to try to catch Him doing something wrong. Since Jesus knew His audience He intentionally told this story.

To review, the younger brother came home after blowing all of his inheritance that he received after his father had to sell 1/3 of his land to give him. His father sees him down the road and runs to welcome him home and threw him a lavish party. The older brother gets to the house hears the music, sees the dancing, the feast in the dining room, blows a gasket and won't go inside. I get the image of when a cartoon character gets angry, their face turns red and smoke comes out of their ears. That's how angry you can imagine the older brother is. The father comes out to talk to him to persuade him to come inside but he refuses. He says, still my imagination, I work my butt off around here, do everything I'm suppose to do, barely so much as have a glass of wine or look at a girl, and HE pointing through the window at the party, makes you sell some land so he can get his inheritance early, disowns this family, goes and blows his money doing God knows what, and you welcome him back. NOW, I'll have even less inheritance because he'll get a third of what he left me with.

Without directly saying so, Jesus was letting the pharisees know they were like the older brother. The Pharisees complained about Jesus spending time and even eating with "sinners." The older brother acted all righteous complaining about the sinner younger brother, seeing his moral lifestyle as superior. By rejecting the father's request to come into the party he's portraying himself no better than the younger brother. Both brothers showed their lack of love for the father. The younger for flat out rejecting his family, and the older by rejecting the father thinking he was morally superior. 

As we look at this earthly father being in the role of our Heavenly Father, we can see how we sin against God by doing things that would obviously be wrong in the Father's eyes. What isn't as obvious is the holier than thou people thinking they're superior because they're in church every Sunday or every time the doors are open, teaching classes, raising their hands worshipping, yet they're looking down their noses at the girl who has a couple of little kids and no husband, or a full parking lot at a bar on Saturday night. But let them notice a guy walk out of that bar and the same guy come into church Sunday, or the girl with the kids, and see how they treat them, or the whispers they start about them.

Jesus is letting us know that the righteous that don't show love and compassion are no different than the blatant sinner that the righteous love to look down on. There were two other parables that Jesus told before this one that tie into this. We'll talk about these next week. 

Have a great week,

Keep Searching,

Paul 

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