God's Extravagant Love Allows U-Turns.

How wonderful the love of God is. Can anybody really love like God? It is indeed true that He does not want any of us to perish so He is very patient with us. This love is so unlike the love of any other. He just loves us and I thank Him for that.

This love is expressed in the story of the prodigal son. The son decided to be silly so he left home. As far as he was concerned, he had come to the point in his life when he did not need any form of support and/or control. After having enjoyed the goodness of this father for so long, He decided to leave and amazingly, he left with all of his inheritance. I would have thought that a man that wants to stay away from His father would have amassed his own wealth. Worse still, he knew his father needed the help he provided by working with him but he was too preoccupied with self to care about the pain he caused other people.

The father loved him enough to truly give him his inheritance and he left. He forgot to connect with the invisible inheritance (spiritual gift from the father) but was well connected to what he had and could touch – money. Of course as it is with money, it ran out. Money does have wings and it flies especially when God is not with you. It does not matter how much of it one has, it still can fly. After suffering for a while, the bible says:

Luke 15: 17 – 19 NLT “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself…..I will go home to my father and say, “father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant”

It is the goodness and love of God that brings us back to our senses. It is not the easiest thing to come back to one’s senses. The devil does not want us to come back to our senses neither does the flesh because it is somewhat humiliating. It takes the grace of a loving God for one to return to one’s senses. If we can come back to our senses and then return to the point where we took the wrong turn, then we are blessed.

Let us be encouraged to make that turn around that turns our lives around truly for good. It is never too late to make that turnaround and return to God. Coming to one’s senses usually provokes repentance and restitution where necessary. It may be tough but it has the power to put us back on the right path with God and for our lives. You may have lost some things because there will surely be consequences for your action but there will still be something left for you.

God in His love took Him back with all he had done and loved Him as if he had never done anything. What manner of love is this?

1 John 3: 1a NLT “See how very much our father loves us, for He calls us His children, and that is what we are!”