I sometimes sit quietly to ponder the parable of the prodigal son. It has personal meaning to me, it hits home!

The younger son was impetuous, selfish, self-centered. He wanted it all and he wanted it now.

He stupidly squandered all he had – his wealth, his talents, his gifts.

Deserted by his fair-weather friends, he spiralled into despondency, left to his own devices, meagre though they were. Humiliated, driven to despair, scratching through the mud for food, he likely considered suicide as the way out.

Yet, at his lowest ebb, his thoughts turned to home.

‘Home!’ This single word perhaps means more that any other words in the English language, other than ‘I love you.’

Home is where your heart is, the place where you weather all life’s little storms — and revel in the sunshine. Home is where you are you, magnified. Our homes say a lot about who we are—and what we think is important in life. Home and family are our nest, the centre of our life, the hub from which all our daily experiences extend. Our home and family are where we should feel most comfortable in the world. They determine how we make our life decisions; they shape our attitudes, our awareness, our self-esteem.

Coming home is the essence of being and belonging.

It is those thoughts of home, and of his father, that led the prodigal to take those tentative steps that led him back to where he belonged and into the arms of a tender, loving father – a father who did not even stop to think about forgiveness for his son; it was already given, without any thought.

Spiritual writer Henri Nouwen suggests the story of the prodigal son is a story about returning.

Throughout my own life journey, I have so often drifted away from the love of God and into a wayward existence, with its highs and lows. Or I get so caught up in the busyness of being busy, that I forget to pause and turn to God.

Yet, the homeward pull is always there. I have to return home to my first love.

It is a lifelong struggle – this desire to return home. And yet, the Father is always there (here) with his total, unconditional and abundantly generous love. He greets me home with a bear hug that warms my entire being.

Generally, the word ‘home’ leads us to think in terms of a physical structure, a house. Yet, there is another dimension.

In “Counting the Cost” C S Lewis, the Irish author and scholar known for his work on Christian apologetics, and for his children’s series The Chronicles of Narnia, said this: “Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently he starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of – throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.”

Paul confirms that we are indeed a dwelling place for God.  “… in him you also are being built together into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.” [Ephesians 2:22]

“We love (God) because he first loved us.” [1 John 4:19]. No matter where I roam – or how often – my thoughts always turn to home. I must return.

For, it is when I am at home that I am loved. God always loves me. St Paul assures: “… there is nothing in all Creation that will ever be able to separate us from the love of God which is ours through Christ Jesus our Lord” [Romans 8:39].

It takes a heap of living to make a house a home. When you’ve lived long enough to have filled a house with love, then it becomes a ‘home’.

Proverbs teaches, “By wisdom a house is built, by understanding it is established; and by knowledge its rooms are filled with every precious and pleasing possession” [24:3-4].

“Come, let us return to the LORD … as certain as the dawn is his coming. He will come to us like the rain, like spring rain that waters the earth” [Hosea 6: 1,3].

My home is filled with love – the Father lives there. I am home.

Have a golden day and treasure life!