Inheritance

 And since we are his children, we are his heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory. But if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering.  Romans 8:17  "God wants us to have everything He has." Dudley Hall

One of the great tragedies in Jesus' story of The Prodigal Son is the son's squandering of his inheritance. He took his father's riches but had no real understanding or appreciation for how vast and wonderful those riches were. His father had meant for them to sustain and bless him throughout his life, but in his ignorance and self-destructive behavior, all of it ran through his hands like water. He ended up a pauper, in a pig pen, eating pig food. 

Paul spoke much of the riches we have in Jesus Christ. Peace, joy, hope, and infinitely more. Romans 8:17 points to that with a beauty and wonder that all eternity will be needed to even begin to comprehend its depth. Yet, have we even begun to comprehend it? Are we, who are His sons and daughters by faith in Christ, living more like the prodigal, squandering, wasting, and losing those riches by our neglect, our waywardness, and our selfish choices? 

In my prayer journal I have written the statement, "Father, may we not let our wonderful inheritance slip out of our hands." I fear too many of us are doing just that. We're squandering our inheritance in Him by our behaviors, our attitudes, and our lifestyles. We have an inheritance of riches in Him meant not to just enhance and bless our lives, but the lives of others as well. The value of that inheritance can't be measured, but like the prodigal who had no understanding of what it was his father had given him, we also are ignorant of what it is we have been given in Jesus Christ. So we live in ways that more often than not lead us to our own kind of pig pen, eating the same kind of pig food. Our inheritance in Him slips out of our hands, squandered. Yet there is hope.

A man or a woman may recklessly throw away their earthly fortune and inheritance and have it irrevocably lost. It does not have to be so with our heavenly one. It was in the pig pen that the prodigal came to understand what it was he had done and what he had lost. In the pig pen, his heart went back to the father he'd forgotten and the life he'd had with him. In his suffering, he remembered the one who loved him beyond words. He began his journey home, willing to be a hired man in his father's household. Humbled, he expected nothing, but his father, whose heart had been seeking his return all along, ran to him, embraced him, and dressed him in a beautiful robe. He was restored. 

We're not told as to just how the restoration unfolded for him, but clearly, the son was restored to the household and would have access to all his father's wealth. I feel very sure that never again did he squander a bit of it. Never again did any of it slip out of his hands. In the pain of his suffering he came to realize the depth of the riches he had lost. Oftentimes, most times, it takes the same for us.

If you're a son or daughter of the King, you have an inheritance in Christ. All that He has is made yours as well. Are you squandering it? Is it slipping through your fingers through ignorance, neglect, and sinful choices? If so, the pig pen and its food awaits. It needn't be so. He lavishes His riches. Don't waste or miss them. Walk in the blessing. Be a blessing.  Know the depth of the riches to be had in Christ the King.

Blessings,
Pastor O