A new spin on the past

by Inge Schmidt

The prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32) is a familiar and favorite Bible story for many people. And really, what’s not to love? The story has all the makings of a quality television drama-a family torn apart by wealth and greed, a father who unconditionally loves his sons, arrogance and repentance, and let’s not forget riotous living!

But even better, the prodigal son has a spiritual moral that we can all relate to. How many times have we been the prodigal son, consumed in materiality in its various forms, only to hit rock bottom and realize that there is a better way if we’re willing to turn ourselves around?

And how many of us have had the experience of following the straight and narrow path of the elder son, and found ourselves jealous and angry when the troublemaker brother comes home and gets a party?

I know I’ve played both parts at different points in my life. I have to confess, though, that when the story of the prodigal son appeared in the recent Bible Lesson on Everlasting Punishment, I read the story thinking to myself, “Yep, great story, don’t be arrogant and prideful, don’t get consumed by materiality, but hey, God loves me either way.” By Wednesday, I felt a sense of dissatisfaction. The story was comforting in its familiarity, but I was craving something more.

I study the Bible Lesson each day because it always gives me new ideas to work with, fresh insights into understanding God and my relationship to Him. So what about a seemingly stale story? I affirmed that Bible Lesson was my spiritual daily bread (see Matt 6:11) that couldn’t go stale, and went about my day.

As I walked to class that morning, I found myself thinking about all sorts of moments in my past that I was less than proud of-moments where I had been unkind or unloving. I thought about a falling out with a friend, a relationship gone bad, and the list went on. Over the course of the last year or so, I’ve been doing some serious mental housekeeping, and had cleaned up both my actions and thought. I’d seen a great deal of healing and those experiences felt so distant, like they hadn’t even been my experiences, so I was surprised to be even thinking about them again.

But there they were, and the more I thought about them, the more they started to seem real and a part of me again. Suddenly, the rapid replay of these negative experiences was paused. A different thought came to me, “What happened to the prodigal son after the party ended the night he came home?”

Now that might seem like a kind of random thought to have pop into your mind. But I’ve realized that it was an angel message, the Christ present and acting on my behalf. I was immediately able to get out from under the barrage of those negative thoughts, which were making me doubt my own progress and become self-critical and unloved. And I began to search for an answer to that question.

At first, I was discouraged. Sure, the prodigal son came home and his father was happy to see him, but after that party was over, I was pretty sure he had a lot to work out. After all, I had walked away from my various prodigal moments and felt that unconditional and redeeming love from our Father-Mother God, but here they were still haunting me.

Fortunately, another one of those angel messages came to me, this time a line from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, “…the belief in sin is punished, so long as the belief lasts.” If the first angel message intrigued me, this angel message just confused me. How did it relate to the question? I put aside my human reasoning, and just turned wholeheartedly to God, trusting that He knew what He was doing and would show me exactly what I needed to understand. And He sure did. Like watching someone put a jigsaw puzzle together; the thoughts just came one by one, and pieced together to form a big, clear picture.

I realized that the party only had to end if the son went back to sinning. When the prodigal son returned home, his father had no interest in hearing his stories, or even hearing his apologies. Humanly, that seems like an awfully tall order-total and complete forgiving and forgetting. The father identified his son correctly-as the active expression of spiritual qualities, which couldn’t be wasted away. When the son returned home, he changed the way he identified himself. He turned away from his sin-identifying himself as a greedy materialist-and left the lifestyle behind. He returned to a higher understanding of himself, as spiritual, loved, and pure. He left the belief of sin behind-and in doing so, no longer suffered the consequences. I’m now convinced the party wasn’t a one time event for a few hours that evening, but a constant celebration of the son’s spiritual goodness by the father, the son, and all the guests.

So what does all this have to do with my experience that Wednesday? Well, to start with, I realized that I had accepted those negative memories as real parts of my past. I knew that I would never make those mistakes again, but I still accepted that they had happened and had consequences. But in doing so, I was sinning (misunderstanding myself and God), and as a result, I was suffering-feeling anxious, worried, regretful-all those negative things.

I realized I had the same opportunity as the prodigal son. I could stop misidentifying myself with this mortal history, and start identifying myself correctly-as the spiritual idea of God, perfect, pure, and innocent. All those negative thoughts were what Ms. Eddy calls aggressive mental suggestions. It didn’t matter what tense the verb was, they were still just suggestions. And I could right then and there reject the suggestions-stop the riotous living-and join my Father-Mother God in celebrating the beauty and goodness and perfection of myself and all of creation. Even more importantly, I deserved to stay at that party. And party I did.

As I fell asleep that night, I sang with gratitude and mentally danced with joy for all that I had learned that day. I couldn’t wait to wake up and read the Bible Lesson and the section about the prodigal son again the next day!

This entry was posted on Friday, November 16th, 2007 at 9:18 am and is filed under Bible Related. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response.