SOAPS of last week 10/2/08

[skburton]

Hi - I hope that this post will revitalize this group as the last
post was in 2008. I was very excited to find this on the Church's
website since I am at my computer about 8 hours per day.. this group
would be very helpful for me..

But anyway, as I did my SOAPS this week, I was particularly struck by
the lost son.. I have always heard this preached more as a way to
describe God's reaction to someone coming to Jesus.. which I am sure
it is. But as I prayed and thought, I realized that this was also
describing me. I have been a Christian for almost 30 years and I had
grown distant, failing to pray, failing to read, failing to attend
Church. A couple of years ago, God began to call me back to him, I
did not realize that I was so far away until he called and it was so
very hard to hear his voice. The lost son WAS a son.. he was not an
outsider, he was a part of the family.. like me. He took the
inheritance from his Father and went and squandered it on riotous
living.. just as I had taken the Spiritual gifts that God had given me
and spent them on useless, unprofitable things. He came to his senses
and thought, why am I doing this ? Why am I here in this foreign
country, starving to death ? Again, just as I was when God came to
get me. The son decided, I will return to my Fathers house, and
there, I will be able to once again eat and live. I know I have given
up any right to be called his son, so I will go as a servant. I was
so struck by this.. this was ME. This was also reinforced by Dale's
message today.. the part about him driving around the old
neighborhood with his dad, remembering his old, familiar stomping
grounds.. that too, is ME.. Thanks be to God, I am on the way back
to my Father's house.. I am near the old stomping grounds that I
remember fondly, but I am not yet withing the four walls of my
Father's house.. I will know that I am back firmly within my
Father's house when it is like it was before, without any religious-
ness or any pre-thought on my part; the last thought I have as I lay
down to sleep is "Good night, Lord" and the first thought I have upon
awakening the next day is "Good morning Lord". It used to be that
way. I want it to be that way again..I am approaching my Father's
house again and I think I hear feet running to meet me...