Learn about heaven’s kingdom realm with the wide-eyed wonder of a child… Matthew 18:3 (TPT)
Pursuit of Truth and Beauty – Hunger Series – Part 4
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One could argue that hunger drove the prodigal son away from home. An insatiable curiosity to explore and taste and experience. And then one could argue that it was another kind of hunger that led him home. I know this isn’t the usual reading of the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15), but it takes a certain kind of father to allow his children to learn their own lessons about hunger and longing… And be willing and waiting with love and acceptance on either end of the journey.
And perhaps the parable has something to teach us parents and guides and teachers about how to lead those we are responsible for. Did the father in this parable get it wrong? Should he have been as willing to give his son what he asked for?
I’ve written about this parable before; you can find the series back here. It’s one of my favorites.
But I digress.
If your kids are anything like mine or anything like we all were as mini humans, they are insatiable, endlessly, hungry. My son is seven and a half and inhales everything in sight. Anything that resembles food goes into his mouth. Same with my five-year-old daughter.
Not just food, but they are hungry for knowledge, itching to learn. They long to have their imaginations stretched and they crave new adventures. So many sentences begin with: where, what, when, how, and why. They look at the world with eyes and hearts larger than the largest dinner plates on earth. They want to touch, see and TASTE it all.
Maybe Jesus was thinking of this when he said:
“Learn this well: Unless you dramatically change your way of thinking and become teachable, and learn about heaven’s kingdom realm with the wide-eyed wonder of a child, you will never be able to enter in. Whoever continually humbles himself to become like this gentle child is the greatest one in heaven’s kingdom realm.” Matt 18:3-4 (TPT).
As I went from adolescent to young adult to ‘early twenty-something' to ‘I must really be an adult now cos I have kids and a mortgage,’ I discovered disappointment. When you’re young, innocence and ignorance have a way of vibrantly coloring the world. Because you don’t know what’s out there, you paint up for yourself what you think it could be. But as you grow and learn and discover what really is out there and how things really work, the picture can end up looking and being different than you imagined it to be; than you hoped and believed it to be. It’s easy to trade our hunger, longing, and yearning for settling, getting and using.
It’s not so much that the world is fundamentally dull and disappointing, but that we forget to keep wonder alive even when disappointment comes. When we discover the deep darkness and sharp corners that do exist, we close ourselves off in case we discover more of it. The challenge of adult life is to be as curious and insatiable as a child. That is the great work of faith; when we can stare darkness and cruel reality in the face and imagine what could be on the other side as if healing and redemption do actually exist.
Albert Einstein said:
“The pursuit of truth and beauty is a sphere of activity in which we are permitted to remain children all our lives.”
Sometimes you’ll discover disappointment.
Sometimes you’ll make mistakes.
Sometimes you’ll feel like a prodigal.
Or the father/mother/brother/sister/friend of one.
Stay hungry.
(Stay woke.)
Go to The Deepest, Truest Sense – Hunger Series – Part 5
Written by Liz Milani