Wandering

"Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love."

Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing, written by Robert Robinson

There is nothing like singing a good hymn on a Sunday morning.  There is also nothing better when you actually read the lyrics of a hymn and get something out of it.  I read through the lyrics of, "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing," and realize how good God's grace is to us.  

"Jesus sought me when a stranger,

Wandering from the fold of God;

He, to rescue me from danger,

Interposed His precious blood."

I was a stranger to God due to my sin; however, Jesus sought me.  Jesus died for me, though I was an enemy of God.  When after accepting Christ as my personal Savior, my heart will "prone to wander."  Again, Jesus seeks after me.  He doesn't want to just leave me.

So Jesus told them this story:  “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them gets lost, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others in the wilderness and go to search for the one that is lost until he finds it?  (Luke 15:3-4)

But that is not all.  I have to make the choice to turn around my life and go back to God, as well.  It's like the Parable of the Lost Son.

To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.
  “A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.
 “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.”’
 “So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him.  His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.’
 “But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet.  And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began.

 The son realizes what his life has become and chooses to turn back around to his father.  Unfortunately, it had to take him to be eating out of the same feeding stalls as pigs.  Isn't it funny how sometimes, we have to be in the muck and grime of life to realize what it has become in order to get back to God?  Either way, God accepts us back with His arms open. 

"Here's my heart, Oh take and seal it, seal it for Thy courts above."