Prodigal Son

Fallen from sonship, beggared of grace,

Grant me. Father, a servant’s place.

    - Christina Rossetti - A Prodigal Son (1902)

My favorite part of the story of the Prodigal Son is the understanding the father has of the situations that his son has been through which are never spoken. He knows that he has journeyed, seen amazing and horrible things, fallen to the lowest depths, and there, alone, made the choice to come back. We wonder, then, about the other son who stayed with his father the whole time. Did he stay out of love and understanding, or out of fear for what was out there? Did he choose his path because of love or because of selfishness? I really don’t know for sure, but the parallels are clear to me. I see myself in both of those sons at times. It’s long past time to follow the path of the prodigal son. You can’t half-deny God, it doesn’t make any sense.

It confuses me more than anything when I see people who know and accept that God is real, but don’t act like it. How can you know it is true and at the same time deny the implications? How, if you know you are asked to do something, can you say no? How long can you wander the earth for your own reasons with your own small interests in the face of that?

In other news, I wrote a riddle today for a friend. I got her a little present for Christmas and she wanted a hint at what it could be. I spent a little time looking online for something decent but there’s so few quality riddles there. Instead, I did a little research, opened up a rhyming dictionary and made the following:

I talked to some others and they agree that it’s a ridiculously hard riddle. If you want to try it out, I recommend using Google to help. And keep in mind that the answer is still only a hint at what the present is. I wasn’t going to give it away.