God’s Big Agenda Item

Recently I was looking at the story of the Prodigal Son which reminded me that Elton John once sang “Sorry seems to be the hardest word.” I doubt the universal validity of that statement. I’m sure we all know of some people for whom the word flows off the tongue without much thought or sincerity. Have you ever noticed that in the story of the prodigal, upon his return the son is embraced (in all his uncleanness) by the father before he utters his “sorry”. In fact it is as if there is something more important here than the “sorry”.

Monday 13^th February was the 9^th anniversary a significant day … the day on which an apology was given to the First Peoples of our nation. “Sorry” was repeated many times. Dare I say it?  “It was a significant day for God!” Not because a sometimes hard word was uttered. Rather because that hard word is a precursor for something that lies at the heart of God’s plans and purposes, namely reconciliation. God’s big agenda item is reconciliation. His big desire is that people be reconciled to Him and reconciled to each other. After all that’s why He came to earth in the person of His son Jesus … to open the way for all to be reconciled. Reconciliation is difficult. Reconciliation is costly but fortunately for us, God has done the difficult and has borne the complete cost so that we can be reconciled to Him. Even before we’ve considered saying sorry God has moved towards us with compassion and love.

Peter Morphew
Chaplain