The Prodigal Son: Part 2

The Lure of "Far Countries"

The Prodigal was enraptured by the promise of the far country. And surprisingly, Dad gave this impudent son his future inheritance—He divided his living between them. Why would Dad give in to his son when he certainly could have predicted the tragic results? As Norman Cox has written, there “comes a time when fathers can no longer protect their children from themselves.” Dad knew that this boy would have to learn hard truths the hard way. One of those truths is that far countries “always turn out more and more like home the longer you stay there.... People are people the world over. If they cut your throat on Wall Street, they will skin you alive in Hong Kong. If they don’t appreciate you in Podunk where they know you, they certainly won’t appreciate you in Paris where they never saw you before. At home the young son was at least the son of his father. In the far country he was only a foreign yokel ripe for fleecing.”


How many of us have felt the pull of the far country—a new city, a new job, a new church, a new spouse? I know a woman in a troubled marriage whose friends wanted to navigate her to a destination called RELIEF. The ports-of-call on this cruise sounded lovely: Peace, Freedom, New Start, New Husband. But in the same way that cruise brochures conveniently leave out some destinations: Sickness, Stormy Seas, Cramped Accommodations, her friends description of Relief failed to mention that she would also dock at Distressed Children, Loneliness, and Financial Stress. Though her friends’ advice promised to remove her pain and offer a quick solution, she discovered that she had been duped. She was believing the “lies of Satan rather than the harsh but redemptive truths of God.” When she was willing to listen, God showed her that her marriage’s problems were not terminal, that her husband was not solely at fault, that with God’s help and hard work she could save her marriage.