Letting Go - Day Four

If you live with a prodigal, you know what it means to love someone.

 

Love is a means of survival. Love is what gets you up each morning and inspires you to serve someone who acts like they hate you. Loving this way means duty, sacrifice, responsibility, and resilience.

 

Many years back, an R&B icon famously crooned a pseudo-love anthem to the world asking this skeptical question, “What’s love got to do, got to do with it?” If you live with a wayward person, the answer is a no-brainer: everything!

 

But there is a side of love that’s difficult to face. You’ve had a taste of it already if you are persisting in hope that this person you love might change.

 

This 4-day track comes from the Catalyst App Harvey Gilbert’s new book, Letting Go.

 

Maybe you were a prodigal. Maybe you loved someone who wasor is a prodigal. Maybe someone you lead is struggling to continue loving the prodigal in their life.

 

Regardless, this aspect of our broken world impacts everyone. Over the next four days, we will look at some very practical ways of approaching the prodigals in our lives as well as receive the necessary encouragement to keep pressing on!

 

Complete the challenges at the end of each day to help process your journey as well as be entered in to win a copy of Letting Go.

 

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DAY 4: DON’T GIVE UP

 

Jesus loved prodigals to the very end. His statement “It is finished” (John 19:30) was not an admission of defeat but a declaration of success. Christ had overcome sin. Love won.

 

Forgiveness is available. Prodigals can come home.

 

But their coming home can take time. Prodigals move slowly.

 

Your prodigal is not your enemy. Giving up is your enemy. Weariness is your enemy. Thank God that in certainly situations, a period of waywardness can be short. May there be more! But most prodigal stories are more like that of the son in Luke 15:11–32, a saga that spans the time it took to travel far, indulge much, deposit consequences, withdraw consequences, collapse under consequences, get a clue, and then travel

slowly home.

 

Here’s the formula for waiting: Buckle up; don’t grow weary; do good; don’t give up!

 

Most importantly, don’t miss the promise: “For in due season, we will reap” (Galatians 6:9). “Due season” is not here yet. “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven” (Ecclesiastes 3:1). Now is not the season or the time. You will reap; just don’t give up.

 

Challenge:

What is your current attitude towards continuing to love the prodigal in your life? Whether it’s daily reading scripture, talking with a pastor or connecting regularly with a friend, what resources can you tap into in order to receive ongoing support?

 

If you don’t have a prodigal, what practical support can you offer to someone who is struggling with this?

Don't forget to complete each challenge on the Catalyst App, for your chance to win a copy of Letting Go.