document.write("");
document.write("My Flickering Mind
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document.write("Jill Carattini
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document.write(" Posted on Wed, 23 Jul 2008 00:00:00 GMT
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document.write("Gallery statistics report that the average time a person spends lookingat a particular work of art is three seconds. To those who spend theirlives caring for the great art museums of the world, I imagine this isa disheartening sight to behold day after day. It would have beeninteresting to hear the thoughts of the St. Petersburg curators whowatched as Henri Nouwen sat before Rembrandt\'s Return of the Prodigal Son for more than four hours.
I wonder how often I am more like the three-second viewer than acaptivated Nouwen, moving through my days with my eyes barely open. Howoften am I surrounded by the presence of God, but unaware andunseeing--missing, in my absence, the bigger picture? One of myfavorite poems begins with the lines, \"Lord, not you, it is I who amabsent.\"(1)
The parable of the prodigal son is typically understood as a story thatspeaks to us when we have wandered away from God in belief orobedience. It is a story we often apply to a specific time in ourlives--a momentous return to faith, a homecoming back to the church, aparticular event that caused us to remember God\'s grace personally andpowerfully. It is a parable that at one time or another describes manyof us. Perhaps it is also a parable that describes us daily. In the daily struggle to see, the constant battle to be present and conscious of the presence of God in this place, we come and go like prodigals.
The parable tells us that the wayward child had a plan for returning tohis father\'s house: he would confess his sin against heaven and againsthis father, and then he would ask to be treated as one of the hiredservants. He would work his way back into his father\'s life. But thefather doesn\'t even give him a chance to fully present the offer. Uponseeing his son, he says to his slaves, \"\'Quickly bring out the bestrobe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on hisfeet; and bring the fattened calf, kill it, and let us eat andcelebrate; for this son of mine was dead and has come to life again; hewas lost and has been found.\' And they began to celebrate\" (Luke15:22-25). With every symbol of restoration, the father who was waitingembraces the son who was lost.
Gripped by the intensity of the massive painting before him, HenriNouwen found himself becoming \"more and more part of the story thatJesus once told and Rembrandt once painted.\" Yet in Rembrandt\'spainting we do not find the father eagerly rushing out to greet hiswayward son as it is described in the Gospel of Luke. Rather, we findstillness; we find the parable\'s characters at rest. Rembrandt slowsour flickering minds to the scene that captures a thousand words forour daily walk in faith: \"Lord, not you, it is I who am absent.\" Inthis scene, the son has returned, and he is kneeling before his fatherin his ragged shoes and torn clothes exactly as he is: the one whoinsisted upon defining himself apart from his father, the one who was absent. In pursuit of life beyond his father, the child lost sight of life itself.
In the parable of the prodigal son, Jesus bids us to slow down and bepresent, to taste and see, to be still and know: the Father is near. Heis here, though we are absent. He waits, though we put off Him off. Hegrieves over our wandering hearts and minds, moving in grace to embracethose who long to see. He is the God who runs to greet his waveringchild, and it is a sight to behold.
Jill Carattini is senior associate writer at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.
(1) Denise Levertov, \"Flickering Mind,\" The Stream and the Sapphire (New York: New Directions, 1997), 15.");