Running Away From God

I was all grown up when I ran away from home…

I was four-and-half years old…

and totally indignant that my mother  had asked a grown-up like me to wash my hands before dinner…

I reached for my cowboy hat—slapped it on my head and started getting ready for life on my own…

I’d need pajamas, a book, and maybe … if nobody was watching … my favorite teddy bear.

I threw everything a cowboy would need into my red wagon – called out “I’m running away now!” and waited to hear my mother loudly protesting…

When I heard nothing. I headed out the door.

Inside the house, my mother picked up the phone and called my grandmother, who lived a block away.

“Bobby is running away,” she said.  “Call me when he gets there.”

Two minutes later I arrived at my grandmother’s house.

“I’m running away from home!” I announced.

Making no comment on my announcement or my wagon loaded with pajamas, books and a teddy bear, she said…“Why don’t you play in the back yard, while I fix dinner?”

Ten minutes later, she called, “Time for dinner.  Come in and wash your hands!”

Wash my hands?  Were the rules the same everywhere?

If I had to wash my hands at Grandma’s house, I might as well go home…

I couldn’t outrun my mother no matter where I went…

It may seem like mothers are everywhere… But only God is really omnipresent…

And still we spend so much time running away from Him…

Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!  If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.  Psalm 139 7-10

Like a loving parent, God watches us when we run away…

He watches and waits to welcome us home…

“But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him. Luke 15:20