Everything I have is yours

“My son, you are here with me always; everything I have is yours.”

At different times in my life, I have identified with both sons in the story of the Prodigal Son. When I was deepening my faith, I saw myself in the younger son. A wayward child, rolling around in the metaphorical mud until I finally came to my senses and came back to my Father. As I persist in my practice of the faith, I more often see myself as the elder son, eyeing what others have and how they have been blessed with something just out of my reach.

It seems like every season involves something I thought God was withholding from me: a stable job, like-minded friends, community, marriage, a house, children. Whatever I think my next step is, I pray incessantly until I have what I want. I begin to sound like a whinier version of the elder son: “But, God, we were chaste before and after marriage! We did the months of marriage prep! God, we even did the charting! You can't even give us one baby?”

I am never content with the blessings that I have, but I see the next step, the next milestone, the next blessing I want. I'm single minded in my prayer, only talking to God about what I think I need. I fail to take into account all the blessings I do have, ignoring the fact that I used to pray for all the things I have now. I feel as if God is holding back from me the very thing that will make me happy, holy, the best version of myself.

That’s not how God works, though.

He’s not withholding anything that would be for my good. Whatever I don’t have isn’t being kept from me in an effort to make me try harder, pray harder, do what is in front of me harder. If He is not giving me something, it must be for my own holiness that He hasn’t said yes to that particular prayer yet. Even the gift of children, the most common refining fire for married couples, isn't being denied to me because that is the thing that will finally make me a good person. He isn't moving the goalposts on me to make me try to be holier on my own or meet some arbitrary standard of holiness before He gives me what I want. 

Anyway, He has already given me everything. 

In the parable of the Prodigal Son, the question we should be asking is, where is Jesus in this story? What truth is He trying to impart? 

Jesus is the inheritance. The kingdom of God is the inheritance. Jesus is our inheritance. The kingdom of God is our inheritance.

And God isn’t withholding that from me. God has given me everything that He has: His Son, the promise of Heaven, the Eucharist, the Church. He hasn’t held anything back. He has given me greater goods and greater blessings than I pray for, than what I think I need. 

God, the Prodigal Son's father and my Father, isn't failing to give me good gifts. He's asking me to use the gifts I already have to cultivate my inheritance. Even if I can't grow His kingdom through my own body, I'm still called to grow His kingdom through blessings I have already. I may only see what I don't have or what I don’t perceive as already mine, but that’s not how God works. God has given me my inheritance already. He has given me Himse