What do you know about parental math?
A set of parents did the usual thing when their son moved away to college. The packed up the belongings. They drove halfway there and spent the night at the hotel laughing and telling stories. Got their son settled in his dorm room the next day, had an extended brunch, and then drove half way home. And now it was Sunday night, they were back home and their son was 700 miles away. And though he was not the first child to have moved out of the house, they were simply sad. Though they knew it is a part of the journey of life, but it did not stop the emptiness. In his journal that night, the dad wrote this:
Oh, our hearts were filled with pride at a fine young man and our minds were filled with memories from tricycles to commencements, but deep down inside somewhere we just ached with loneliness and pain.
Somebody said you still have three at home—three fine kids and there is still plenty of noise — plenty of ball games to go to — plenty of responsibilities— plenty of laughter —Plenty of everything…EXCEPT MIKE.
And in parental math, six minus one just doesn’t equal plenty.
In parental math, six minus one does not equal plenty. Just ask anyone who has dropped their kid off at college. Just ask anyone who has ever said ‘goodbye’ to a friend… or buried a loved one. Ask anyone who has loved and let go: Five minus one never equals plenty
No one gets thru life without missing someone. Try as we might to not suffer this, people will leave us. By age or alienation; through dementia or deployment; through distance or death, ‘goodbye’ visits us all. The song from Les Misérables describes the pain well as “empty chairs at empty tables.”
If you are someone who ever aches at goodbye; if you know that loneliness or find yourself missing someone these days, then today’s scriptures say to you: YOU understand something at the very heart of God.
Jesus tells us today that his God – and our God – is like the woman who desperately scours the entire house just for one little lost coin. That God so cares about EACH of us, that even if the 99 sheep are still safe, God would ridiculously go after the lost one. In other words, in God’s math, 100 minus one is just not plenty. There is an empty space in the heart of God that is only filled by each of us. THAT is the love that is at the heart of the universe.
There are some who struggle to believe that. Or who think that their sin or their flaws made them unworthy of God’s love. And I am sad when to see others doubting that they matter like that lost coin or straying sheep – because I knew that struggle in my adolescence. And, sometimes I get discouraged when I see hatred or self-righteousness, people deciding that some people matter – and others don’t. God is not like that. More real than all that is wrong with us and this world is THAT love – the very love that Jesus describes for us today. The great compassion in the heart of God for EACH person is the very foundation upon which the entire world is built.
I hope you’ve tasted that kind of love; that someone has loved you like that. Maybe not perfectly, because only God loves perfectly. But, like that. If so, you have been given a glimpse into the heart of God. If you’ve not known that, I hope you can come to know that that kind of love is here for you. It is. And I will do everything, and ask each of YOU to do everything we can to make sure that – in all of our gatherings, all our interactions – by how we treat each other, we make that kind of welcoming, searching love real.
Yes, that dad described it well: In parental math, six minus one does not equal plenty. Then Dad concluded his reflection this way:
For God sure has plenty of children—plenty of everybody… EXCEPT YOU and all of them together can never take your place.
And there will always be an empty spot in God’s heart—and a vacant chair at His table when you’re not home.
And if once in a while it seems God’s crowding you a bit—try to forgive Him. It may be one of those nights when He misses you so much He can hardly stand it.
Yes, in Love’s math, six minus one will never equal plenty. Not for God, and God willing, not for us as well.