the weight of love

I love you today and I love you tomorrow

I love you as deep as the sea

I love you in joy, and I love you in sorrow

You can always come home to me

There once was a man who found him a treasure

Buried out under a tree

He sold all he had just to own it forever

The treasure is you, you see

I love you today and I love you tomorrow

I love you as deep as the sea

I love you in joy, and I love you in sorrow

You can always come home to me

There once were some sheep safe on a farm

And one little lamb got loose

The shepherd went out and carried it home

That little lamb is you

I love you today and I love you tomorrow

I love you as deep as the sea

I love you in joy, and I love you in sorrow

You can always come home to me

--Andrew Peterson

The refrain of this song is on one of the Veggietales videos we have and I always find myself looking through tears at the Kiddo when I hear it.  There is no expanse of time or space, no wrong that comes to mind, no hurt that I can imagine that would make me stop loving him.  I will always be waiting to welcome him, no matter the circumstance, with open arms and a heart breaking with the weight of love.

Aptly, the song comes at the end of the video about the prodigal son, and oh how even sweeter that story has become to me since becoming a parent myself.  Knowing the burden of love that I carry for my son, I have some sense of how that father must have hurt as he watched his son go away from him, with the full realization that he couldn't stop him from hurting himself.  In his son's absence, how his heart must have ached for his child's return, regardless of his disrespect.  The best part of the story, though, is of course the reunion... when despite it all and without a second thought, the father runs to meet his son when he sees him coming up the road.

I have some sense of that part of it, too... the being received and celebrated even though you've been so miserably wrong part.  Because as of July 14, 1999, I had been so miserably wrong and under the weight of my sins for far too long.

But thank God for the flawless love of Jesus... the weight of which He carried all the way to Calvary.  Just to make me His treasure.

That Wednesday night, when my Lord saw me coming, He opened His arms to welcome me.  And according to my Bible, there was rejoicing in Heaven over this one little lost lamb.

Maybe the best part of all, though, is that today or tomorrow, in good times or bad, no matter where I am or what I've done...

I can always go home to Him.