God Seeks and Calls Us

I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away, and will bind up that which was broken and will strengthen that which was sick; but I will destroy the fat and the strong; I will feed them with judgment. Ezekiel 34:16.

The man who separates from God that he may serve himself, is the slave of mammon. The mind that God created for the companionship of angels, has become degraded to the service of that which is earthly and bestial. This is the end to which self-serving tends. If you have chosen such a life, you know that you are spending money for that which is not bread, and labor for that which satisfieth not. There come to you hours when you realize your degradation. Alone in the far country, you feel your misery, and in despair you cry, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” … The love of God still yearns over the one who has chosen to separate from Him, and He sets in operation influences to bring him back to the Father’s house. The prodigal son in his wretchedness “came to himself.” The deceptive power that Satan had exercised over him was broken…. Miserable as he was, the prodigal found hope in the conviction of his father’s love. It was that love which was drawing him toward home. So it is the assurance of God’s love that constrains the sinner to return to God…. In the parable there is no taunting, no casting up to the prodigal of his evil course. The son feels that the past is forgiven and forgotten, blotted out forever. And so God says to the sinner, “I have blotted out, as a thick cloud thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins.” “I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”—Christ’s Object Lessons, 201-205.