By LARRY TIMM

Pastor of Peabody Bible Church

The hunger that attacked his stomach was nothing compared to the memory that blistered his mind. He couldn’t forget that fateful day, that life-changing day, that day that now seemed a lifetime away from this pigpen.

That day that now haunted him with bitter regret.

It had been like any other day, and that had been the problem. All the days dripped with the monotony of the usual. In boyhood, such routine days and weeks had offered security and comfort, but as he grew to manhood, a fire of discontent raged ever hotter inside of him. “This can’t be all there is,” he had told some of his father’s servants.

At first, the young man had contented himself that his father’s wealth would someday be split between he and his older brother. However, the more he dwelt on that thought, the less comforting it became because someday seemed too far away.

He wondered how long he would have to wait for his father to die.

Now kneeling in the muck of the pigpen, a suffocating sense of loneliness covered him like the ragged garments plastered against his sweaty, filthy skin. Repeatedly in his mind, he replayed the events of the day he approached his father and demanded his share of the estate. It was as though he had slapped his father in the face and yelled, “Drop dead, Dad.”

Suddenly a thought flickered in his mind. Maybe it’s not too late to go home.

To be continued