The Hands That Welcome You Home

In 1669, near the end of his life, Rembrandt van Rijn completed one of the most tender paintings in Western art. The Return of the Prodigal Son hangs today in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, and if you ever stand before it, you will notice something remarkable about the father's hands.

The son kneels in rags. One sandal is gone. His head rests against his father's chest like a child who has finally stopped running. But look at those hands resting on the boy's back. Henri Nouwen spent months studying this painting and noticed what countless visitors had missed: the father's left hand is strong and firm, the right hand softer and gentle. One holds, the other caresses. One says, "You are safe." The other says, "You are cherished."

Rembrandt painted this while nearly blind, having buried his own son Titus just a year before. He knew what it meant to love someone so fiercely that their absence tears a hole in the world. And he poured that knowing into every brushstroke of the father's embrace.

This is how God loves you. Not with one kind of love, but with the fullness of love — strength and tenderness woven together. The Almighty does not wait for you to clean yourself up. He meets you in the doorway, places both hands on your back, and draws you close.

Whatever far country you have wandered into, those hands are waiting.