Empty Hand Revolution

The Prodigal Meets King David

As independent as Cosmo had become since leaving home—as confident and unyielding as an unblemished bamboo cane—his father’s words struck him like a typhoon snapping every tree in the jungle. Cosmo teetered on weak knees.

The older man moved more intentionally than Cosmo remembered. The father sat his basket aside, brushed his hands on his pants, and steadily closed the space between father and son.

He continued the hymn at a hum, his hands held out as if attempting to soothe and corral a stray pig. Somehow the father knew the temptation to run coursed through the son’s trembling limbs. Before the son could react, the father wrapped his arms around him, as if Cosmo was a child.

The father placed his lips to the son’s ear and whispered softer than a mosquito. “I know of all the things you’ve done, my son. God has shown me the path you’ve trod.”

Cosmo’s weak knees folded. Blood pounded in his temples. His vision blurred.

The father gripped the boy to his chest. “The lust for violence, the greed, the pride. It’s been a windy road, but God has brought you home.”

Dangling in the father’s embrace, the son breathed a single word, “How?”

The father draped the son’s arm over his broad shoulders. Together the pair hobbled toward the weathered bench propped against the back of the hut. “Did you think for a second God was not with you?”

Cosmo shook his head, a distant vacancy in his eyes. “They tortured me.”

For the first time, the father quaked beneath the son’s weight. “Especially then. Did you not survive an ordeal that should have killed you a dozen times?”

As father and son dropped onto the creaking bench, a memory blossomed in Cosmo’s mind. He remembered praying to God while lying paralyzed on his back in the old woman’s hut. He remembered promising his service in exchange for his life.

“Every action has its consequence, son. God cannot save us from our own choices. But he promises to preserve the most important part, if we surrender it to him.”

“So I suffered violence because of the violence I’ve done to others.” Cosmo gritted his teeth. “It’s just karma in Christian clothing.” His eyes roved the familiar tree line at the edge of the village.

“No.” His father breathed deeply. “Perhaps I failed to tell you often enough when you were a child—you need to understand, son, I love you.”

Cosmo clenched his eyes shut, and the world began to spin.

“No matter what you’ve done, I love you with all the love God has enabled me. Yet my love is imperfect. I’m petty, selfish, quick to anger and slow to forgive. Not so with God. Nothing you do can erode his love, or earn it.”

“Then it’s hopeless.” Cosmo opened his eyes. He saw neither the jungle sloping gently uphill nor the trees composing it. He didn’t feel the light breeze waft beneath the thatch-covered porch where he and his father sat. He didn’t feel anything.

His father shook his head. “I’ve been so frightened of awakening violent spirits from our people’s past, I’ve neglected to teach you the whole of the Gospel story.”

Cosmo didn’t flinch. “Jesus died on a cross. He let the Jews and the Romans kill him. I know the story.”

“No, in the Old Testament there was a king by the name of David. He was a warrior with blood on his hands.”

Cosmo’s spine tingled. For the first time in months a sharpness of focus flooded his mind.

His father continued. “David grew up fighting from a young age. Men flocked to his leadership. He trained them into a small army. God had promised David the Kingdom of Israel, and yet Israel already had King Saul—a mighty man, impressive in the eyes of others.