“It Was No Effort, You Are My Son”

There is a wonderfully touching scene at the end of the movie Star Trek IV:The Voyage Home (or as non aficionados may remember as ‘the one with the whales’)  Mr. Spock has a moment with his father where he is able to thank him for organising the rescue mission that ultimately not only saved his life, but restored it as well.  Facing his father Sarek in his Starfleet dress uniform he says, “It was most kind of you to make this effort.”

Sarek responds, “It was no effort, you are my son.“

In reality, it had been a tremendous effort (that spanned 3 movies).  But it reveals that a parent’s love for a child has no limit to it’s demands and turns incredible sacrifices required of it into no effort at all.

My own parents have demonstrated this more times than I can count but one fairly recent “effort” highlights the topic.  Tammy and I were moving to Mainland China from Denver in 2008.  Because of the Beijing Olympics,  China was cracking down on security and requiring all visa applicants to present their applications to their American consulates in person, or in lieu, to have a representative apply in person on the applicants behalf.  In our case, the closest Chinese consulate was in Chicago which was 2 days drive or an expensive flight away.

Asking anyone else, even close friends, would have likely generated sympathy and a, “is their anything else we can do to help?”  For my parents, who lived in Detroit 5 hours drive away, the response was, “Son, what do you need us to do?”  In the end my parents traveled to Chicago and endured hours of agonising logic defying attitudes from the Chinese bureaucracy there but in the end, we got our visas.  Despite the tremendous effort, in my parent’s heart, if this was what was required for me to move on to a more successful and fruitful period of life with my family then in the end:

“It was no effort, you are our son!”  

Our God in heaven’s attitude towards us, his children, is even so much more!

When we as the human race found ourselves separated from from our Father and through our own choice were bound and destined for misery and death, God enacted a rescue plan that would literally re-balance all creation.  He took the form of a man himself and endured the pain and suffering we laid upon him.  Christ endured the horror of the cross so that death could be defeated and we could once again be in union with our Creator and Father!

Jesus literally went “to hell and back” to rescue God’s children from sin and death.

See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!

1 John 3:1

I know that one day I will see Jesus face to face.  It is a moment that everything within me cries out for.  And when I see him I think I will be a bit less composed than Mr. Spock was.  I will probably fall to my knees in tears thanking him for everything he has done and the tremendous effort he went to in rescuing me that we could be together.

I know then he will likely pull me onto my feet, hug me close, and whisper in my ear;

“It was no effort, you are my son.”