✨ The Longsuffering Father: A Prodigal Parable for Mothers Who Wait

Shifting the perspective of the one who long- suffers

By Jennifer Greene-Sullivan

Longsuffering.

It’s the fruit of the Spirit no one wants prays for, yet it is the very one that changes you the most. Because it doesn’t bloom in comfort, it blooms in darkness, in silence, in the ache of watching someone you love walk away, trashing everything without sense or reconsideration.

The parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11–32) is often told as the son’s redemption story, and, yes, there’s beauty in the return.

However, today, I want to sit with the Father.

Read it again.

The Father gave everything the son asked for—knowing it wouldn’t be stewarded well.

Then… he waited. He waited in the solitude and the torment.

We are not told what those days, those months, those years looked like. However, we are told this:

“But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him.” (Luke 15:20, ESV)

Which means the Father was looking.
Which means the Father was ready.
Which means the forgiveness happened long before the return.

🌱 What Longsuffering Births

The woman, the precious mother, who waits faithfully, prays relentlessly, forgives before she is even asked—She does not remain unchanged.

Longsuffering may not be glamorous, but it is holy.
It births a woman who carries the weight of wisdom, not bitterness.
It makes her a resting place for the brokenhearted.
It deepens her discernment.
It draws her nearer to God, the Father, who waits alongside her.

This version of you—the pruned, Spirit-filled, longsuffering version—is new, and you’ve never met her before now. This version of you takes pain and persistence to a brand new level. Ultimately, she only rises through fire.

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🔁 A Shift While You Wait

You may be in the place where you blame yourself. Later, you might swing to blaming the prodigal. Eventually, you’ll have to forgive both. The blaming and the surrendering produces the place; the place where the Father in the story teaches us the most!

He doesn’t give conditions.
He doesn’t wait at the porch, demanding an explanation.
He runs.

Because he already forgave in the suffering.

So while you wait:
→ Shift your gaze.
→ Shift your prayers.
→ Shift your identity.

You already have the promise—but now begins the season of abiding in the waiting.

🕰️ The Pain of the Promise: Waiting in Real Time

Waiting on a prodigal rewrites time.

The past feels too painful to relive.
The future becomes too painful to dream, and all that’s left… is the present.

For the mother waiting, the present is holy ground. It’s where she must plant herself, day by day, hour by hour, sometimes second by agonizing second.

What’s the only way to survive it?

She must remain rooted—not in her fear, not in her child’s choices—but in her identity as a daughter of the King. She must fix her eyes on Jesus—again and again and again—every time her heart breaks open in fresh grief.

Whether it’s ten times a day or fifty.

God’s timing is perfect. We say that with our mouths, but to the mother of a prodigal, it can feel like God’s timing is a jagged, rusty knife—one that gashes deeper with every second that passes.

Yet…

Even here, in the waiting, victory is growing underground.

There is purpose in the promise, and the longsuffering mother must choose to live in that purpose, even while she clings—feverishly, faithfully—to the promise that one day,
the Father will run to his prodigal and celebrate his return.

👣 A Mother’s Road: My Own Prodigal Journey

I don’t write this as a woman imagining the pain of the prodigal’s mother.
I write it as one who birthed, raised, and suffered through her very own.

It’s been seven long, hard-fought years since my daughter Sophia turned fourteen—
the year she wrecked our Polaris Ranger and, in many ways, shattered more than her body. Her mind, her spirit, and our peace would be tested for years to come.

But nothing—nothing—compared to the 76 days when she was 17.
Seventy-six days of silence.
Seventy-six days of trauma.
Seventy-six days where my daughter was running the streets—mentally sick, destitute, and desperate.

I had no idea where she was. No idea who she was with, and I had no options to help her or to fix the horror unfolding before me.

Those 76 days of hell traumatized me as a mother—but they also transformed me into the daughter Jesus created me to be.

This week, Sophia turned 21. She is safe. She is beautiful. She has been blessed beyond measure, healed and restored. She is still growing—and so am I.

She doesn’t get everything right. Neither do I.

Here’s what I know for certain:

I never gave up.
Not through the torment.
Not through the hospitals.
Not through the strangers she ended up with day after day in 2021.

The fruits of the Spirit weren’t handed to me—they were burned into my heart.
Longsuffering. Faithfulness. Mercy. Hope.

I have lived every single word of this blog.
I can tell you with full authority:

Don’t give up.
God is faithful—because that’s who He is.

And one day, just like the Father in the parable…
you’ll see your child from a distance, and you’ll run.

But for now—don’t wallow in sorrow or drown in regret.
Dig into prayer.
Lean into fasting.
Cling to the Word.
Let your community surround you.

I had resilient friends, a precious church family, and family members who went to the mattresses for Sophia—for me and for our family. God will send reinforcements.
Even the angels will minister to you, so that you do not dash your foot against a stone (Psalm 91:12).

A Prayer for the Longsuffering Parent

Father,
You see the ache in my heart—the pain I can’t put into words, and the child I keep placing back into Your hands. You understand long suffering better than anyone because You are the long-suffering Father. You let us go. You wait. You run when we return. I give You this child again today. I surrender the shame, the fear, the regret, and the false belief that I could have saved them. I declare today: You are faithful.
Grow the fruit of longsuffering in me. Let it deepen my compassion, sharpen my prayer life, and anchor my spirit. Surround me with people who will go to the mattresses for my child and for me.

And when the time comes, Lord—
make me brave enough to run,
gentle enough to embrace,
and joyful enough to celebrate what You’ve redeemed.

In Jesus’ name,
Amen.

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✨ Challenge This Week: Living the Longsuffering Call

1. List anything you’ve been blaming yourself for—and surrender it in prayer.
2. Reach out to your reinforcements: a trusted friend, mentor, or pastor who can help carry your burden in prayer this week.
3. Pray daily for your prodigal by name, but also for yourself—to be shaped into the image of the Father while you wait.
4. Sing The Blessing over your prodigal each day.
5. Celebrate each small victory, no matter how quiet it may seem. Let it water the seed of hope.

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📖 Scripture Study for the Waiting Season

Luke 15:11–32 (ESV) – The Parable of the Prodigal Son
→ Focus on the Father’s response before and after the return.

Romans 2:4 (ESV) –
“Do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience… not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?”
→ Mercy leads to transformation, not compromise.

Psalm 91:11–12 (ESV) –
“For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.”
→ God’s reinforcements are real. He surrounds you.

2 Peter 3:9 (ESV) –
“The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness… but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish…”
→ God’s timing is rooted in mercy, not delay.

Galatians 5:22–23 (ESV) –
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience [longsuffering]…”
→ Longsuffering is a fruit, not a failure. Let Him grow it in you.

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