And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat: and no man gave unto him.
The verse pictures the prodigal reduced by waste and famine to the lowest work of feeding swine, starving in a far country and longing to fill himself with the carob pods fed to the animals, while friendless and with no one giving him anything in contrast to the bread in abundance in his father's house. His supposed liberty has become bondage to sin and degrading service of Satan, wasting God's gifts and leaving him spiritually impoverished and perishing with hunger. The husks are what cannot truly nourish the soul, sin's meager and unsatisfying rewards set against the spiritual food God gives his children. His suffering and felt want humble him, make him sensible of his sin and his father's love, and turn him from the swine to begin the journey home in repentance and humble confession as his last hope. When he comes the Father receives him with compassion, forgiveness and greatest joy without reproach, covering him with righteousness and making a feast, and those who have strayed in such want are to be sought and met with pity, tender encouragement and free forgiveness rather than censure or cold rejection.
Parable Setting and Purpose
Luke 15:16 belongs to the parable of the prodigal son, one of the parables Jesus gave in response to the complaints of the scribes and Pharisees that He associated with sinners. The parable was given to teach mercy and forgiveness toward the lost. It shows both the misery of one who has strayed from God and God's tender pity and kindness toward those exposed to temptation. Although wanderers choose their own course and fall into misery, He does not abandon them but remains tender in pitying love toward them.
Christ told this pathetic, touching story of a son returning to his father's home to illustrate immortal truth directly from familiar facts of daily life and experience. He came right to the point without long, farfetched, complicated reasoning, drawing from His treasure house things both new and old to illustrate and enforce His teaching. The illustration was given to interest every mind and appeal to every heart, touching the heart, awakening the sympathies, and commending truth to the conscience, while leaving hearers free to accept or reject it as they chose. By such teaching the daily task, instead of being a mere round of toil, is brightened and uplifted by constant reminders of the spiritual and the unseen, with a spirit open to the influences of nature and delighting to teach from them. Its setting includes the father who, seeing his son afar off, ran to meet him and rejoiced that he who had been thought dead was indeed alive.
The parable teaches that a repentant sinner returning to the Father is welcomed without reproach, and that penitence is what is required. The elder son represents unrepentant Israel, which refused to treat publicans and sinners as brothers to be sought and forgiven.
Details of His Want
His own self-indulgence and wasteful spending, meeting a famine, reduced him to utter destitution and drove him to hire himself out to feed swine. That work was the lowest and most disreputable employment, a deeply degrading occupation especially for a Jew. His supposed liberty had become bondage, and his sinful indulgence and separation from his father left him spiritually as well as outwardly impoverished.
Hungry in a famine-stricken land, he longed to fill himself with the husks fed to the swine, even their refuse. His hunger marked the depth of his poverty and the misery that followed his departure and wasteful living. Yet though he desired that food, no one gave him anything, and no one supplied his need.
He was friendless and without help, abandoned by his former companions. The pleasures and friendships of his prosperous life had left him alone, and returning to his father in repentance and humility remained his last hope. In that extreme need no man relieved him, which shows the larger call to seek and win back the lost with joy when they return.
He was starving and perishing with hunger in a foreign far country, friendless, destitute, and emaciated through disobedience and sin. That deprivation stands in contrast to the rich supplies in his father's house, where even the servants have provisions and bread in abundance. Remembering that abundance humbled him, made him sensible of his need, and moved him to decide to return with humble confession. The husks he desired were carob pods, a bean-like fruit with a seed inside, the same pod-fruit as the locusts eaten by John the Baptist with wild honey.
Misery of Separation from God
The longing to be fed from the swine's trough shows how the desire for freedom from a father's authority turns into wild license and then into bondage to sin, degrading drudgery, and captivity to the tempter. The youth who sought liberty is left hungry in a famine-stricken land, reduced to the lowest and most disreputable work, longing for the animals' food yet unable to get even that because no one gives him anything. His former companions have abandoned him, proving that the pleasures and friendships of his prosperous life have left him alone. Life apart from God in this way wastes the blessings, years, and powers God gives and leaves the person spiritually impoverished, degraded, and wretched. To stay long away from Him serving sin and the flesh and the devil brings no profit but poor wages.
His estrangement came by a selfish decision to separate from his father and avoid his counsel, reproof, and advice, through disobedience and sin. That course left him friendless, destitute, and emaciated with hunger, reduced to tending swine and longing for their food while no one gave him anything. The verse pictures a thorough backslider who has left his Father's house and service for the service of Satan and of sin, like a young man turned from God or one who has left the Lord's service and is not fully on the Lord's side. Such a one needs to leave sin and return to his father's house and service, recognizing his need, confessing backsliding, and turning toward heaven to respond to God's love.
That far-country condition comes through Satan's temptations, through mistakes and severe treatment by brethren who do not understand youth, and through giving up the Sabbath for worldly business and trade advantage. The wayward son also illustrates Israel's rejection of God's care: like a son gone astray Israel resisted grace, rejected repeated offers of mercy, and failed to value privileges and blessings from a loving Father, facing consequences over which Christ grieved. The same prodigal course is taken by those who claim to keep the commandments yet transgress the law, unthankful and unholy, using entrusted talents to counterwork God and exerting influence on Satan's side while retaining a form of godliness. Prodigals are also made by indulgence at home through parents' failure to restrain their children.
Husks as Empty Provision
The husks are what cannot truly nourish, the superstitious rites and human traditions that formed the worthless spiritual food Rome gave the people and that could not supply the wants of the soul. When the new teachings of the gospel supplied what their souls needed, people turned away from those who had so long fed them husks. In the same way the husks the hungry son wanted picture sin's meager, unsatisfying rewards, set in contrast with the spiritual food God gives His children. To prefer sin's husks to that food is moral madness.
Those who spend their means on themselves while the poor lack food and shelter are living on husks. Wealth that could bring comfort to people in need is instead used for unnecessary display and possessions. The verse applies to people so impoverished that they are perishing for scraps discarded in a country of abundance, while money is spent selfishly and needlessly elsewhere. Being satisfied with such spiritual husks includes putting worldly appearance in dress before Christ's character, God's will, and lasting riches. It also includes comparing with others, copying their conduct, and excusing one's own wrongs by pointing to others' faults, which leaves one spiritually stunted while indulging unconsecrated feelings.
Dwelling on other people's faults is living on husks like the poor food the hungry prodigal desired. Looking for and speaking of failings develops evil in the one who does it, while contemplating Jesus and His character changes a person into His image. A hungry person left without help will reach for husks. People seeking truth and those newly awakened who have no teacher cry for solid food that strengthens spiritual strength, not husks that fail to nourish.
Hunger Leading to Return
His suffering and felt want humbled him and made him sensible of his great sin and neglect, leading him to appreciate his father's love and acknowledge his claims, recognizing that only his father could supply his great need. Separated from his father through disobedience and sin and reduced to want, friendless, destitute and emaciated with hunger, his adversity broke his pride and turned his thoughts toward home.
Remembering that his father's household has bread in abundance and that even the servants have provisions, he decided to return with humble confession of his sin and unworthiness, in repentance and humility, as his last hope. His desperate hunger, when he could not even obtain the food given to the swine, pressed that memory home and fixed his resolve to go back.
His misery marks the depth of his degradation and turns him from the swine to begin the journey home. Turning to God in repentance is not a degrading step, for God welcomes the returning sinner with love as the father received his son.
Returning means turning square about at once, leaving sin and the service of Satan even at loss of position and livelihood, deciding to be a Christian from that day and coming back to the Father's house and the Father's service to receive pardon and love with purified thoughts and changed purposes. It means confessing backsliding and turning toward heaven, linking with God with full decision of soul, believing in Christ, learning from Him and following Him, and giving the rest of life to Jesus. The backslider's return is a turning unto the Lord with confession and contrition of soul after wandering away.
That return brings the promise of eternal life and heaven's imperishable riches, for the Father still loves the one who has left and calls him back to receive God's love and Christ, whose blood has purchased him. After sin and failure one can turn to Jesus, who welcomes him and gives strength for a fresh effort. The one who returns is still invited to wear Christ's yoke, lift His burden, and learn His meekness and lowliness of heart, and as reward will find rest unto the soul.
Even the poorest person who comes repentant to the Father is welcomed with joy in heaven. None who seek Him with confession and contrition of soul seek Him in vain, for Jesus meets such returning souls with deep compassion and pitying tenderness, having so loved them that He died to save them, and He can be firmly trusted to do for them all He has promised to those who believe.
Being welcomed to a son's privileges requires living by a son's conditions, accepting a son's obligations along with a son's privileges. That means submission to God's authority and obedience to His word, and unreserved surrender of the whole life, not money alone but self-denial and personal effort. Deliverance is given only on condition of obedience and submission, leaving the devil's side, and like the lost sheep found by the shepherd the returned wanderer must remain under care in the fold in obedience and not renew his wanderings, repaying love by obedience.
The story warns not to delay returning to parents and to God with a humble heart. Some who come to the Sanitarium may likewise turn back toward God, and they can be wisely helped and saved as truth becomes part of their lives. People who have gone astray may be kept from returning to God by the harsh, unchristlike conduct of those who claim to follow Christ.
Father's Compassionate Welcome
The husks belong to the story of a son separated from his father, wasted in a distant country and held captive by the tempter, whose misery shows the depth of need and abandonment before return. Even while he is still in rebellion in that far-off want, the father's love remains strong and his heart is already yearning for him. God does not wait passively but takes the first step to seek the wanderer, working through influences and drawing him by the Spirit to bring him home, giving despondent and distrustful sinners reason to take courage. The longing to return is itself that drawing back to the Father.
When the erring one becomes sensible of great sin and neglect, appreciates his father's love and acknowledges his claims, and comes as to the only one who can supply his great need, the heavenly Father though sinned against receives him with compassion, pity, forgiveness and greatest joy. He does not hurl denunciations and accusations of wrath, nor meet the return with reproach, cold rejection, complaints or repeated reminders of mistakes. He prepares a feast to welcome him, gives robe and ring and a place at God's table, and covers him with Christ's righteousness, the robe of righteousness. Penitence is what is required, and the repentant sinner returning in humility is welcomed without reproach and forgiven, showing how God will deal with all erring ones who come back in repentance. That welcome sets former hardship and starvation against compassionate forgiveness, and gives grand themes for thought and a solid foundation for faith.
That love is revealed in giving His beloved Son to die for the race, making a channel for the outflow of infinite love so that all who believe may be restored to favor, obedience and life in Christ. Christ's death is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world, and God regards those perishing in sin and hunger far from His house with that love. His dying love on Calvary, the just dying for the unjust, is the sinner's assurance of acceptance, peace and love, daily beseeching the lost to be reconciled and in no wise casting out any who come. Viewing Him upon the cross breaks every barrier down, supplies what the soul lacks, and restores to divine favor. The Father still loves the one who has left, calls him back to receive that love, and promises eternal life and heaven's imperishable riches to those who believe, learn and follow.
The return makes all heaven glad, with all heaven's resources and angels' help given to seek and save the lost in careless and hardened misery. Seraphs and cherubs sing praises to God and the Lamb for mercy and loving-kindness to the children of men, and there is greater joy over one sinner who repents than over many who need no repentance. Even the poorest repentant person is welcomed with joy among the heavenly host, for God as the true shepherd goes after the lost sheep, speaks to the distressed soul ready to die, calls for return, heals backsliding and loves freely.
Those rescued from sin can be brought back to the Father and then, with God working with the returned one, help bring other sinners and youth to Him and to conversion. Linking with God with full decision of soul brings blessing, rest, and the invitation still to wear Christ's yoke, lift His burden, and learn His meekness and lowliness.
The son's starvation in a foreign land, longing for swine's food with no one giving him anything while his father's house has rich supplies, stands against that compassionate welcome. It stands also in contrast to the elder brother's stubborn, selfish, displeased, murmuring and coldly rejecting response, whose complaints though natural and understandable are not right. Those gone astray and suffering in want need pity, help, sympathy and above all free forgiveness, not that cold rejection.
That same hunger and misery pictures people burdened by guilt and temptation whose hope is nearly gone, including one once proud and ambitious now fallen and under Satan's control through selfish indulgence. With loving encouragement rather than blame they can be led to return to the Father in penitence and find hope of redemption through Christ. Christ meets such a fallen one with tender sympathy and words suited to his need.
Seeking and Restoring Wanderers
The husks mark the lost as in careless and hardened misery, yet one to be sought and saved with all the resources of heaven and the help of angels, whose bringing back to God makes all heaven glad. God acts as the true shepherd toward those ready to die, going after the lost sheep and speaking to the distressed soul with a call to return and the promise to heal backsliding and love freely. The parable shows what God really is, a Father waiting with yearning love to receive the returning prodigal, preparing a feast rather than hurling denunciations and accusations of wrath, having loved the race in giving His Son to die for them. The teacher of truth is to make this waiting Father known to the sinner in order to win souls in the way of the Lord, for the son's return illustrates God's work to reclaim the lost and bring them back to the Father's house.
Those who have strayed and are reduced to want and degradation call forth tender sympathy and earnest effort rather than severe judgment, for their suffering and felt need are what drive them back and make them sensible of sin and neglect. They are objects of compassion like those perishing with hunger, to be met with pity, help, sympathy, tender encouragement, and above all free forgiveness when they return. Their return is not to be met with complaints or repeated reminders of mistakes, nor with censure, reproach, suspicion, or jealousy, nor with contempt, blame, or a cold condemning attitude that drives them away and holds them at a distance. The father instead welcomes and encourages his erring child, restoring him with a robe and ring, and the heavenly Father though sinned against receives such an erring and repenting one with compassion, pity, and greatest joy, knowing he needs pity and love.
The elder brother's complaints over that welcome, though natural and understandable, are not right. His cold, self-righteous, envious, and jealous spirit fails to share the father's compassion and appears when church members murmur that ministers do not constantly feed them with sermons but carry the truth to those who know it not. That same displeased, selfish, murmuring spirit is acted out distinctly when a church raised up by past labor complains that further labor goes to other suburbs and to the baptism of awakened souls rather than to itself, feeling that more labor is not given to it while labor is given to gather new souls. Indifference and careless disregard for the perishing manifest the spirit of the elder brother instead of partaking of God's spirit and joy over the found.
A living church is not a gossiping church planting doubt, questioning, evil surmising, and jealousy while expecting constant feeding, for to be given food constantly while not doing righteousness at home or in the church is a curse instead of a blessing. Its members are the Lord's chosen vessels to carry salvation and His light bearers reflecting the light of truth to all contacts, delivering an effective testimony by precept and example, burdened for souls, praying in sincerity, stretching out hands all the day long, bringing truth close to hearts and hunting for souls. Right discipline teaches members to work rather than expect to be fed, so that those who have had labor bestowed on them gain a knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ whom He has sent, and with Christ formed within as the hope of glory seek to save those that are lost. The practical lesson, to be carefully studied together with the lost sheep and the lost piece of silver, involves eternal interests and must be practiced by seeking the lost sheep instead of wounding and driving it away, and by refusing the complaining elder brother's attitude when the prodigal returns.
Those who have left the Father's house and are in misery, longing for the food given to pigs while no one helps them, are to be encouraged to return to Him in repentance. Tender, compassionate efforts are to restore the fallen rather than holding them at a distance, and they can be wisely helped and saved as truth becomes part of their lives. Coming back to God is illustrated by the prodigal's decision and return to his father's house, and his coming illustrates God's work to reclaim the lost and bring them back to the Father's house.
The verse pictures the prodigal reduced by waste and famine to the lowest work of feeding swine, starving in a far country and longing to fill himself with the carob pods fed to the animals, while friendless and with no one giving him anything in contrast to the bread in abundance in his father's house. His supposed liberty has become bondage to sin and degrading service of Satan, wasting God's gifts and leaving him spiritually impoverished and perishing with hunger. The husks are what cannot truly nourish the soul, sin's meager and unsatisfying rewards set against the spiritual food God gives his children. His suffering and felt want humble him, make him sensible of his sin and his father's love, and turn him from the swine to begin the journey home in repentance and humble confession as his last hope. When he comes the Father receives him with compassion, forgiveness and greatest joy without reproach, covering him with righteousness and making a feast, and those who have strayed in such want are to be sought and met with pity, tender encouragement and free forgiveness rather than censure or cold rejection.
Parable Setting and Purpose
Luke 15:16 belongs to the parable of the prodigal son, one of the parables Jesus gave in response to the complaints of the scribes and Pharisees that He associated with sinners. The parable was given to teach mercy and forgiveness toward the lost. It shows both the misery of one who has strayed from God and God's tender pity and kindness toward those exposed to temptation. Although wanderers choose their own course and fall into misery, He does not abandon them but remains tender in pitying love toward them.
Christ told this pathetic, touching story of a son returning to his father's home to illustrate immortal truth directly from familiar facts of daily life and experience. He came right to the point without long, farfetched, complicated reasoning, drawing from His treasure house things both new and old to illustrate and enforce His teaching. The illustration was given to interest every mind and appeal to every heart, touching the heart, awakening the sympathies, and commending truth to the conscience, while leaving hearers free to accept or reject it as they chose. By such teaching the daily task, instead of being a mere round of toil, is brightened and uplifted by constant reminders of the spiritual and the unseen, with a spirit open to the influences of nature and delighting to teach from them. Its setting includes the father who, seeing his son afar off, ran to meet him and rejoiced that he who had been thought dead was indeed alive.
The parable teaches that a repentant sinner returning to the Father is welcomed without reproach, and that penitence is what is required. The elder son represents unrepentant Israel, which refused to treat publicans and sinners as brothers to be sought and forgiven.
Details of His Want
His own self-indulgence and wasteful spending, meeting a famine, reduced him to utter destitution and drove him to hire himself out to feed swine. That work was the lowest and most disreputable employment, a deeply degrading occupation especially for a Jew. His supposed liberty had become bondage, and his sinful indulgence and separation from his father left him spiritually as well as outwardly impoverished.
Hungry in a famine-stricken land, he longed to fill himself with the husks fed to the swine, even their refuse. His hunger marked the depth of his poverty and the misery that followed his departure and wasteful living. Yet though he desired that food, no one gave him anything, and no one supplied his need.
He was friendless and without help, abandoned by his former companions. The pleasures and friendships of his prosperous life had left him alone, and returning to his father in repentance and humility remained his last hope. In that extreme need no man relieved him, which shows the larger call to seek and win back the lost with joy when they return.
He was starving and perishing with hunger in a foreign far country, friendless, destitute, and emaciated through disobedience and sin. That deprivation stands in contrast to the rich supplies in his father's house, where even the servants have provisions and bread in abundance. Remembering that abundance humbled him, made him sensible of his need, and moved him to decide to return with humble confession. The husks he desired were carob pods, a bean-like fruit with a seed inside, the same pod-fruit as the locusts eaten by John the Baptist with wild honey.
Misery of Separation from God
The longing to be fed from the swine's trough shows how the desire for freedom from a father's authority turns into wild license and then into bondage to sin, degrading drudgery, and captivity to the tempter. The youth who sought liberty is left hungry in a famine-stricken land, reduced to the lowest and most disreputable work, longing for the animals' food yet unable to get even that because no one gives him anything. His former companions have abandoned him, proving that the pleasures and friendships of his prosperous life have left him alone. Life apart from God in this way wastes the blessings, years, and powers God gives and leaves the person spiritually impoverished, degraded, and wretched. To stay long away from Him serving sin and the flesh and the devil brings no profit but poor wages.
His estrangement came by a selfish decision to separate from his father and avoid his counsel, reproof, and advice, through disobedience and sin. That course left him friendless, destitute, and emaciated with hunger, reduced to tending swine and longing for their food while no one gave him anything. The verse pictures a thorough backslider who has left his Father's house and service for the service of Satan and of sin, like a young man turned from God or one who has left the Lord's service and is not fully on the Lord's side. Such a one needs to leave sin and return to his father's house and service, recognizing his need, confessing backsliding, and turning toward heaven to respond to God's love.
That far-country condition comes through Satan's temptations, through mistakes and severe treatment by brethren who do not understand youth, and through giving up the Sabbath for worldly business and trade advantage. The wayward son also illustrates Israel's rejection of God's care: like a son gone astray Israel resisted grace, rejected repeated offers of mercy, and failed to value privileges and blessings from a loving Father, facing consequences over which Christ grieved. The same prodigal course is taken by those who claim to keep the commandments yet transgress the law, unthankful and unholy, using entrusted talents to counterwork God and exerting influence on Satan's side while retaining a form of godliness. Prodigals are also made by indulgence at home through parents' failure to restrain their children.
Husks as Empty Provision
The husks are what cannot truly nourish, the superstitious rites and human traditions that formed the worthless spiritual food Rome gave the people and that could not supply the wants of the soul. When the new teachings of the gospel supplied what their souls needed, people turned away from those who had so long fed them husks. In the same way the husks the hungry son wanted picture sin's meager, unsatisfying rewards, set in contrast with the spiritual food God gives His children. To prefer sin's husks to that food is moral madness.
Those who spend their means on themselves while the poor lack food and shelter are living on husks. Wealth that could bring comfort to people in need is instead used for unnecessary display and possessions. The verse applies to people so impoverished that they are perishing for scraps discarded in a country of abundance, while money is spent selfishly and needlessly elsewhere. Being satisfied with such spiritual husks includes putting worldly appearance in dress before Christ's character, God's will, and lasting riches. It also includes comparing with others, copying their conduct, and excusing one's own wrongs by pointing to others' faults, which leaves one spiritually stunted while indulging unconsecrated feelings.
Dwelling on other people's faults is living on husks like the poor food the hungry prodigal desired. Looking for and speaking of failings develops evil in the one who does it, while contemplating Jesus and His character changes a person into His image. A hungry person left without help will reach for husks. People seeking truth and those newly awakened who have no teacher cry for solid food that strengthens spiritual strength, not husks that fail to nourish.
Hunger Leading to Return
His suffering and felt want humbled him and made him sensible of his great sin and neglect, leading him to appreciate his father's love and acknowledge his claims, recognizing that only his father could supply his great need. Separated from his father through disobedience and sin and reduced to want, friendless, destitute and emaciated with hunger, his adversity broke his pride and turned his thoughts toward home.
Remembering that his father's household has bread in abundance and that even the servants have provisions, he decided to return with humble confession of his sin and unworthiness, in repentance and humility, as his last hope. His desperate hunger, when he could not even obtain the food given to the swine, pressed that memory home and fixed his resolve to go back.
His misery marks the depth of his degradation and turns him from the swine to begin the journey home. Turning to God in repentance is not a degrading step, for God welcomes the returning sinner with love as the father received his son.
Returning means turning square about at once, leaving sin and the service of Satan even at loss of position and livelihood, deciding to be a Christian from that day and coming back to the Father's house and the Father's service to receive pardon and love with purified thoughts and changed purposes. It means confessing backsliding and turning toward heaven, linking with God with full decision of soul, believing in Christ, learning from Him and following Him, and giving the rest of life to Jesus. The backslider's return is a turning unto the Lord with confession and contrition of soul after wandering away.
That return brings the promise of eternal life and heaven's imperishable riches, for the Father still loves the one who has left and calls him back to receive God's love and Christ, whose blood has purchased him. After sin and failure one can turn to Jesus, who welcomes him and gives strength for a fresh effort. The one who returns is still invited to wear Christ's yoke, lift His burden, and learn His meekness and lowliness of heart, and as reward will find rest unto the soul.
Even the poorest person who comes repentant to the Father is welcomed with joy in heaven. None who seek Him with confession and contrition of soul seek Him in vain, for Jesus meets such returning souls with deep compassion and pitying tenderness, having so loved them that He died to save them, and He can be firmly trusted to do for them all He has promised to those who believe.
Being welcomed to a son's privileges requires living by a son's conditions, accepting a son's obligations along with a son's privileges. That means submission to God's authority and obedience to His word, and unreserved surrender of the whole life, not money alone but self-denial and personal effort. Deliverance is given only on condition of obedience and submission, leaving the devil's side, and like the lost sheep found by the shepherd the returned wanderer must remain under care in the fold in obedience and not renew his wanderings, repaying love by obedience.
The story warns not to delay returning to parents and to God with a humble heart. Some who come to the Sanitarium may likewise turn back toward God, and they can be wisely helped and saved as truth becomes part of their lives. People who have gone astray may be kept from returning to God by the harsh, unchristlike conduct of those who claim to follow Christ.
Father's Compassionate Welcome
The husks belong to the story of a son separated from his father, wasted in a distant country and held captive by the tempter, whose misery shows the depth of need and abandonment before return. Even while he is still in rebellion in that far-off want, the father's love remains strong and his heart is already yearning for him. God does not wait passively but takes the first step to seek the wanderer, working through influences and drawing him by the Spirit to bring him home, giving despondent and distrustful sinners reason to take courage. The longing to return is itself that drawing back to the Father.
When the erring one becomes sensible of great sin and neglect, appreciates his father's love and acknowledges his claims, and comes as to the only one who can supply his great need, the heavenly Father though sinned against receives him with compassion, pity, forgiveness and greatest joy. He does not hurl denunciations and accusations of wrath, nor meet the return with reproach, cold rejection, complaints or repeated reminders of mistakes. He prepares a feast to welcome him, gives robe and ring and a place at God's table, and covers him with Christ's righteousness, the robe of righteousness. Penitence is what is required, and the repentant sinner returning in humility is welcomed without reproach and forgiven, showing how God will deal with all erring ones who come back in repentance. That welcome sets former hardship and starvation against compassionate forgiveness, and gives grand themes for thought and a solid foundation for faith.
That love is revealed in giving His beloved Son to die for the race, making a channel for the outflow of infinite love so that all who believe may be restored to favor, obedience and life in Christ. Christ's death is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world, and God regards those perishing in sin and hunger far from His house with that love. His dying love on Calvary, the just dying for the unjust, is the sinner's assurance of acceptance, peace and love, daily beseeching the lost to be reconciled and in no wise casting out any who come. Viewing Him upon the cross breaks every barrier down, supplies what the soul lacks, and restores to divine favor. The Father still loves the one who has left, calls him back to receive that love, and promises eternal life and heaven's imperishable riches to those who believe, learn and follow.
The return makes all heaven glad, with all heaven's resources and angels' help given to seek and save the lost in careless and hardened misery. Seraphs and cherubs sing praises to God and the Lamb for mercy and loving-kindness to the children of men, and there is greater joy over one sinner who repents than over many who need no repentance. Even the poorest repentant person is welcomed with joy among the heavenly host, for God as the true shepherd goes after the lost sheep, speaks to the distressed soul ready to die, calls for return, heals backsliding and loves freely.
Those rescued from sin can be brought back to the Father and then, with God working with the returned one, help bring other sinners and youth to Him and to conversion. Linking with God with full decision of soul brings blessing, rest, and the invitation still to wear Christ's yoke, lift His burden, and learn His meekness and lowliness.
The son's starvation in a foreign land, longing for swine's food with no one giving him anything while his father's house has rich supplies, stands against that compassionate welcome. It stands also in contrast to the elder brother's stubborn, selfish, displeased, murmuring and coldly rejecting response, whose complaints though natural and understandable are not right. Those gone astray and suffering in want need pity, help, sympathy and above all free forgiveness, not that cold rejection.
That same hunger and misery pictures people burdened by guilt and temptation whose hope is nearly gone, including one once proud and ambitious now fallen and under Satan's control through selfish indulgence. With loving encouragement rather than blame they can be led to return to the Father in penitence and find hope of redemption through Christ. Christ meets such a fallen one with tender sympathy and words suited to his need.
Seeking and Restoring Wanderers
The husks mark the lost as in careless and hardened misery, yet one to be sought and saved with all the resources of heaven and the help of angels, whose bringing back to God makes all heaven glad. God acts as the true shepherd toward those ready to die, going after the lost sheep and speaking to the distressed soul with a call to return and the promise to heal backsliding and love freely. The parable shows what God really is, a Father waiting with yearning love to receive the returning prodigal, preparing a feast rather than hurling denunciations and accusations of wrath, having loved the race in giving His Son to die for them. The teacher of truth is to make this waiting Father known to the sinner in order to win souls in the way of the Lord, for the son's return illustrates God's work to reclaim the lost and bring them back to the Father's house.
Those who have strayed and are reduced to want and degradation call forth tender sympathy and earnest effort rather than severe judgment, for their suffering and felt need are what drive them back and make them sensible of sin and neglect. They are objects of compassion like those perishing with hunger, to be met with pity, help, sympathy, tender encouragement, and above all free forgiveness when they return. Their return is not to be met with complaints or repeated reminders of mistakes, nor with censure, reproach, suspicion, or jealousy, nor with contempt, blame, or a cold condemning attitude that drives them away and holds them at a distance. The father instead welcomes and encourages his erring child, restoring him with a robe and ring, and the heavenly Father though sinned against receives such an erring and repenting one with compassion, pity, and greatest joy, knowing he needs pity and love.
The elder brother's complaints over that welcome, though natural and understandable, are not right. His cold, self-righteous, envious, and jealous spirit fails to share the father's compassion and appears when church members murmur that ministers do not constantly feed them with sermons but carry the truth to those who know it not. That same displeased, selfish, murmuring spirit is acted out distinctly when a church raised up by past labor complains that further labor goes to other suburbs and to the baptism of awakened souls rather than to itself, feeling that more labor is not given to it while labor is given to gather new souls. Indifference and careless disregard for the perishing manifest the spirit of the elder brother instead of partaking of God's spirit and joy over the found.
A living church is not a gossiping church planting doubt, questioning, evil surmising, and jealousy while expecting constant feeding, for to be given food constantly while not doing righteousness at home or in the church is a curse instead of a blessing. Its members are the Lord's chosen vessels to carry salvation and His light bearers reflecting the light of truth to all contacts, delivering an effective testimony by precept and example, burdened for souls, praying in sincerity, stretching out hands all the day long, bringing truth close to hearts and hunting for souls. Right discipline teaches members to work rather than expect to be fed, so that those who have had labor bestowed on them gain a knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ whom He has sent, and with Christ formed within as the hope of glory seek to save those that are lost. The practical lesson, to be carefully studied together with the lost sheep and the lost piece of silver, involves eternal interests and must be practiced by seeking the lost sheep instead of wounding and driving it away, and by refusing the complaining elder brother's attitude when the prodigal returns.
Those who have left the Father's house and are in misery, longing for the food given to pigs while no one helps them, are to be encouraged to return to Him in repentance. Tender, compassionate efforts are to restore the fallen rather than holding them at a distance, and they can be wisely helped and saved as truth becomes part of their lives. Coming back to God is illustrated by the prodigal's decision and return to his father's house, and his coming illustrates God's work to reclaim the lost and bring them back to the Father's house.