Most people know the parable that Jesus taught concerning the father and his two sons and refer to the story as “The Prodigal Son” .  The younger son insisted that he be given his inheritance before his father died.  This was a most offensive request that basically said “I consider you dead to me father”.  The younger son took the money and left the family estate and lavishly squandered away all the money.  He then hired himself out as a slave to a citizen of the country he was in and endured a miserable existence for a while until he came to his senses and remembered that even his father’s slaves were better cared for than he was.  He made a plan to go back to his father and beg for forgiveness and ask that he be made a slave on his father’s estate.  While he was still a distance from home, his father who was always looking for his son to return, saw him and ran to him to welcome him home and even prepared a feast in his honor.  The older son who stayed and worked with the father, heard the party music and was angry about the celebration being held in his brother’s honor.  The parable of course has a profound meaning concerning the nature of our heavenly Father and the nature of man.

Luke 15:11-32  11And He said, “A man had two sons. 12“The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the estate that falls to me.’ So he divided his wealth between them. 13“And not many days later, the younger son gathered everything together and went on a journey into a distant country, and there he squandered his estate with loose living. 14“Now when he had spent everything, a severe famine occurred in that country, and he began to be impoverished. 15“So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. 16“And he would have gladly filled his stomach with the pods that the swine were eating, and no one was giving anything to him. 17“But when he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired men have more than enough bread, but I am dying here with hunger! 18‘I will get up and go to my father, and will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in your sight; 19I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me as one of your hired men.”’ 20“So he got up and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion for him, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. 21“And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ 22“But the father said to his slaves, ‘Quickly bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet; 23and bring the fattened calf, kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; 24for this son of mine was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.’ And they began to celebrate.  25“Now his older son was in the field, and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. 26“And he summoned one of the servants and began inquiring what these things could be. 27“And he said to him, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has received him back safe and sound.’ 28“But he became angry and was not willing to go in; and his father came out and began pleading with him. 29“But he answered and said to his father, ‘Look! For so many years I have been serving you and I have never neglected a command of yours; and yet you have never given me a young goat, so that I might celebrate with my friends; 30but when this son of yours came, who has devoured your wealth with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him.’ 31“And he said to him, ‘Son, you have always been with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32‘But we had to celebrate and rejoice, for this brother of yours was dead and has begun to live, and was lost and has been found.’”

The word “prodigal” is not used much today in American speech, even though people frequently display the behavior.  In one sense prodigal means to wastefully or recklessly expend your resources.  From this stand point it means that you are fully aware that you have enough resource to live on, perhaps enough to invest and last a life time, but you purposefully decide to waste the resource on a “party” lifestyle and therefore you expend it long before necessary.  This is why most people refer to this story as the “prodigal son”, since he is the one who recklessly wasted his inheritance that probably should have lasted him a life time.

From another sense the word prodigal means to lavishly and extravagantly give away your resource.  From this standpoint, it means that you give away what you have to people but your resource is not depleted and you continue to give, again and again.  This giving without reaching the limit of the resource represents the action of the father.  Even after the son takes all that is his from the father, the father continues to give to the son. The father in the story is like out Heavenly father who is a “prodigal father” who has no limit to His resources.  God is always ready to give, willing to give and able to give.

This is why this parable in the Bible is so wonderful, in just a few verses it describes the message of the whole Bible.  It describes the passionate love that our prodigal heavenly Father has towards us, i.e “grace”.  God is always looking for one of the prodigal sons to realize his Spiritually bankrupt condition of sin and repent and come to God, to enjoy a personal loving relationship with Him.  God is the ultimate prodigal Father with an abundant supply of grace and love that never runs out.  The prodigal son is saved by the prodigal Father, he is born again, with a new life in Christ.  God rejoices in the reunion and has a party to honor the occasion.  On the other hand the older brother represents a person who is standing on his own self righteousness, lost in his sin (self indulgent nature).  The older son is also dependent on the grace of the prodigal Father for his daily bread but he thinks because he has tried to be a good son that this makes him deserving of the Father’s favor and care.

To me, as a born again Christian, I understand that I am a prodigal son that has come home to God, the prodigal heavenly Father.  I realize this is my Father’s world and that something is wrong with the world and it is getting worse all the time.  The world is wearing out and dying like I am wearing out and dying.  I realize I can’t fix this world or ignore the effects of sin that are causing it’s death and my death.  I need God’s love and righteousness to be saved from the death penalty that sin has caused.  I am rejoicing in my new life in Christ and my future home in heaven.  I have made peace with God through Jesus Christ.

But I was once like the older “Pharisee” son.  As a matter of fact, I am the older son of the family.  My younger brother, like the prodigal son in the story, made some bad decision as a teenager and endured a life plagued by emotional and mental problems for 30 years until the grace of God moved him to come to the prodigal Father.  During these years where my brother was hostile and unreachable, many times I thought if I could punch his lights out, that would wake him up to the consequences of his destructive behavior.  Oddly enough, he would always back down when I stood up to his ranting but the rest of the family was not as fortunate.  There are many things that came together to miraculously reach him and save him but I think the biggest factors were the prayers of my mother and the desperate act of my father who begged the judge to put him in a recovery program.  Thank God, this story has a happy ending my younger brother is free from the destructive lifestyle and he is a born again Christian, like me.  Now instead of wrestling on the floor like we did as boys or wanting to punch on each other, we wrestle together against the forces of Spiritual darkness.

However, during my early adult years I was more like the responsible older son.  I was responsible in that I wanted to get a job and have some money but I wasn’t very responsible toward my family or my brother.  I didn’t reach out to help but ran from the issue to live away from home.  And like the older brother in the story, I was jealous at times of all the care and concern and love that was poured out on my brother to make him see the futility of his actions.  Every time I came home it was the same thing “Don’t say anything to upset your brother”, “See if you can talk to him”.  If I had any news it usually didn’t get discussed because most of the conversation would be about my younger brother.  “What are we going to do?”  “What can we do?”  My family members were like prisoners of my brother in their own home.

Look, I am not trying to air old laundry or re-live the sins of the past.  I am retelling the story so others may find hope and deliverance through prayer and by the abundant grace of God.  I love my brother (and my two sisters) and no one has showed more love and compassion towards me than my mother and father.  I am mainly telling this story to set the stage for the “Pharisee” son, like me who thought because of his good behavior that God “owed” him a good life on earth and an eternal life in heaven.  Like the responsible older son, I didn’t waste my inheritance but I invested the money my parents gave me in a good education and a job.  I tried to live a life of virtue under my own efforts in order to be found approved of God,  i.e. works salvation.

This is the mentality of the Pharisees, they were sincere in their efforts to keep the law of Moses but they were insincere in the efforts to love others or to want to know the will of God.  They gave the minimum effort required by the law in their tithes and offerings and not a penny more.  They did not sympathize with the needs of others or seek to know what God wanted them to do beyond the law.  The concept that God blessed them in order that they would bless others was an unknown concept to them.  If they every read Micah 6:8 it’s meaning did not register “He has told you, O man, what is good; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God?

James explains what it takes to please God and be a peace maker for God …  it takes wisdom from above!  James 3: 13Who among you is wise and understanding? Let him show by his good behavior his deeds in the gentleness of wisdom. 14But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth. 15This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly, natural, demonic. 16For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder and every evil thing. 17But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering, without hypocrisy. 18And the seed whose fruit is righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

A person with a Pharisee mentality understands the “Truth” necessary to worship God but they didn’t understand the “Spirit” of love that is also necessary in order to give an acceptable offer of worship to God.  By the way, those who come in the Spirit of love only and think all the problems of the world can be fixed by giving a person what he wants, have an equally offensive mentality toward God.  People like this have no soundness of truth to understand that most of the time getting what we “want” is not the “best” that God has in store for us.  This is why God is seeking those who will worship Him in both “Spirit and Truth”!   The older son needs God’s grace, love and Holy Spirit just as much as the younger son but unfortunately to someone who thinks he is “good enough”, grace is a dirty word to them.  Because to the person who thinks they are in control and able to do what is right, grace looks like an excuse people use to not even try do to what is right, like parents who don’t keep score at T-ball games and proclaim that everyone is a winner.  And in this case the the Pharisees are right, we are responsible before God for giving our best effort to compete and removing an acknowledgement for winning removes the glory we can give to God.

Perhaps, the sin of self righteousness is the hardest one to expose as coming from a self indulgent nature (SIN).  So how did God overcome the self righteousness in me?  Well quiet frankly I am still a work in progress and many people who deal with me say it takes “EGR” extra grace required to patiently see the good in my intentions or for me to see the vanity in my actions and apologize.  But God did reach me one day, when all my self righteous efforts failed to keep my family together and even though I was good at my job, my job was being abolished.  It finally dawned on me at that dark time that I did not have the power to hold these things good together no matter how hard I tried.  I remembered from my youth that only God has the power to hold things together, bless us and comfort us but I had walked away from God.  I hadn’t prayed to Him or asked Him to be part of my life for many years.  I was not saved, even though I grew up “going” to church.   But thank God a black lady at work found me in despair and told me how to be born again and have God’s Spirit in me to guide me and comfort me.  Praise the Lord … I am God’s son!

The bottom line is that we are all Spiritually disconnected from God, deciding on our own what is right and wrong and what is best for us.  Although, we are aware that what we decide and do is wrong at times, damaging and destroying us and the world around us, we want to remain in control, thinking we can figure it out.  We are not concerned about God’s will for our life or God’s will for other people.  Moreover, we act clueless toward God and indifferent toward His Heavenly Kingdom that He is trying to build.  Even though we know something is not right and we are running from God, our sin suppresses the truth, yet we are without excuse for suppressing the truth and ignoring God.

The father pleads with the older son to come and join in the celebration.  He tries to explain the miracle that has occurred, it is like his younger brother has been resurrected from the dead!   His brother was dead in sin but now he is alive.  And the older son is dead too, deadly obsessed with his self indulgent nature (sin), yet he just doesn’t realize it.  Even the miracle of the resurrection is lost on someone who is lost in their sin.  This is what Jesus told the rich man in Hades, even if someone rises from the dead (meaning Himself, Jesus Christ) some people will not listen.  To me, the mystery concerning the depravity of the human heart is a bigger mystery than the goodness that is found in the heart of God.

Luke 16:31 “But he said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.'”

– Rogersings

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