2.04.04. The prodigal
IV. THE PRODIGAL
“ And he said, A certain man had two sons: and the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living. And not many days after, the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far coimtry, and there wasted his substance with riotous living. And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he b an to be in want. And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country; and he sent him into his fields tc feed swine,” etc — Luke 15:11-24.
I. HIS DEPARTURE.
HE young man goes away. Why? What drives or drags him from that sweet home — the home that might be sweet to him, if he would open his heart and drink in its pure enjoyments?
Within the man are the “ seven devils “ that hold the reins and direct his course, and urge him to his ruin. “ The pleasures of sin for a season” have been long secretly nursed in his heart: now they have obtained the mastery, and can no longer be restrained. The impure passion which he has cherished and not crucified now lords it over him; and under the tyranny of his own lusts the way of this transgressor is hard. Like the centurion among his soldiers, the will of this possessing foul spirit is supreme over all the powers of the victim’s mind, and all the members of his body. To the right hand appetite says, Do this; and the right hand doeth it. So with all the rest of the faculties: they do the bidding of their master, even to the maiming and mutilating of themselves.
These imperious lusts drove the young man from his home, because they could not completely get their own way in his father’s presence. “ Out of my father’s sight,” he thought, “ and then no longer any bridle on my passions; no longer any limit to my pleasures.” The wretched dupe was photographed long ago, for warning to all generations, “ With her much fair speech she caused him to yield, with the flattering of her lips she forced him. He goeth after her straightway, as an ox goeth to the slaughter, or as a fool to the correction of the stocks; till a dart strike through his liver; as a bird hasteth to the snare, and knoweth not that it is for his life” (Proverbs 7:21-23). The fugitive could not halt or look behind him till he had crossed the borders of his native country, and found shelter among foreigners, as a tree is hidden by the wood.
Nobody knows me here! I have here no character to keep; I shall give rein to passion, and have pleasures without stint.
Very soon, however, his substance is wasted. The English word ’’substance” is ambiguous. It may mean the pith and marrow of a man’s body, or the contents of his purse.
It may be taken both ways at once; for these two kinds of substance generally melt away together, in the bitter experience of the prodigal. His fortime is lost; his health has failed; and his pleasures, such as they were, have fled. The pleasures, when they flee, leave behind them stings and terrors in the conscience. The youth begins to be in want; — in want of food, and clothing, and home; in want of friends, in want of peace — in want of all things. A waif drifting towards the eternal shore — a lost soul.
Such is the track of a prodigal. The fbotprints are thick on that path. A multitude tread it. The way down to death is thronged. As the saved tread their path in daily life, they are jostled at every step by a crowd hastening the opposite way. Oh, it is a solemn thing even for the saved to tread our streets, for they are rubbing every hour on fellow-immortals hastening on their own feet to their own destruction! But yet there is hope. If these pages meet the eyes of any prodigal, turning his back on God and all the good — chasing the pleasure that is fleeing from his grasp, i order to lead him over a precipice to the death that does not die, — we have two pieces of good news for him. Pause, prodigal, and listen!
1. God is angry with you. How do you know that?
I read it in his Word: **And the Lord was angry with Solomon, because his heart departed from the Lord God of Israel” (1 Kings 11:9). But you promised to give us good news, and you announce the most dreadful message that can reach human ears, — the anger of the Almighty God! The message I bring is good tidings: nay, it is, in your circumstances, the best news that could possibly be sent to you from God or man. If God were not angry, but pleased with you, in your sin, it would mean that there is neither holiness nor happiness in heaven or on earth — in time or eternity; which would be folly and blasphemy either to think or to say. If God were not angry with you, prodigal, for going away, he would not be glad when you return. I shall give you here a note of my experience.
I have learned to love and delight in the anger of my Father in heaven. BSs anger against my departing, when I depart, means that he loves to feel me near. If he were pleased when I go away, I could not expect him to welcome me back.
Think of it: as the central sun would miss this world, if this world should burst its bonds and wander away into the darkness of space; so God, the Father of the spirits of aU flesh, misses a single wandering soul, and is angry.
Anger here is but the other side of love. It proves that “ he careth for you.”
If I were a runaway child of an earthly father, and if the conviction could be conveyed to my weary, despairing heart, in the land of the stranger, that my father was angry with me for going away, hope would beam again into my dark soul; for the fact would lead me to expect a welcome, and no upbraiding, if I should return.
2. Christ himself, by the word of his own lips, in the parable, marked and made a path for the prodigal’s return. As they said to the blind man at Jericho, “ Be of good comfort; rise, he calleth thee,” — so, with the Bible open in our hands, we can address every prodigal child: “ Rise, he calleth thee.” Why did he paint the picture? Why did he leave on record for all generations this most tender and melting story? It was to make and leave open a way from the place where the prodigal lies, on the very brink of the pit, back and up to the Father’s home and the Father’s bosom. He traced every step of that way with his own hand. The way leadeth imto life, and the gate stands open now.
Poor worn-out wreck, at war with yourself and with all the world; torn with remorse, and freezing under the dark shadow of despair; lonely, desolate, lost; — there is One that cares for you. Read the parable of the Prodigal Son once more. Though father and mother forsake you. He who spoke that word will not give you up. If he had been willing to let you go, and content to leave you lost, he would not have left on record that wonderful word. The lines of the parable are like beams of light from heaven, streaming towards the dark region round the sides of the pit — the outgoings of the heart of Jesus in unchanged compassion towards those self -destroyers who have put themselves beyond the reach of human help. He who wept over Jerusalem is still the same. That departure, in its results, is now grieving you: there is another One whom it grieves. Christ weeps for want of you: he will not frown on you when you return.
“ Just as I am, without one plea But that thy blood was shed for me, And that thou bidd’st me come to thee, O Lamb of God, I come! “
Make that plea your own, and you will feel the arms of the Father’s love clasped around you. “ This man receiveth sinners.”
II. THE RETURN.
“ Out of the depths have I cried unto thee.” I suppose it ’will be foimd, when the books are opened, that most of the cries that have reached to heaven rose from the depths. When all was lost, when he was on the point of perishing, the prodigal came first to himself, and then to his father. The word that marks the turning-point is very suggestive: “ He came to himself.” Had he then been beside himself, had he not been in his right mind, when he left his home and wasted himself among strangers? The word makes it clear that the man was not himself in his prodigal course. His act was madness, as well as sin. It was the act of the evil spirit in him, and yet it was his own act. Jesus rebukes Peter when he says, “ Get thee behind me, Satan.” The madness of a prodigal’s act does not make it any the less his own. It is a great point when the deceived soul discovers his deceiver and denounces him. The tide of battle is already turned when the ruined soul finds out that himself is his destroyer, and turns against the enemy within his own heart As soon as he comes to himself, he resolves to return to his father. But the picture, as drawn by the Master in the parable, speaks for itself. It does not need explanation. The point in hand for us is its application. When the prodigal comes to himself, is convinced that he is lost by his own sin, he returns to God, and is accepted. To show how this blessed word operates, I shall describe a case that came under my own observation long ago — a case from which I learned a good deal of the Lord’s way when I was young, and which has been a mine of wealth to me ever since. When I was sixteen years of age, a youth very dear to me, two years older than myself, was seized with paralysis of the limbs. He was handsome and amiable and wellconducted — no prodigal, but the delight of the family circle, and a favourite throughout a wider sphere. The ailment advanced by very slow degrees; but it advanced, and he died before he was twenty-two years of age. In the earliest stages he was pleasant, but reserved. Afterwards, for a while, he became sad. At the next stage he opened like a flower in spring, and blossomed into the most attractive beauty, both of person and spirit. He manifested peace and joy in believing. His society was sought even by aged and experienced Christians.
After his souFs burden was removed, his face lighted up and his lips opened; he told me fully the history of his spiritual course, which he had kept secret at the time. It was this: When, he found himself a cripple, although otherwise enjoying a considerable measure of health, he saw that the world had for him lost its charm. The happiness he had promised himself was blasted. His former portion was gone, and he had none other. After the first sadness passed, he thought of turning towards Christ for comfort; but he was met and precipitously stopped at the very entrance on this path by the reflection: “ Christ knows that as long as I had other pleasures I did not care for him; he knows that if I come to him now, it is because I have nothing else — that I am making a do-no-better of him. He will spurn me away. If I had chosen him while the world was bright before me, he might, perhaps, have received me; but as I never turned to him till I had lost the portion I preferred, I can expect nothing but upbraiding.” This thought kept him long back. It was like a barrier reared across the path — the path that leadeth unto life — and he could not surmount it. By degrees, however, as he studied the Scriptures in his enforced leisure, he began to perceive that, although he deserved to be so treated, Christ would not treat him so. He discovered that “ this man receiveth sinners” when they come, without asking what it was that brought them. Further, he learned that whether one come when the world is smiling, or when it is shrouded in darkness — whether he come in health or in disease — it is in every case the love of Christ that draws him; and that no sinner saved vrill have any credit in the end. All and all alike will attribute their salvation to the free mercy of God. At first his thought was, ’’ If I had the recommendation of having come when my fortune was at the full, I could have entertained a hope.” But at last he learned that whosoever will may come, and that he who Cometh will in no wise be cast out. On these grounds he came at Christ’s command, was accepted, and redeemed. For the remainder of the journey he went on his way rejoicing.
It is possible that some who read these pages may have fallen into that “ slough of despond” in which that young man for a short time lay, and the story of his experience may help them out. But by far the best help in such a case is the parable of the prodigal The Physician who wrote this prescription knows both the ailment and the cure. He is mighty to save.
You have sinned away your soul, prodigal, and perhaps sinned away also the health of your body. You begin to be in want, and in your want your poor desolate heart tries to turn to Christ. But the consciousness that your own wickedness has wasted aU that you had rises up before you, and seems to drive you away from the Redeemers presence. He seems to say, “ When your vice has so wasted you that you can no longer get any enjoyment in it, will you come with your ’ blemished’ body as an offering to me?” — he seems to say these forbidding words; but though you hear these words, Christ has not spoken them.
“An enemy hath done this;” the same who sows tares among the wheat. When the tempter cannot get you to go any deeper into vice, he tries to persuade you that Christ will reject you for having gone so deep. But be of good cheer; answer this fear with a “ Get thee behind me, Satan.” These things savour of man, but not of God, my Redeemer. His terms are, “ Him that cometh.” He has left that brief blessed word behind him, and nothing has been added to it since. And look to the prodigal in the mirror that He holds up, until the prodigal’s latter end be yours. What did that youth deserve from his father? The fellow was out and out worthless. He could not enjoy prosperity while his father was near; he would not remain with his riches even in the same territory. In the land of the stranger, when he began to be in want, he thought not of home. This yoimg gentleman, reared in ease and honour, will serve a stranger rather than come home. He consents to be a “ field hand,” toiling and associating with the meaner class of slaves. Nor is it merely to till the stranger’s ground that the Hebrew freeman is reduced, but he must accept the most detested of all employments — must feed the foreigner’s swine. The wretch submits to all this, and plods on through his dreary task with no tender relentings towards home. When hunger comes, if he can succeed in sharing the swine’s food, he will live on that rather than cast himself on his father. It was only when even swine’s food was not to be had, and death by starvation was staring him in the face, that he said, “ I will arise and go to my father.” And how did the father receive him? Look again to that divinely drawn picture: “ His father ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.”
Young man, far from Christ, and fearing that he would forbid your approach because of your provocations, look once more into this picture. Remember, it is not the history of an actual case. It is a story made by Christ, and so made in every feature as best to serve his purpose. And his purpose is to show that he receives sinners, even the chief; that no possible or conceivable degree of provocation has any effect in closing his heart against him that cometh.