Luke 15

The Pharisees complain that Jesus welcomes sinners, so he answers with three stories: a lost sheep, a lost coin and a lost son. Each ends in a celebration, because God rejoices when the lost are found. The last story also shows a second son, the older brother, who stays outside the feast. It leaves us asking whether we share the Father’s joy.

Luke 15:1

Tax collectors were hated for working for Rome and for cheating their own people. Along with other notorious sinners, they kept pressing close to Jesus. They came not just to look but to listen. His words drew those who knew they needed mercy.

BSA: listen (“to hear, to obey”): Their listening was more than curiosity; hearing Jesus began to move them toward obeying him.

See also: Luke 5:30-32.

Luke 15:2

The religious leaders were offended. In that culture, sharing a meal meant acceptance and friendship, so they saw Jesus’ table as a scandal. Their complaint, meant as an accusation, states the gospel exactly: he receives sinners and sits down with them.

BSA: welcomes (“receives, accepts”): Jesus does more than put up with sinners; he takes them in as guests.

Greek: διεγόγγυζον (diegongyzon, G1234) — “kept muttering.” The word sounds like the low murmuring it describes, and the tense suggests they went on complaining under their breath.

Luke 15:3

Jesus answers the complaint with a parable, a short story that makes a truth easy to see. Notice that it is one parable told in three scenes, all with the same message about lost things being found. He speaks to the critics as well as the crowd.

BSA: parable (“story, illustration, a teaching comparison”): He places a familiar picture beside a truth so that his hearers can grasp it.

Luke 15:4

Jesus asks them to picture a shepherd. Anyone with a hundred sheep would go looking for the one that strayed. The shepherd does not write it off as an acceptable loss. He keeps searching until he finds it, which shows how much God values each person.

BSA: go after (“pursue, search for”): The shepherd actively chases after the sheep; he does not wait for it to find its own way back.

Greek: ἀπολωλὸς (apolōlos, G622) — “lost, perishing.” The word carries the sense of being on the way to ruin, not merely misplaced. That is why the search is so urgent.

See also: Ezekiel 34:11-16; Psalm 119:176.

Luke 15:5-6

When the shepherd finds the sheep, he does not scold it or drive it home. He lifts it onto his shoulders and carries it, glad to do so. Then he invites the neighbors to share his happiness. Finding the lost is a joy to be shared.

BSA: joyfully (“rejoicing, with great happiness”): The rescue is a delight to the shepherd, not a burden. Rejoice with me (“be glad, celebrate together”): Joy over a found sheep is meant to be shared with others, which tells us how the Pharisees ought to have responded.

See also: Isaiah 40:11.

Luke 15:7

Jesus applies the story. Heaven celebrates when one sinner repents. The ‘righteous’ who need no repentance are those who think they are fine as they are. Jesus gently points out that the Pharisees, by grumbling, were missing the joy of heaven.

BSA: repents (“changes their mind, turns away from sin”): Repentance begins with a changed mind and shows itself in a changed direction.

Greek: μετανοοῦντι (metanoounti, G3340) — “changing one’s mind, turning around.” Repenting means more than feeling sorry. It is a real change of mind and direction that leads a person back to God.

See also: Matthew 18:12-14.

Luke 15:8

Now a woman takes the place of the shepherd. A silver coin, probably a day’s wage, could mean a great deal to a poor household. A small house had little light, so she lights a lamp and sweeps the floor until she finds it. God’s seeking is careful and thorough.

BSA: search (“look for, seek diligently”): She does not give up halfway; she keeps looking until the coin is found.

Luke 15:9-10

Again the finder calls her friends together to rejoice. Jesus again says heaven is glad over one sinner who repents. The angels see the joy of God himself. Even one person coming home matters to him.

BSA: presence (“before”): The joy is felt in the very presence of God, with the angels as witnesses.

Luke 15:11

Jesus begins a third and longer story. A father has two sons. Everyone listening, tax collectors and Pharisees alike, can find themselves somewhere in it. As the story unfolds, we find that both sons are far from the father’s heart in different ways.

See also: Luke 15:1-2.

Luke 15:12

The younger son asks for his inheritance while his father is still alive. In effect, he is saying he wants the gift without the giver. The father does not argue or hold back. He lets his son choose, and divides his property.

BSA: share (“portion, inheritance”): He wants what is coming to him now, and he wants it to be his own to control.

Luke 15:13

Within days the son turns everything into cash and leaves for a far country. Distance from his father is what he wants. There he wastes it all. The choice that looked like freedom starts to unravel quickly.

BSA: squandered (“scattered, wasted”): He threw his wealth away as if scattering seed on the wind, with nothing coming back.

Greek: ἀσώτως (asōtōs, G811) — “recklessly, wastefully.” The word describes a life with no restraint and no thought of saving, where a person simply pours himself out on pleasure.

Luke 15:14

When his money is gone, a severe famine strikes. His troubles come all at once. The friends and pleasures he bought have vanished, and he has no one to help him. Sin promises much and leaves a person empty.

BSA: need (“want, lack, falling short”): He feels what it is to be without, a hunger that his own choices created.

Luke 15:15

He takes a job feeding pigs. For a Jewish listener, this was the lowest place imaginable, since pigs were unclean animals. The son who wanted independence is now working for a stranger in a job that disgusts him.

BSA: hired himself out (“to join, to cleave”): The word pictures him attaching himself to a stranger out of desperation.

Greek: ἐκολλήθη (ekollēthē, G2853) — “glued himself, attached himself.” The picture is of a man clinging to a stranger because he has nowhere else to go.

See also: Leviticus 11:7.

Luke 15:16

He is so hungry that he would eat the pods fed to the pigs, yet no one gives him anything. This is rock bottom. He has no money, no friends and no food. Nothing in the far country can fill him.

BSA: longed (“yearned deeply, was desirous”): His hunger has become a deep, aching desire, with nothing to satisfy it.

Luke 15:17

Here the turning point comes. He thinks clearly for the first time. He remembers that even his father’s hired workers have plenty of bread. His hunger sends him back to the memory of his father’s goodness.

BSA: came to his senses (“returned to a state of moral and spiritual awareness”): He wakes up to the truth about himself and about his father.

Greek: ἑαυτὸν (heauton, G1438) — “himself.” The phrase is literally ‘coming to himself.’ Sin had been a kind of madness, and now he sees reality again.

Luke 15:18-19

He rehearses his plan. He will go home, confess that he has sinned against heaven and against his father, and ask to be taken on as a hired servant. He does not claim any right to be a son again. He only hopes for mercy.

BSA: sinned (“missed the mark, fallen short”): He admits that he missed what life with his father was meant to be.

See also: Psalm 51:4; 1 John 1:9.

Luke 15:20

He gets up and goes. His father had been watching, and sees him while he is still far away. In that culture, a dignified older man did not run, yet the father runs. He embraces and kisses his son before the son can say a word.

BSA: compassion (“moved with pity, sympathy, and tender mercy”): The father’s heart was stirred deeply for his son, long before any apology was made.

Greek: ἐσπλαγχνίσθη (esplanchnisthē, G4697) — “was moved in his inmost being.” The word comes from the Greek for the inner organs, the gut. The father felt his son’s misery in the deepest part of himself.

See also: Psalm 103:13.

Luke 15:21

The son begins his speech, and the father’s welcome has already shown him how much love there is. He confesses plainly. In the story the father does not let him finish asking to be a servant. Honest confession meets complete acceptance.

See also: Romans 2:4.

Luke 15:22

The father calls for the best robe, a ring and sandals. The robe honors him, the ring is a sign of family authority, and sandals mark a free son, not a slave. The father restores him as a son, not as a servant on probation.

BSA: best (“first or foremost”): The finest robe in the house is given to him, not an ordinary one.

See also: Isaiah 61:10; Genesis 41:42.

Luke 15:23-24

The fattened calf was kept for a special occasion, and now the whole household feasts. The father explains why: his son was dead and is alive again, lost and now found. The words speak of a real new beginning that only the father’s mercy made possible.

BSA: dead (“spiritually lifeless”): Life away from the father was a kind of death, and coming home is a coming back to life.

Greek: ἀνέζησεν (anezēsen, G326) — “came back to life.” The verb means to live up again, which is a strong picture of resurrection.

See also: Ephesians 2:1; Luke 19:10.

Luke 15:25-27

The older brother comes in from the fields and hears music and dancing. He asks a servant what is happening, and learns that his brother is home and his father has killed the fattened calf. He has been near the house all along, yet knows nothing of the father’s joy.

BSA: safe and sound (“unharmed, whole”): The servant stresses that the brother was received back in full health.

Luke 15:28

The older son is furious and will not go in. Now the father goes out to meet this son too, just as he ran to the first one. Both sons need him to come to them. The older son’s heart is tested by the very feast that welcomes his brother.

BSA: pleaded (“entreated, begged, comforted”): The father pleads with tenderness and does not simply give an order.

Greek: παρεκάλει (parekalei, G3870) — “kept calling alongside, kept urging.” The verb suggests that the father kept at it, gently coming alongside his son to persuade him.

Luke 15:29-30

The older son’s complaint shows how he saw himself. He has been working like a slave and counting his obedience. He calls his brother ’this son of yours,’ not ‘my brother.’ His resentment reveals that he never really knew his father’s heart.

BSA: served (“been a slave, obeyed”): He thinks of his life with his father as slave labor rather than loving fellowship.

Greek: δουλεύω (douleuō, G1398) — “I slave, I serve as a slave.” He does not say he served as a son but as a slave, and this word shows the cold, joyless spirit behind his years of obedience.

See also: Proverbs 29:3.

Luke 15:31-32

The father answers him gently and calls him ‘Son.’ He has always been with the father, and everything the father has is his. The feast is not unfair. It is right to celebrate when a brother is found. The parable ends without telling us whether he comes in, and it leaves that question with the listener.

BSA: fitting (“necessary, appropriate”): Rejoicing over a found brother is the only fitting response.

Greek: ἔδει (edei, G1163) — “it was necessary, it had to be.” The father says celebrating was not just allowed but necessary, because a lost one had come home.