December 2, 2002
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JMac on the Prodigal Son - Luke 15
John MacArthur reinterprets this parable of Jesus in light of the culture of Bible times, and comes up with some shocking revelations!
The Younger Son
When we come to a parable like this, it's critical for us to remember that the Bible is an ancient Middle Eastern book and place ourselves in the attitudes of a Middle Eastern peasant village culture. Christ is on His way to Jerusalem the last months of His life. He has some enemies, the Pharisees and the scribes. They are legalistic, corrupt inwardly, hypocritical and hostile to Jesus. Jesus confronted their hypocrisy and identified them as self-righteous and not truly righteous. He identified them as not truly understanding the Scripture or the will of God. He told them they did not know God or the true way of salvation. He told them they were excluded from the Kingdom of God because they were inwardly corrupt and they were headed to divine judgment.
They said He represented the devil himself and what He says is demonic and hellish. One way they found effective was to say "Jesus associates with the Devil's people, tax collectors, prostitutes, criminals, the general category called sinners." The Pharisees were outraged, they would not associate with these kinds of people and kept themselves aloof to protect their own imagined purity. Despite the miracles of Jesus which were inescapable, they never did try to deny them, despite His ample evidence of His deity, despite the power and the clarity and the transforming nature of His words, they kept coming back to the fact that He was satanic and it was evident on this occasion because He was associating with the people who belonged to the Devil.
Now this sets off an answer from our Lord. "You don't get it, do you? "I do this because it is the Father's joy, it is God's joy to save lost sinners." And He goes on to tell a story about a shepherd who had a hundred sheep and he lost one and went and found it. What He is saying to them is you are so far from God, you don't understand what causes God to be content, satisfied, and joyful. It is the recovery of sinners.
This story of the recovery of a lost son identifies the nature of repentance, recovery and rejection. First, there is a shameless request, and then a shameless rebellion. Verse 11, "And He said, 'A certain man had two sons and the younger of them said to his father...Father, give me the share of the estate that falls to me." He is outrageously disrespectful toward his father and has no love whatsoever. There is no thankfulness for what generations of his family have provided for his father and one day for him. It is as if he said, "Dad, I wish you were dead. You are in the way of my plans. I want my freedom and I want out of this family now. I've got other plans, they don't involve you, they don't involve this family, they don't involve this estate, they don't involve this village. I want nothing to do with any of you. I want my inheritance now."
In a culture where honor was so important, any son who made such an outrageous request from a healthy father is understood to be wishing his father was dead. The son was in a way also committing suicide because that kind of request of a father would be responded to with a slap across the face. Then he would be shamed publicly and perhaps dispossessed of everything he had and perhaps even considered as dead and dismissed from the family. It was even customary in that time and place to hold an official ceremony, a funeral, for such insolence. You were out of the family and you were dead. The only way back in was some restitution, some way to earn your place back in the graces of the family for the dishonor you had brought. In the social structure of Israel, that was the supreme act of shame.
And his request: "Father, give me the share of the estate that falls to me." He uses the word estate, meaning the goods and property. He's asking for the material stuff, land, animals, buildings, whatever of the family possessions he is entitled to get. And in a two-brother family, according to Deuteronomy 21:17 the estate would be divided unequally. But all he wanted was the tas useios, the material "stuff." The normal word for inheritance is kleronomia, which includes everything that comes with the material: management of the estate, leadership, responsibility. and accountability for the future. He didn't want any part of the family, no part of the father's future. He wants freedom and distance, without any restraint or accountability. He's asking to have now what he should wait for after his father dies. The village would expect the father to be angry, ashamed, dishonored and furious with his son.
But this is the first surprise in the story. Rather than strike him across the face for his insolence, the father grants him what he wants because he is willing to endure the agony of rejected love. The greater the love, the greater the pain when that love is rejected. This is God giving the sinner his freedom. There's no law in the customs of Israel that would forbid a father to do this. He's not doing this because because he thinks this is best. He's giving the sinner his freedom. And the sinner's not really breaking the law but he is demonstrating the absence of a relationship. And that's the point.
The sinner has no relationship to God whatsoever. Doesn't love God, doesn't care about God, wants nothing to do with God, nothing to do with the family of God, wants nothing to do with the future of the family of God, wants no accountability to God, wants no interest in God, doesn't want to answer to God, doesn't want to submit to God, doesn't want any kind of relationship at all. In fact, has none. And God in the agony of rejected love lets the sinner go. It's like Romans 1, He gave them over.
The shameless request is followed by a shameless rebellion just a few days later. He's waited long enough. He's sick of being in the father's presence. He's sick of having any accountability or relationship with the family. He has no love for his father. He has absolutely no love for his older brother either and his older brother has no love for him. And, by the way, as a footnote, the older brother has no love for the father either. That's right...the older brother has no love for the father. In fact, when the boy comes home and the father is happy, the older brother is angry. He has no investment in the father's affections whatsoever. He is equally unloving, equally ungrateful even though he stays home. He is the hypocrite in the house.
So the father basically has no relationship with either son. These are two kinds of people who have no relationship with God. One is irreligious and one is religious. One is as far away from God that he can get. The other is as close as he can be.
But what did the younger son want? "Not many days later,.the younger son gathered everything together." He turned all his property into cash at a discounted price. Whoever bought it can't take possession until the father dies, but the buyer is more than happy to hold on to the value of that property and wait the years until that man dies. This is the foolishness of the sinner. He wants to get away from God now. He wants no accountability to God. He sells cheap all of the opportunities that God has provided for him, all the good gifts, all the gospel opportunities, everything that's good that God has put into his world. All that goodness and forbearance of God that's meant to lead him into a relationship with God he spurns and once he gets his cash, you see what happens in verse 13, "He went on a journey into a distant country."
Get fast and get out far. Gentile land would be distant country. Any country outside Israel is Gentile land. He went to a Gentile land which was a horror. You can't be worse than to scorn your father and dishonor your father. And you add to that materialistic greed. And you add to that selling off the generational family estate. And you add to that going into a Gentile land as far away from anybody who knows you you can get so nobody knows or cares what you do. He's gone and he's dead. Only could be restored now if he were to come back and repurchase the estate which he sold. He'd have to come back and buy it back.
The rebellion is on. "That when he got into the distant country, he there squandered his estate with loose living." Squandered means to scatter. He trashed his life. This young son represents open sinners who make no pretense of faith in God, no pretense of love for God. But sin never works out the way it looks. "Now when he had spent everything." He comes into town, he sets himself on the party trail and goes on a wild spree, collecting around him all kinds of people who wanted to cash in on his foolish generosity. He surrounds himself with lowlifes and he runs out of money. That was his fault.
"But a severe famine occurred in the country..." That's not his fault, but that's how life is. So now he's made some bad decisions himself, the worst possible and circumstances have made it even more severe. He's alone and destitute in a foreign land, nowhere to turn. But he's still not ready to humble himself and to go back, to be humiliated, to face his father and the resentment of his older brother for having wasted the substance. He doesn't want to face the town. He doesn't want to face any of it.
For the first time he can't supply what he needs and comes up with the first plan. He attached himself to one of the citizens of that country. "I've got to get a job. I've got to pick myself up." He attached himself to one of the citizens of that country. Citizen is a word that refers to a privileged person. He found somebody who had some means and he stuck himself to this guy. I'm pretty sure that the implication here is that this wasn't the guy's idea. The picture here is of a man who is now a beggar. And so he finds a citizen who has some means and he sticks to this guy to the point that the guy can't get rid of him. And finally it says in verse 15, he sent him into his fields to feed pigs.
This isn't really a job. It's the lowest possible thing that anybody could ever do and as it turns out, it doesn't pay anything, but to get rid of the guy he says, "Go to the field and feed my pigs." And so desperate, he does it. And this point the gasp is louder than ever. This is a Jewish boy feeding pigs in a Gentile land, serving a Gentile. Jews could not eat pork because they were unclean animals. And he ends up feeding pigs. "Go feed my pigs." This is lower than low can be.
He was longing to fill his stomach with the carob pods that the swine were eating, from a bitter black berry that sometimes the pigs ate off a bush, but was also taken and from which molasses was extracted. The pulp that was left from that was thrown to the pigs. Fighting pigs for something to eat would be a losing battle. And here is this Jewish guy out there and the incredulous reality is he's a pig. He can't get lower. And whatever promise he thought he had about a job and money, verse 16 says at the end, "No one was giving anything to him." He didn't get anything. That's what makes me think that he stuck himself to this guy and the guy said, "Get out of here, go feed my pigs," and he had no other choice. He ran out there, he wasn't being paid anything and he wound up acting like a pig, trying to eat pig slop and get enough to fill his stomach. This is the greatest rebellion, the greatest breach, the greatest waste of a life, waste of an opportunity, this is the most despicable kind of conduct that the Pharisees could conceive.
Sin is rebellion against God the Father. It is not rebellion so much against His Law, it is more rebellion against His relationship. It is the violation of His Fatherhood, His love. Sin is disdain for God's Law, but before that it's disdain for God's person, God's authority, God's will. Sin is shunning all responsibility, all accountability. It is to deny God His place. It is to hate God. It is to wish God was dead. It is to not love Him at all, dishonor Him. It is to take all the gifts that He's surrounded you with in life and squander them as if they were nothing. It is to run as far from God as you can get to give Him no thought. It is to waste your life in self-indulgence and dissipation and unrestrained lust. It is to shun all except what you want and it is reckless evil and selfish indulgence that ends you up in the pig slop, bankrupt spiritually, empty, destitute, nobody to help, nowhere to turn, facing death, eternal death. And then the foolish sinner has exhausted plan A, I'll fix my own life, I'll go to psychology, I'll take drugs, I'll drink alcohol, I'll go to some self-help group, I'll move to a new neighborhood, I'll marry a new person. When all that stuff is exhausted, the sinner wakes up at the bottom. And this is where the young man is, a shameless request, a shameless rebellion, but it leads to a shameful repentance.
The Father
Now at this point, the father reenters the story in the mind of the son, and we go from a shameless request and a shameless rebellion to a shameful repentance. He had done everything he could to make sure he kept his father out of mind while he was indulging himself. But now left with nothing, dying of hunger, thinks "How many of my father's hired men have more than enough bread, but I am dying here with hunger?" All repentance begins with an honest assessment of one's condition of destitution, helplessness, no resources, and impending death.
A hired man was a day laborer at the lowest level. They are poor unskilled workers who were available to do something that was temporary and earn a little money to survive. Now the son remembers that his father was loving, good, kind and generous and gave them more than they needed to survive.
Hired men were lower than slaves. Slaves lived in the family. They weren't necessarily paid wages, typically they were supported as part of the household. You worked in a family, they gave you your food and your lodging and took care of all of your needs and maybe there was a little pocket money for discretionary things. Hired men were not in a position to negotiate and took what they could get to survive. But this was a generous father, and he's ready to go back to this man that he knows to be merciful and generous and compassionate and kind. He is ready now because there's nowhere left to go. All he can do is humble himself, face his shame, admit his terrible sin and disgrace, and go back and try to be treated with the same kind of mercy and compassion and kindness that he knows his father treats poor people. Maybe if he can work long enough, he can earn back what he lost and make restitution back to the family and have a reconciliation with his father.
Here is not only repentance here but faith in his father. He trusts in his father's goodness, compassion, generosity and mercy. Repentance is linked to faith. He knows the kind of man his father is and in spite of the horrible way he has blasphemed his father, dishonored his father, shamed his father, the horrible way he has treated his father, the terrible way he has lived his life, coming to the very bottom he knows his father is a forgiving man and penitently he trusts to go back and receive forgiveness and do whatever works he needs to do to make restitution and be reconciled.
His sensible thinking then moves his will. This is how repentance works. First of all the sinner comes to himself, comes to his senses, begins to really look and assess where he is and where he's headed to the inevitable death and destruction and eternal damnation. The sinner says I can't keep going this direction, there's only one to whom I can turn, that's the Father whom I have flaunted and dishonored. I have to go back bearing my shame and full responsibility for my sin. I have to cast myself on His mercy, forgiveness and love. And I have to tell Him that I'm willing to work to do whatever I need to do to earn my way back. Everybody would have understood that.
It's very humbling, but he says he's going to do it. He is very severe with himself. "I have sinned against heaven and in your sight." What he may mean by that is "my sins pile up as high as heaven." This is true repentance, holding back nothing, no excuses, no blame anywhere but himself. And so true penitence matched with true trust in a father's love and forgiveness starts the sinner back.
He has to go back to save himself from his sin. Empty, alienated, headed for eternal destruction, every sinner whoever repents starts with powerful conviction of his own or her own condition, destitute, empty, headed for eternal death. Every sinner who comes back takes full responsibility for that sin and sees it as an offense that rises as high as heaven. Every sinner who comes back sets his course or her course toward God to come back. And the Jews would have understood that when you come back, God will accept you if you do the work. He had no rights, forfeited them all when he took his part of the estate and liquidated it and squandered it, no rights, no worthiness. I'm no longer worthy to be called your son, just make me a hired man. Just give me a job and over all the years that it takes I'm going to work to earn back everything I lost. I have no rights, he says, I have no privileges, I lay no claim, I don't ever expect you to receive me on my terms. Remember now, he's dead, they had a ceremony when he left, a funeral. That's why he's referred to twice by the father as my son who was dead. I don't expect to live in the home. I don't expect to be a slave. I don't even expect a relationship with you, father, I just want to work and I'll earn my way back. Make me as one of your hired men.
You know, there's real faith here in God and there's real repentance. This is the real stuff. And those Pharisees and Sadducees at this point would be applauding. They liked the idea that he came to his senses and that he's coming back. But they know there's no instant reconciliation, that's not how it's done. He's penitent and he trusts his father but he's going to have to earn his way back. He's filled with remorse for the past and pain in the present. And he's looking forward to even more pain in the future as he works for years to earn his way back. Everybody would get it because that was the way they thought it had to be done.
We have read of a shameless request, a shameless rebellion, and then a shameful repentance and a shameful reception, this is amazing, this is paradoxical and this is shocking. Verse 20, "So he got up, came to his father, but while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion and ran and embraced him and kissed him." At this point, if the Pharisees and scribes were standing on anything, they fell off. This is way beyond their sensibilities. In fact, this is a shameful reception by their assessment.
It starts out simply by saying he got up and came to his father. The son, the sinner, ready to face the shame he deserves. He wants restoration, he wants a new start. He needs his father and his father's resources. His father can give him life instead of death. He has hope in the goodness and kindness and forgiveness of his father. He's truly penitent. He doesn't even want to be a slave, he'll work as a hired man to be paid to earn his way back. He doesn't want anything he doesn't deserve. And he will work to earn it.
The Pharisees and scribes listening to Jesus, along with anybody else would say, "Yeah, that's right." And you know what? When he does come to his father they would know what the father would do. First of all, the father would not be available. He had been dishonored. His respect had been tarnished in the community. He had been shamed by such an outrageous and rebellious son, and he had brought shame upon himself in some ways by even allowing him to do that. And here comes the son with another outrageous request after he has already cost a great portion of the family its fortune and the father his honor.
The father would refuse to meet him and make him sit outside the gate of the home somewhere in that village for days in public view. Nobody would take him in so that the whole town could heap scorn on him with people mocking him and perhaps even spitting on him. The son would expect it and he would sit there and take it. The Pharisees and scribes would expect that he had to be justifiably shamed before everybody as part of the retribution for the shame he had brought upon his father.
And when the father did let him in it would be a very cool reception and he would be required to bow low and kiss the father's feet. Then the father would tell him with a measure of indifference what works he would have to do and for how long he would have to work to demonstrate that his repentance was real. And if he did work as long as he needed and paid back in full what he owed, then he could be reconciled and only then. All the rabbis taught that repentance was work a man does to earn God's favor when he feels sorry for his sin. That's what repentance was, you feel sorry for your sin, you want to be restored to God so you do work and by that work you gain favor with God by making restitution. Everybody knew that was the way it was done.
But what happened could only be described as shameful. 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. Now I just got to take that apart a little bit. The son hadn't reached the entrance to the village, but his father sees him, which is an indication of the father seeking, isn't it? Everybody would know that. The father looking. They would assume he had been looking a lot very often, that he knew the kind of life that his son was headed toward would end up the way it ended and that he hoped that he would survive it so that he could come back and the father bearing a private pain and a suffering love all alone in his own heart looking, and looking and looking and looking.
It's daylight, has to be daylight in the story because he sees him a long way off, which means the town is full of people, the town is crowded, the town is busy. The father is looking and looking, because he wants to reach his son before his son reaches the village to protect him from the shame. He wants to bear the shame, take the abuse. He's willing to have the people say, "What's he doing? This man who has been dishonored now dishonors himself by embracing this wretched boy."
He felt compassion, for his past sin, for his present filth, but compassion for what he was about to experience. He felt a sick feeling in his stomach when he saw the boy and knew he was headed toward this unleashing of scorn. And so it says he sprinted. Middle Eastern noblemen don't run. It's almost as if he's impatient, he can't get there fast enough. This is beneath his dignity. In this culture,the reason Middle Easterners of rank do not run is that traditionally they all have worn long robes. No one can run in a long robe without taking it up into his hands. When this occurs the legs are exposed which is considered humiliating. No one was to jump or take long strides. One foot should be on the ground at all times. Honor was connected to the robe.
What is God, symbolized by the father, running for? Why does He bring shame and scorn on Himself for exposing Himself? It's just shocking. The Father runs taking the shame to protect the son from taking the shame. He takes the scorn and the mockery and the slander so that his son doesn't have to bear it. And then when he finally gets there, even more shockingly, he embraced him, literally fell on his neck, just collapsed in a massive hug, buried his head on the neck of his son, stinking and dirty and ragged as he was. And now we know that the father has been suffering silently for the whole time he's been gone. He's been suffering quietly, loving that boy while he was gone and now that quiet silent suffering love has become publicly displayed as he runs through the street bringing shame on himself to embrace his son and spare him from shame. Everybody now knows how much that father loves that son. So much that he takes his shame, that he empties himself of any pride, of any rights, of any honor and in a self-emptying display of love brings shame on himself in order to throw his arms around that returning sinner and protect him from being shamed by anyone else. By the time the boy walked into the village, he was a fully reconciled son.
I cannot tell you what shock would go through the listeners. And if that's not enough, it says, "And he kissed him," kata phileo repeatedly...repeatedly on the corner of the lips, on the cheek, anywhere. This is amazing. You want to know how eager God is to receive a sinner? He will run through the dirt and bear the shame, He will embrace the sinner with all His strength and plant kisses all over the sinner's head. Some people think that God is a reluctant Savior. No, He's not. This is the kiss of affection repeated and repeated. He's ready to kiss his Father's feet, but His Father is kissing his head. This is a gesture in the culture of acceptance, friendship, love, forgiveness, restoration, reconciliation, all the above. And all of that before the son says one word. What does he have to say? He's there, that's enough to indicate his faith in the father and his repentance. He came knowing he had to cast himself on the father's mercy and he came knowing he had to be ready to bear the shame. And he came.
This is radical and totally unorthodox. This is where the story has its huge surprise. The father condescends, humbles himself out of this deep love for this son, comes all the way down from his house to the dirt of the village, runs through bearing the scorn and the shame, throws his arms around the penitent believing sinner who is coming to him in his filthy unclean rags, that father is doing exactly what Jesus did. He came down into our village to run the gauntlet and bear the shame and the slander and the mockery to throw His arms around us and kiss us and reconcile with us.
The shock is that all this happened without any works. It was all grace as the next verse makes clear. "The son understood it and the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven,'" or up to the heaven, "'and in Your sight I am no longer worthy to be called your son.'" End of speech. But he left something out. What did he leave out? Go back to verse 19, he left out the last one, "Make me as one of your hired men." Why? Because there's no need for works. He's just received grace. His repentance is real. His faith is true. And his father responds with complete forgiveness and reconciliation.
A shameless request, shameless rebellion, a shameful repentance, and a shameful reception by that father in their minds, led to a shameless reconciliation. Let's come to verse 22. This is the last little section about the father. "The father said to his slaves, 'Quickly bring out the best robe, put it on him, put a ring on his hand, sandals on his feet."
The father did a shameful run and now he shamelessly heaps blessing on this reconciled son. They wouldn't understand this at all, just absolutely mind boggling that a father wouldn't be more protective of his own honor. He gives him three things, a robe, a ring, and sandals. They all understood the implications. Every nobleman had a best robe, the first ranking garment. And he puts it on him. Then he puts on his hand a signet ring that was a sign of authority. The hired men and servants went barefoot and only masters and sons wore shoes, sandals. This is the full honor of sonship. He's giving him honor by putting this robe on him.
This is all a way of saying, "The best of everything I have is yours," as symbolized in the robe. It's even more than that, you now have become fully restored as a son. It's as if the king passes his robe to the prince, another self-emptying act by the father. Again, this father just seems not to be at all concerned about his own honor. They don't understand that God's honor comes in his loving grace and forgiveness. All they know about is His works and Law. This is what Jesus is doing with these sinners, the very thing the Pharisees and scribes refuse to see as the activity of God. They refuse to see it as the work of God. But it is the work of God. It's the work of God to give everything He has to the penitent sinner immediately, not after some time gap but immediately.
And then the father in doing this practices what is called historically, it's an old word, usufruct. You may have heard it if you ever worked in the financial world. Usufruct is a term used to speak of the right to exercise control over property that's been irrevocably given to the older son. Even though the father has already irrevocably given that part of the estate to the older son who's still in the home, the father can apply the right of usufruct to use that at his own discretion since he is still the patriarch of the family. He has authority to do that. And so essentially what he does is lay claim to all that belongs potentially to the older son and say it's all yours. And they would be saying, "What in...how could you reward this kid for the way he behaved and tapped the stuff that belongs to the guy who stayed home?" This again is just beyond their comprehension. But that's exactly what the father says. That older son would have worn that robe. That older son probably would have worn that robe first at his wedding cause that's when that robe would come out. That was the single greatest event that could happen in a family, the wedding of the older son. He would have worn it but now the younger brother has it. That older son should have been able to act in behalf of his father by having his father's ring and therefore being able to sign all the documents authentically that related to the possession of the family. This doesn't make any sense. He don't reward somebody who does that. You reward this guy who stayed home, right? Wrong.
The whole crowd would just be stunned with incredulity. This is just completely opposite the way they thought. And then not only are you giving him the robe which essentially gives him the honor in the family, but you're giving him the ring which gives him the authority to act with regard to all that the family possesses, all the assets of the family, all the treasures of the family, all the possessions of the family can be moved around by whoever has the stamp. He has authority to act in behalf of his father. He has authority to act in the place of his father. He has authority to dispense all the family resources. All of this should have gone to the older son. Sandals on his feet, a sign that he's the master now, he's not a hired man, he's not even a slave, he's the master. He has authority. He has honor. He has responsibility. He has respect. He is a fully-vested son who can act in the place of his father and who has a right to access all the family treasures.
Grace, triumphs over sin at its worse. This is a completely new idea - undeserved forgiveness, undeserved sonship, undeserved salvation, undeserved honor, respect, responsibility, fully vested son without any restitution, without any works. This kind of lavish love, this kind of grace bestowed upon a penitent trusting sinner is a bizarre idea in a legalistic mind.
And then the attention focuses from the son to the father. And there is a shameless rejoicing, verse 23. The father holds nothing back, he knows no shame. He calls for a party to end all parties. "Bring the fattened calf, kill it, let's eat and celebrate for this son of mine was dead, has come to life again. He was lost and has been found. And they began to celebrate." This is prime veal kept around for such a thing as the wedding of the older brother or some very significant dignitary who came, some monumental event which would call for a massive mega feast. This is the biggest event that has ever happened in the history of the family or the village from the perspective of the father. Here we have the picture of heave rejoicing that just one lost sinner comes home and God puts on a mega feast.
A calf like this could feed up to 200 people. Everybody in the village would be there. It would be an insult to the villagers to have a whole calf and not invite everybody. And it had to be eaten at one sitting. They didn't preserve those things. Everybody come on and join the party. The one that was dead has come to life. Who gave him his life back? Did he earn it back? No. His father gave it back with all the rights and privileges. His father did, and they began to celebrate.
This is the celebration of the father. The feast honors the father. It honors the father for what he has done. It is the father who gave him back his life. It is the father who made him a son. It is the father who restored him to blessing by merciful forgiveness and gracious love. And the whole village comes to rejoice with this shameless father who celebrates his own grace and his own mercy. This father has exhibited unheard of kindness, unheard of goodness, sacrificial love, sacrificial grace. The son who was dead, literally the Greek says, is up and alive. The one who was lost is found. The son has new life, new status and new attitude. He has for the first time a real relationship with a loving, forgiving father who has made him heir of everything he possesses to whom he has been reconciled and to whom he will eagerly give his love, his service in response. The son entrusts his life to the father and the father entrusts his resources to the son. The son is finally home. He's in the father's house. He's in the family. He has full access to all the riches of the father. And he joins with everyone in celebrating the greatness of this event. That's what heaven's all about. It's the endless celebration of the grace of a loving Father to penitent, believing sinners. That's what eternity is. Heaven's joy will never end when a sinner comes home.
God receives the penitent sinner who comes repenting and believing. "Him that comes to Me I'll never cast out." There is mercy with Him. There's a throne of grace where we can go and obtain mercy. God gives forgiving grace that is lavish. God replaces the filthy stinking rags of the sinner with His own robe of righteousness. As the prophet Isaiah said, "He covers us with a robe of righteousness." God gives the child of His love forgiveness, honor, authority, respect, responsibility, full access to all His treasures and the full right to represent Him. We come bringing to the people around us the treasures of God as His ambassadors. God is almost impatient in His desire to give. He runs to embrace. He runs to kiss. Quickly put the robe, quickly give him the ring, quickly get the shoes. He wants all that He has to be given to the repentant sinner and He wants to start the party immediately and call all who live in heaven to come around and celebrate Him as the reconciling Father who welcomes a penitent son. God treats the sinner as if he was royalty, making him an heir and a joint-heir with Jesus Christ. And God holds a heavenly celebration for every wretched sinner who comes to Him and it never, ever ends.
The Elder Son
We come to verse 25 and there are three more shameful things here...a shameful reaction, a shameful response, and a shameful resolution. These involve the older son. The shameful reaction, verse 25, "His older son was in the field. When he came and approached the house he heard music and dancing. Summoned one of the servants, began inquiring what these things might be. 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.'" And we meet the older brother.
Now most people say the older son, he was the Christian. Yeah, he was the believer who was at home doing what he should. That's not true. The Pharisees and the scribes, the legalists, are sitting there listening to the story, and everything everybody has done up to now is shameful. They're just waiting for somebody to do what's perceive as the right thing. Now here comes somebody who will do something that the Pharisees think is the honorable thing to do.
In meeting him, they meet themselves. "His older son was in the field." Now he's been out in the field working that day as much as landowners work, sitting under a shade tree making sure everybody else does what they need to. The father hasn't told him anything and hasn't been looking for him. The father hasn't sent a messenger out to the field to say, "Your brother's back and we're going to have a party, come on in, greet your brother, embrace your brother, rejoice with me and help me get this party off the ground." The firstborn son was the number one primary party planner in the family. He had the responsibility for events in honor of the family. And the party was in honor of the family, not so much the son who came back, but the father who took him back, reconciled him. And the whole village game together to give honor to such a loving gracious merciful forgiving reconciling father. But nobody bothered to tell him.
The father doesn't go to him because he has no relationship to the father. The father knows he has no interest in his brother, he proved that at the beginning of the story when he didn't try to stop his brother from doing what was terrible. He had no interest in his father, and proved that by not intervening between his brother and his father to stop his brother from such a dishonorable act toward his father. In fact, he took his part of the inheritance gladly, never defending his father's honor. He has no relationship to anybody in the family. Being out in the field is sort of a metaphor for where he was in terms of that family. The younger son was in a far country, this guy's in a far field. But the symbolism there is they're both way off from the father. They both come home but to very different receptions.
The day ended and he came and approached the house. "He heard music and dancing." Everything up to this point has been shameful. It's against what all of the Pharisees believe to be right. They're drawn into the story now. They make ethical judgments all the way as the experts on honor and shame. Outraged by the conduct of everybody, they are about to find somebody they like who turns out to be them. They resent divine grace annd don't understand the loving heart of God. They don't understand His mercy and tenderness, compassion, forgiveness and desire to reconcile with sinners. That's why they don't understand why Jesus, God in human flesh, spends His time with sinners. This is the one guy that makes sense to them. They resent the unholy son and think the father is some kind of a fool.
But finally they have somebody they can identify with, somebody who knows what honor is. And he comes to approach the house, not having been included in anything at all. The father knows that. He knows he has no interest in him or concern for his joy. He knows he doesn't care about his younger brother. He has no love, no desire to honor, no respect, and no interest in what pleases his father. He has no compassion on his father's grieving heart for the wayward son. He doesn't care at all about his brother. He's a Pharisee. He pretends to stay in the father's house, to be dutiful, to do what the father says, to hang around, to get what he wants, to get approval and affirmation and wealth and land and community prestige. He wants to appear religious. On the outside he upholds all the conventional modes of external honor.
He comes and he hears the music and the dancing. The fattened calf has been killed. He is stunned. But mostly he is suspicious, because legalists are always suspicious, particularly of joyful people. This had been planned with months of preparation, and not with him as the center of it. He is, after all, the owner of the land because the estate has already been divided. This is then his calf and all the rest of the things that are going on are using the things that actually belong to him and he hasn't even been consulted. Here's the biggest event that the village has ever known, the biggest event the family's ever known and he doesn't even know anything about it. This is another outrageous act on the part of the father who just continues to do shameful things in their minds. It's an insult.
And so, he arrives. "And when he approached the house he heard music and dancing,"and then it should say, "And he rushed in to his father and said, 'Father, what's all the joy about?'" But he doesn't do that. If he loved his father, he would have rushed into the house and said, "What's going on?" And his father would have said, "Your brother's home," and he would have embraced his father and rejoiced with tears because he knew his father loved his brother. He knew his father had ached in his heart as long as he was gone, and he knew he had gone out to look for him day after day. Whatever made his father rejoice would make him rejoice if he loved his father. But he has no love for his father at all, he has a love for himself. It's all about him and his property and his reputation and his prestige. This is shocking. "I go to work, it's a day like any other day. I go out there to sit under the tree and make sure everybody does what they're supposed to. I come in and you've got the biggest celebration ever. Why wasn't I consulted?"
His brother's homecoming should have filled his heart with joy, and he should have rushed in, because he knew how his brother's life had started out when he left. He knew his father's heart had been broken and how regularly he looked for him and longed for him. If he loved his father at that point, he would have immediately run in. But it really was fear that his brother would come back. "Your brother has come and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has received him back safe and sound." His worst fears, his brother came back, oh, and his father...what?...received him.
This outrageous conduct is more than this older brother can bear. His father has received his brother back in Shalom, the peace of a full, eternal reconciliation between a father and son. That's why there's a party. There wouldn't be a party if he had come back and had to work for the next twenty years. This...this is the worst possible scenario because now the father is using his resources on this party. The son has already depleted the whole family treasury by taking his half, and now he's back depleting more of our family resources. And the foolish father is using those resources on him. The son is the favorite guest at the banquet but the banquet is really in honor of the father. The town is there to celebrate a father who's that merciful and gracious and kind and loving in reconciling. You see, that's the picture of heaven's joy. A legalist who thinks you earn your way to heaven doesn't understand that God's joy is found in justifying the ungodly, that God's joy is found in forgiving the sinner who is bankrupt and has nothing. The older son, that's why his worst fears have come true. His brother's back, his father has embraced him, this is outrageous. And for the first time in the story the Pharisees are saying, "Yep, that's exactly the right attitude, that's exactly what he should feel. He should be outraged. We are outraged. This whole story is just one outrage after another."
He can't be a part of a shameful event. His son has shamed himself. His father has continually shamed himself. He's gotten the whole community involved in this shameful celebration. And he's not going to be a part of it, verse 28, "He became angry and was not willing to go in." Of course he wouldn't go in. He hated the idea of grace. He resented this mercy and this instant reconciliation. And he says all of this, as we will see. But before we listen to his speech, let me help you define this kind of sinner. Augustine said, "Free will without grace has the power to do nothing but sin. The sinner can choose his category but he can't choose anything other than sin.
Works may appear good on a human level good, that is they help people, they're kind, they relieve people's suffering, they're charitable, they're philanthropic, whatever. But they are really sinful when they are done by the unregenerate because they lack purity and they lack true motive which is the glory of God. And anything that is not done to the glory of God is done then to the glory of man and that is the sin of all sins. They are really expressions of human pride. The works of sinners may not all be crimes, but they are not without sinfulness because they are done for personal and selfish motive and gain. They bring honor to man. They produce self-satisfaction and self-gratification. They produce pride and a sense of well-being and that deceives the sinner and that increases sin because it is proud and pride is at the head of all sins and so we really in doing good apart from God, apart from grace are adding to our pride which is to compound our sinfulness at its most devastating point.
If you think by doing those good deeds you are obtaining salvation, now you have added another sin to your pride. You have added the sin of a misunderstanding of the revelation of God and the gospel. You have added the damnable lie of a works/righteousness system to your pride. This is what happens to extremely religious people. So you see extremely profligate evil people in the story and extremely religious people in the story and the point is not that everybody is either one of those extremes, the point is that God opens His compassionate, forgiving, reconciling love to those who are at those extremes and everybody in between. And you see that because at this point the Lord in telling the story has the father, who is God in Him, in Christ, mercifully humble Himself.
Verse 28, "And his father came out and began entreating him." Here we see God the initiator again. Here we see God in Christ the seeker, just as in the case of the younger son, the father came down out of his house and ran right down to the middle of town for all to see, bearing the scorn and the shame of the embarrassment of violating public common conventional behavior. And he did it to embrace the sinner and protect him from the shame. Here the father leaves the festival, goes out and does what you would never expect God to do, beg a sinner, beg a hypocrite. He is the one who seeks to save the lost.
When the information about the older son reaches the father, the word comes to him that his son is on the outside and he's not going to come in. He now knows he has his second rebel son and we're now going to find out how God feels about religious hypocrites. What they would have expected was that the father would be absolutely insulted by this. It is a blatant insult. It is disregard for the father's honor, the father's joy, the brother's well-being. He shows himself as having no love for either of them. And the traditional Middle Eastern response would be to take the son and give him a public beating for such dishonor. But nothing goes the way you'd think it's going to go in this story. It's just one breach of perceived honor after another. But instead of the father ordering him to be beaten and locked in a room somewhere until he can be dealt with, the insulted dishonored father comes out. And he starts begging him. Here he shows up again in condescension and mercy. Here he shows up again in compassion and love and humility and kindness, leaves the party, comes out, goes into the night with everybody watching and the buzz sure is going to go through and they know what's going on. Another act of selfless love kindly toward this son in the same way that he ran to embrace the younger son. He goes out in mercy and he reaches to the hypocrite the same way he reached to the rebel.
He comes right out and goes alongside his son. And he pleads with him, and he calls him to come to the kingdom, to come to his house, to come to the celebration. And this son with whom the Pharisees and scribes are so clearly identified should have brought them face-to-face with themselves and their complete ignorance of the father whom they said they served. Oh, they were in the house, they were around, they were the religious ones, they were the dutiful ones, they were the moral ones. But they didn't know the heart of God or the joy of God. They had no interest in the recovery of lost sinners. They refused to honor God for saving grace which has always been the way God saved.
Here is this wonderful compassionate grace of God reaching out to these angry hypocrites. And the response of the older son, verse 29, "He answered and said to his father, 'Look...'" There's no title. There's no respect. And then he says, "For so many years I have been serving you," "For so many years I have been your slave." Now there's a legalist mentality with no joy. This guy he has seen his life nothing but slugging out in slavery to this guy so that when he finally dies you can get what you're after. He was no different than the younger son. He wanted what he wanted, he just had a different way to get it.
And then if you want to know the self-image of a hypocrite, here it is. "And I have never neglected a command of yours." This sounds like the rich young ruler in Matthew 19 and Luke 18 where Jesus says, "Here are the commandments," and he responds by saying, "I've kept all those." He lives with this illusion that he has never ever neglected a command that his father had given him. There is the amazing self-deception of a hypocrite. He's perfect, and claims to understand what perfection is. I understand what perfect righteousness is and perfect justice and I know what perfect honor is and I know how you're supposed to behave and you're in violation of it. Again and again you're in violation of it. You took him back, you ran, you shamed yourself. You protected him from shame. You forgave him. You embraced him. You kissed him. You gave him full sonship. You gave him honor. You gave him authority. You gave him responsibility. You hold this massive celebration for an absolutely unworthy sinner. I'm perfect and you're not."
He has no love for the father. He has no interest in the father's love for his younger brother. He has no desire to share in his father's joy. He has no joy period in anything. But he's still perfect and needs no repentance. How about that? What a classic illustration of a hypocrite. Angry, bitter, slave mentality, I've done all this to get what I expect to get, but he sees himself as perfect and needing no repentance. Nobody goes into the Kingdom of God without repentance. This is classic hypocrisy. His heart is wretched. His heart is wicked. His heart is alienated. His heart is selfish and he's blind to spiritual reality. And again, here are the Pharisees and the scribes, here's the religious sinner in the home of God, in the house of God, if you will, making a public display of affection for God, wearing clerical garb, or attending a certain kind of ritual, certain religious activities, moral on the public front, outwardly good, outwardly obeying the law, keeping all the rules. But no relationship to God. No concern for the honor of God. No joy. No understanding of grace.
The son isn't finished. He's going to dig his claws deeper into his father whom he sees as a sinner. He sees his father as a violator of righteous standards of which he is the source and says to him this. "I have never neglected a command of yours and yet you have never given me a kid, or a goat, that I might be merry with my friends. I've been the worker and I don't even get a goat. He's done nothing for you and he gets the fattened calf. This is not fair. This is not equitable. This is not just. This is not righteous."
You know what the son is really saying? "Father, I don't need to ask you for forgiveness, I haven't done anything. But I'll tell you something, you need to ask me for forgiveness for what you've done." That is the outrage of hypocrisy. That is the outrage of legalism. It demands that God forgive us for a violation of our understanding. He thinks the father needs to ask him for forgiveness.
And the Pharisees are going to identify with him. Yeah, this is right, this is the right posture. This is outrageous conduct by the father. The father is the culprit. The father is the bad guy here,. The son is a bad guy, son number one, sure he's a bad guy, the younger son, but the father's really the bad one, he's the one who has completely violated all conventional standards of respect and honor.
The son gives himself away a little bit here, he says...because he says, "You've never given me a kid that I might be merry with my friends." MY friends. He's accusing the father of favoritism and he's accusing the father of an unjust favoritism. But he's also pointing out the fact that when he has a party, it's not going to include his brother, it's not going to include his father. His father is nothing more than a slave master. He's going to have his party with his buddies. So classic in his description of the Pharisees who associated only with themselves, as we have seen in other texts.
This is the time when the older brother wishes the father were dead, probably wished it a lot if this were a real person. But in the story it comes out. "I haven't had my party. I haven't had anybody kill a kid for me so that I could have a party with my friends." He doesn't care about his father and now his father is wasting assets on this other son, a wicked son who by his own admission is unworthy. If his father was just dead, all of this would be over. If his father was just dead, then he would possess everything and he could start the party with his own buddies. Get the father out of the picture and everything is good, everything is as it should be, everything is honorable again. Let's get back to an honorable world here. We've got to get rid of all this shameful stuff.
Verse 30 carries on a further assault on his father's character, integrity and virtue. "But when this son of yours," he won't even say my brother, so much disdain in him, "When this son of yours came who has devoured your wealth with harlots, you killed the fattened calf for him. You don't give me a goat, but you kill the fattened calf for him, this son of yours." Wow, you can cut that contempt with a knife.
So here is something juxtaposed against a celebration that's pretty stark. You've got a celebration going on with music and dancing and the younger son and the feast and it's just a high time of joy. And out in the dark of the night you've got this horrific assault going on and the older brother is attacking the virtue, the integrity, the character of his father. All that he had kept in for all those years explodes out of him, all that fake respect and honor is gone. And while they're all inside honoring that father, he's on the outside heaping contempt on him. This is the Pharisees. They saw themselves as righteous. They saw themselves as just. They therefore sat in judgment on God in Christ and they condemned Jesus for His mercy, compassion, love, and the gospel of grace.
In his mind a Pharisee would think that son should be dead. If you spend your money on harlots, you get killed. Deuteronomy 21:18-21, you get stoned to death. He should be dead. Instead of dead, look at the party. This is incongruous. This is outrageous. This is shameful, everything about it. It's a shameful reaction by the son who is looking at the whole thing as shameful.
The fattened calf wasn't really killed for the son, he was killed for the father. The father is the one who gives the credit as the reconciler. He determines who is going to be reconciled and under what terms. He's the one who ran and embraced and kissed. It really was a celebration of the father. But his anger has completely blinded him. And he has no knowledge of his father. The father is the main figure at the feast. The father is the one they're all honoring for such loving forgiveness. And the people will accept the younger son because it's against convention to accept him. It would be against the norm to accept him back under those conditions. But they will because the father has. And so it's really the father who is being celebrated, just as in the end, in heaven, the joy of heaven, the eternal joy of the angels and all the redeemed that gather around the throne of God and even the joy of God is the joy that comes to God Himself for being the reconciler. When we go to heaven, the direction of our praise isn't going to be toward the sinners, it's going to be toward the Savior.
So here is this great feast and all the celebration honoring the father. And here at the same time is this son who heaps dishonor on the father simultaneously. It's the picture, the party symbolizes all the sinners who have collected around God to honor Him for their salvation. And outside are the Pharisees who are heaping scorn upon the Father God in Christ.
Then there's a shameful response in verse 31. "He said to him, 'My child, you've always been with me, all that's mine is yours.'" What a tender response. That would be...that would be shameful in the eyes of the villagers. They would say, "Wait, you should finally somebody slap this guy. I mean, enough is enough, this mercy is getting a little over the top here. Please." But he says, "My child," in grieving, painful, agonizing, compassionate love and mercy. He speaks to him in endearing terms. The son uses no title, no respect. The son attacks the virtue, the integrity, the justice and the righteousness of the father. You see the patience of God with the sinners, even hypocrites.
"We had to be merry and rejoice. We had to." It's not like we had an option. "For this brother of yours was dead and has begun to live and was lost and has been found." We had no choice because this is what causes joy to God. Heaven's joy can't be restrained or postponed. Divine joy is released when one sinner repents and is reconciled. And heaven's joy will be released not just for a prodigal, not just for someone who's immoral and irreligious and blatantly sinful, but for secret sinners, rebels, the religious, the moral, the hypocrites, the ones whose lawlessness is all on the inside. God is saying here, Christ is saying, "I go out into the street for the prodigal and I go out into the courtyard for you. I humble Myself and take on public shame for the prodigal. And I humble Myself and take on public shame for you. I come with compassion and love and forgiveness and I am ready to embrace you and to kiss you and to give you full sonship with all its privileges, not just if you're the prodigal, but even if you're the hypocrite." He's really inviting him to salvation. You can come to the party if you choose, if you recognize your true spiritual condition, if you come home you can take possession of everything that's always been there.
The younger son was overwhelmed with his father's grace. Immediately confessed his sin, confessed his unworthiness in the very most magnanimous ways and he received instantaneous forgiveness, reconciliation, sonship all the rights and privileges that the father had at his disposal to give. He entered into the celebration of the father's joy, that is eternal salvation. And as I've been saying, that joy goes on in heaven forever.
The older son, the same tenderness, the same kindness, the same mercy, offered the same grace, reacts with bitter resentment, attacks the virtue, the integrity of the father. And his father makes one final appeal. "My child, it's all here. We had to celebrate, implied, and we will celebrate for you too if you come."
It stops in verse 32, isn't that strange? This is not an ending. What did the older son do? The guests are all there. The guests are waiting, they want to know if he comes in. Having embraced and kissed his older son who repented, they want to know if he humbled himself, if he fell down before his father and sought grace for his long hypocrisy and bitter service. They want to know if he was forgiven and reconciled and they would love to see the father come in with his arm around his son, bringing him to the head table and sitting him next to his brother. Wouldn't that be a great ending?
The Pharisees wrote a different end. "And the older son being outraged at his father, picked up a piece of wood and beat him to death in front of everyone." That's the ending they wrote. That's the cross and that's what they did just a few months after this. And, by the way, congratulated themselves on their righteous act that preserved the honor of Israel and Judaism and true religion and God.
Let's pray. What an ironic thing it is, God, that the father should have beaten the son, is beaten by the son to death in the greatest act of evil the world has ever seen. And yet, and yet, O God, out of that horrible ending of killing Your Son with wood came our redemption. The final shameful resolution of the story is the cross but out of that You have wrought our redemption for on that cross He died to bear our sins and what the leaders of Israel meant for evil, You meant for good. We thank You for this glorious salvation.
