It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.
It was meet that we should make merry and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found. Should he simply take his long-vacant place in the family, without one special sign of wonder and delight at the change? Would that have been nature? But this being the meaning of the festivity, it would for that very reason be temporary. In time, the dutifulness of even the younger son would become the law and not the exception: he too at length might venture to say, "Lo, these many years do I serve thee;" and of him the father would say, "Son, thou art ever with me." And then it would not be "meet that they should make merry and be glad" - as at his first return.
Remarks:
(1) The estrangement of the human spirit from God is the deepest and most universal malady of our nature. It may take the form either of impatience of divine authority or of want of sympathy with the things wherein He delighteth. But important as is the distinction between these two forms of estrangement from God, they naturally run into each other, and are inseparable. In placid and amiable natures, what shows itself chiefly is disrelish of spiritual things. This may not take any active form, and in that case it is only perceptible in the heart's entire satisfaction without God. No fellowship with Him, or even thought of Him, is necessary to such. They get on perfectly well, and even better, when every such thought is away. This is truly a godless life, but it is the life of many of the most attractive and accomplished members of society. In young men it is apt to take the form of dislike of the restraints which divine authority imposes, and a desire to get free from them. But in all, it is the same malady at bottom, with which our fallen nature is smitten.
(2) The extent to which men go from God varies as much as men themselves; but the freedom they assert in this condition is but bondage under another name.
(3) It is not every discovery of the folly, and bitterness of departure from God that will move the heart to retrace its steps; often matters go from bad to worse before any decisive change is resolved on; and in most cases it is only when the soul is brought to extremities that it says in earnest, "I will arise and go to my Father." And when, upon so doing, we are welcomed back, and feel the bond that binds us to our Father even firmer and dearer than if we had never departed, we find ours to be just such a case as the sweet Psalmist of Israel sings of: "Such as sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death, being bound in affliction and iron; because they rebelled against the words of God, and contemned the counsel of the Most High: therefore he brought down their heart with labour: they fell down, and there was none to help. Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and he saved them out of their distresses. He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and brake their bands in sunder.-O that men would praise the Lord for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!" (Psalms 107:10-15.)
(4) The pardon of sin is absolutely gratuitous, and reaches down to the lowest depths of estrangement from God and rebellion against his precepts. The one thing required is to "arise and go to our Father." "Go and proclaim these words toward the north, and say, Return, thou backsliding Israel, saith the Lord; and I will not cause mine anger to fall upon you: Only acknowledge thine iniquity, and I will not cause mine anger to fall upon thee."
(5) The sense of reconciliation to God, instead of checking, only deepens the grief of the pardoned believer for the sin that has been forgiven: "That thou mayest remember, and be confounded, and never open thy mouth anymore because of thy shame, when I am pacified toward thee for all that thou hast done, saith the Lord God." (Ezekiel 16:63). 'True repentance,' says Dr. Owen, 'waters a free pardon with tears, detests forgiven sin, and aims at the ruin of that which we are assured shall never ruin us.'
(6) The deeper sunk and the longer estranged from God any sinner is, the more exuberant is the joy which his recovery occasions. All heaven is represented as ringing with it, while he himself breaks forth into such songs as these - "He brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. And He hath put a new song into my mouth, even praise unto our God: Many shall see it, and fear, and trust in the Lord" (Psalms 40:2-3). But,
(7) This joy over returning prodigals is not the portion of those whose whole lives have been spent in the service of their Father in heaven. Yet, instead of grudging the want of this, they should deem it the highest testimony to their life-long fidelity, that something better is reserved for them-the deep, abiding complacency of their Father in heaven.
(8) In giving such an interpretation of the parable of the Prodigal Son as, in our judgment, bears consistency with all Scripture truth on its face, we have not adverted to interpretations which seem to us to miss the mark. The notion of not a few, that the younger son represents the Gentiles, who early strayed from God, and the older son symbolizes the Jews, who abode true to Him; is rejected by the best expositors; and no wonder, since the publicans and sinners, whose welcome back to God is illustrated by the reception of the prodigal, were Jews and not Gentiles. Clearly this parable has to do, not with nationalities, but with classes or characters. But most interpreters-even such as Trench-misapprehend, we think, almost entirely the truth intended to be taught by the conduct of the older son-who, he thinks, 'represents a form of legal righteousness, not altogether false, but low; who has been kept by the law from gross offences,' etc. Let the reader judge whether this interpretation, or that which we have given is the more consistent and eligible.
(9) Was ever teaching like this heard on earth? Did even the Mouth that spake as never man spake utter such words of grace to the vilest-for fullness and melting tenderness of love-on any other recorded occasion? This is the Gospel within the Gospel, as it has been well called; and it will stand, while the world lasts, an evidence which no unsophisticated mind can resist, that He who uttered it must have come forth from the very bosom of the Father to declare it, and that him that cometh to Him He will in no wise cast out.