THE TWO PRODIGALS
[p. 72] THE TWO PRODIGALS
Deuteronomy 21:18 - 23; Luke 15:11 - 24
There is a striking contrast between these two scriptures — between the prodigal who got exactly what he deserved, and the prodigal who got what he never deserved at all.
One of these two men represents each of us, for each one will either receive in righteous judgment exactly what he deserves at the hand of God, or as a penitent recipient of grace he will get blessing measured, not by his deserts, but by the love of God.
Suppose you get what you deserve, have you thought what it, will be? Perhaps you suggest that God is merciful. I do not see any trace of it in the first scripture I read. “All the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die”. If a man is to be treated as he deserves, he must not talk of mercy — it is a question of justice. Are you prepared to meet “the righteous judgment of God”, and to have your deserts awarded by that holy tribunal?
God has declared that “out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness” (Mark 7: 21 - 23). You may depend upon it that God knows your heart thoroughly. It is easy enough to keep up appearances before men, but God searches the heart, and knows what is there. Woe be to such a sinner, if he gets what he deserves! The eye of God searches out all the evil of your heart, and in a coming day He will judge “the secrets of men”.
Every person who stands at the great white throne will get
EXACTLY WHAT HE DESERVES.
[p. 73] Think of the dread day in which you will be raised again to stand before God, that you may receive in holy judgment all that you deserve. Is it not a terror-striking prospect for your conscience? I know that this is a day when these things are thrust into the background, but it is a tremendous reality that there is righteous judgment with God. Take care how you brave it!
In Luke 15 we learn that all the love of God’s heart is for a poor wretch who deserves
NOTHING BUT JUDGMENT.
At the end of chapter 14 the Lord told out in the plainest terms the condition of fallen men. Man created in innocence was good salt; but, alas! the salt has lost its savour, and is “neither fit for the land, nor yet for the dunghill” — fallen man is good for nothing. Having declared this, the Lord added, “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear”, and we are told that “then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners for to hear him”. It was a congregation prepared to own the truth as to their good-for-nothing condition that gathered round the Lord, and heard from His lips the unfolding of this matchless grace.
The younger son was willing to take all he could get from his father, and then wanted to have nothing more to do with him. We owe our health, strength, faculties, abilities, means, and everything, that constitutes our fortune, to God; but how are we using our “portion of goods”?
Every unconverted man is afraid to trust God with his happiness; he prefers the far country to the Father’s house. The thought in his mind is that he would be a loser by turning to God. What wretched pride is this! Indeed, it is the very essence of the serpent’s poison first instilled into man’s heart in the garden of Eden. The serpent’s suggestion to Eve was, that God was withholding some good — in other [p. 74] words, that man could do better for himself than God was willing to do for him. The prodigal broke away in independence of will, and set up on his own account, and this is just what man has done, and each one of us in particular. “We have turned every one to his own way”.
Having got away from his father, the prodigal set about to enjoy himself, and it is in one way or another, the object of every unconverted man to make himself happy; and this, regardless of the thought that he is doing so at God’s expense.
Remember, you are responsible to God for every moment of a life that can only be rightly spent for His glory.
But in gratifying himself the younger son became poorer every day, and thus it is with you.
YOUR FORTUNE IS GOING FAST.
How soon you will be reduced to the poverty of a shroud! And even with all the resources of health and wealth, man gets poorer every day, because things lose their power to satisfy his heart. There was probably a moment in your history when a penny rattle would have made you perfectly happy, but a thousand pounds would not do it today. You are poorer, and you know it.
Look at Solomon with all the world’s resources at his command, and yet compelled to say, “All is vanity!” A man of the world had to declare —
“My days are in the yellow leaf,
The flowers and fruits of life are gone,
The worm, the canker, and the grief
Are mine alone!”
That is what I call poverty. Queen Elizabeth reached its awful depths when she cried in her death-agony, “Millions of money for a moment of time!” There is a terrible picture of irremediable poverty in Luke 16 — poverty of the deepest kind, where a millionaire’s wealth could not buy one drop of water to cool his tongue.
Thank God! if you reach the moment of poverty now, you may be eternally enriched by His wondrous grace. An old writer has said, “Free grace is a harbour that no vessel ever puts into unless driven to it”.
It is a fine moment when a man comes to the end of all his resources, and must needs turn to God. “He came to himself”, and the first sign of it is that he thinks of his father. “How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough to spare, and I perish with hunger!” Note those words,
“ENOUGH AND TO SPARE”.
The first glimpse of light from God in our souls, is the thought that we may count upon His goodness. “I am worthless, but there is goodness in the heart of God even for a wretch like me. There is bread ‘to spare’, even for me”.
How blessed to find that the God we have dreaded, and of whom we have thought that He wanted more from us than we could render, is waiting in infinite love for us to turn to Him for blessing! “I will arise”, says the prodigal, “and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants”. Much of this is most touching and appropriate, but the last clause spoils it. It looks like humility, but in truth it is wretched pride, for it contains the assumption that he was worthy to be a hired servant. He was as little worthy to be a hired servant as he was to be a son. When people talk of hoping to be worthy of a place just inside the door, it is simply pride of heart and self-deception. If you get what you deserve it will be the lake of fire, and nothing else.
Look at this wonderful picture of grace! “When he was [p. 76] yet a great way off his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him”. Footsore, heart-sick, and empty-handed he comes — his confession yet unmade — and it is enough for the father. His only qualification for favour was that he had his face turned to the father, and that was sufficient. “There is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth”.
We hear nothing about being a hired servant after this. The father’s embrace squeezed that last bit of pride out of his heart. In the presence of such grace he could only take the ground that he deserved nothing — not even to be a hired servant — and allow unmerited love to have its own wondrous way with him.
The best robe, the ring, the shoes, the fatted calf killed, and the merriment that fills the house, all express the wealth and joy of God in the riches of grace which He lavishes upon the repenting sinner. What a lovely picture! None could have told it out but the One who perfectly knew the heart of God. Do you believe that it is a true picture? Have you made this grace your own?
But is it not somewhat of a mystery that a vile and worthless sinner should have such a reception with God?
WHERE IS JUSTICE?
Where are holiness and truth? Well, be sure of this, that not one jot or tittle of the holy claims of God’s majesty has had to be set aside to make way for such a result.
The closing verses of Deuteronomy 21 bring the cross before us. “And if a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and he be to be put to death, and thou hang him on a tree: his body shall not remain all night upon the tree”. It is at the cross of Christ that all the prodigal’s deserts have been unsparingly meted out. There the obedient and devoted One stood in the sinner’s place, and was made “sin” and “a curse” for us. He was forsaken of God, He drank the bitter cup of judgment to its dregs, and thus God has been glorified in righteousness, so that He is righteously free to take the prodigal into boundless favour.
God has raised Christ from the dead, and set Him at His own right hand. He there lives — glory-crowned — to the delight of God’s heart, and on the ground of His work God is receiving prodigals into the favour and acceptance of which He alone is worthy. This is the key to Luke 15. You must have life, righteousness, and acceptance in CHRIST, or be for ever lost.