The Son Who Left - Prodigal Part 1 of 3

Today is the first of a three part series on a Parable you may think you know well. The Prodigal Son is almost aways covered in a 30 minute bible study. That in no way let’s this text breath. Sit back, we’re going deep.

You know this story. You probably think it ends at the party.

It doesn’t. But before we get to the party, we have to go where the son went.

Jesus wasn’t talking to runaways. He was talking to religious men at the edge of a crowd, grumbling because He ate with sinners. And He told them about a son who looked at his father and said two words: give me.

Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. (Luke 15:12)

He got it. All of it. And he walked into a far country, gathered everything, and scattered everything. Then the famine came. Then the pigs. Then the hunger — so deep he envied what the swine were eating. And no man gave unto him.

That’s the world’s economy. It promises freedom and delivers bondage. It gives while you can pay and disappears when you can’t. It was the same deal Israel longed for in the wilderness — the bread of Egypt over the gift of manna. It’s the deal half the sidewalks in America are living right now.

And then a sentence most people read right past. I perish with hunger. In Greek, that word is “lost.” For the first time in Luke 15, the lost one says it about himself.

And when he came to himself… (Luke 15:17)

That is where repentance begins. Not with a better plan. With the truth: I am lost. I have sinned against heaven and before my father. I have nothing to pay.

This is part one of three. The son is on the road. He has a speech. He has an offer — make me a hired servant. He still thinks he has to work his way back.

He doesn’t know his father yet.

Open Luke 15. Read it for yourself. Then ask whether you’ve come to yourself yet.

Episode Link:

https://www.rabbitholesandmeditations.com/the-son-who-left-prodigal-part-1-of-3/