Studying the Parable of the Prodigal Son on the Shoulders of Giants

Voices from the Previous, Knowledge for the Current

The ESV Church Historical past Research Bible is grounded upon the fundamental level that we’ve got a lot to study from those that have gone earlier than us. Charles Spurgeon as soon as inspired his college students to learn commentaries, noting that the Holy Spirit will not be an unique or particular person reward to anyone believer. Since we all know that the Holy Spirit teaches us, we will know that the Holy Spirit teaches others. And the Holy Spirit has been instructing the church all through the corridors of time. We stand downstream from two millennia of gifted academics and instructing. This research Bible goals to introduce readers right now to those academics from the previous.¹

Learn under picks from the parable of the prodigal son in Luke 15 and mirror on the magnificence of this story from Jesus together with commentary notes from gifted academics all through church historical past comparable to Martyn Lloyd-Jones, D. L. Moody, and B. B. Warfield.

¹¹And he stated, “There was a person who had two sons. ¹²And the youthful of them stated to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of property that’s coming to me.’ And he divided his property between them. ¹³Not many days later, the youthful son gathered all he had and took a journey right into a far nation, and there he squandered his property in reckless dwelling. ¹⁴And when he had spent all the things, a extreme famine arose in that nation, and he started to be in want. ¹⁵So he went and employed himself out to one of many residents of that nation, who despatched him into his fields to feed pigs. ¹⁶And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and nobody gave him something. —Luke 15:11–16

As the primary two parables have confused God’s exercise alone with out telling us something in regards to the actions or reactions or situation of the sinner, so this parable is spoken to impress that facet and that facet of the matter, lest anybody must be so silly as to suppose that we should always all be mechanically saved by God’s love even because the sheep and the misplaced coin have been discovered.
—Martyn Lloyd-Jones, “The Parable of the Prodigal Son”

The prodigal son is the logo of a sinner who refuses to rely upon and be ruled by God. How harmful is it for us to want to be at our personal disposal, to dwell in a state of independency, and to be our personal governors! God can’t give to wretched man a better proof of his wrath than to desert him to the corruption of his personal coronary heart.
—Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible

In that nation that’s removed from God, in that state of coronary heart and life wherein males are alienated from the information and love of him, and shut out from all intercourse with him, they are going to ere lengthy discover a mighty famine arising and can be in excessive need of all the things calculated to make them completely happy.
—Joseph Benson, Commentary on the Previous and New Testaments

It was forbidden to the Jews to eat swine, and naturally it was illegal to maintain them. To be compelled, subsequently, to have interaction in such an employment was the deepest conceivable degradation. The thing of this picture, as utilized by the Savior within the parable, is to point out the loathsome employments and the deep degradation to which sin leads folks, and no circumstance may probably illustrate it in a extra putting method than he has achieved right here. —Albert Barnes, Notes on the Entire Bible

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¹⁷“However when he got here to himself, he stated, ‘What number of of my father’s employed servants have greater than sufficient bread, however I perish right here with starvation! ¹⁸I’ll come up and go to my father, and I’ll say to him, “Father, I’ve sinned in opposition to heaven and earlier than you. ¹⁹I’m not worthy to be known as your son. Deal with me as certainly one of your employed servants.”’ —Luke 15:17–19

That’s really what the person did! He confronted issues out with himself and did so fairly frankly. He noticed that his troubles have been completely as a result of his personal actions, that he had been a idiot, and that he ought to by no means have left his father, and may definitely by no means have handled him as he had achieved. He checked out himself and will scarcely consider that it actually was himself. He seemed on the husks and on the swine. He confronted it immediately. Have you ever achieved that? Have you ever actually checked out your self?
—Martyn Lloyd-Jones, “The Parable of the Prodigal Son”

It isn’t sufficient, after we repent, to depart previous sins, however we should have interaction in God’s service, as, when the wind leaves the west, it turns right into a opposite nook. The repenting prodigal didn’t solely go away his harlots however did come up and go to his father. In true repentance the guts factors on to God, because the needle to the north pole.
—Thomas Watson, A Physique of Divinity

Let none suppose that, as a result of they’ve been extra ethical than the prodigal, they don’t must repent like him. All of us with out exception have walked after the creativeness of our personal hearts, with none like to God’s presence or regard for his authority. Let all of us then cry for mercy as depressing sinners. The extra vile we’re in our personal eyes, the extra acceptable lets be to God.
—Charles Simeon, Horae Homileticae

²⁰And he arose and got here to his father. However whereas he was nonetheless a great distance off, his father noticed him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. ²¹And the son stated to him, ‘Father, I’ve sinned in opposition to heaven and earlier than you. I’m not worthy to be known as your son.’ ²²However the father stated to his servants, ‘Carry rapidly the very best gown, and put it on him, and put a hoop on his hand, and footwear on his ft. ²³And convey the fattened calf and kill it, and allow us to eat and rejoice. ²⁴For this my son was useless, and is alive once more; he was misplaced, and is discovered.’ They usually started to rejoice. —Luke 15:20–24

Oh, my associates, come house! God needs you. His coronary heart is aching for you. I don’t care what your previous life has been. Upon the authority of God’s Phrase I proclaim salvation to each sinner. Each sinner has a false concept of God; he thinks God will not be prepared and prepared to forgive him. He says it isn’t justice. However God needs to deal in mercy.
—D. L. Moody, The Prodigal

Even the vilest sinners discover their hopes not solely realized however far exceeded. They arrive for pardon and acquire pleasure, for deliverance from hell and get a title to heaven. Their utmost ambition is to be thought to be the meanest of God’s servants, and they’re exalted to all of the honors and happiness of his beloved kids.
—Charles Simeon, Horae Homileticae

²⁵“Now his older son was within the subject, and as he got here and drew close to to the home, he heard music and dancing. ²⁶And he known as one of many servants and requested what these items meant. ²⁷And he stated to him, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, as a result of he has acquired him again protected and sound.’ ²⁸However he was indignant and refused to go in. His father got here out and urged him, ²⁹however he answered his father, ‘Look, these a few years I’ve served you, and I by no means disobeyed your command, but you by no means gave me a younger goat, that I’d rejoice with my associates. ³⁰However when this son of yours got here, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!’ ³¹And he stated to him, ‘Son, you might be at all times with me, and all that’s mine is yours. ³²It was becoming to rejoice and be glad, for this your brother was useless, and is alive; he was misplaced, and is discovered.’” —Luke 15:25–32

The episode of the elder brother seems not as an excrescence upon the parable however as an important ingredient in it. Its object is to carry up the mirror of reality to the Pharisaic objectors that they might see their conduct and perspective of thoughts of their true mild. Their transferring precept was not, as they fancied, a zeal for righteousness that will not have sin condoned, however only a mean-spirited jealousy that was incapable of the pure response of the human spirit within the presence of an awesome blessing. The impact, you see, is to position the Pharisaic objectors themselves within the class of sinners, facet by facet with the outcasts that they had despised, to probe their onerous hearts till they acknowledged their misplaced property additionally and so to convey them as themselves prodigals again in repentance to the Father’s home.
—B. B. Warfield, “The Prodigal Son”

The “searching for love” of God that’s not signalized within the parable with regards to the misplaced—the confessedly misplaced—son is introduced earlier than us in all its stunning enchantment with regards to these but unrepentant elder brothers. For, you’ll observe, the daddy doesn’t await the elder brother to return into the home to him; he goes out to him. He speaks soothing phrases to him, addressing him tenderly as “baby,” proffering unbroken intercourse with him, endowing him with all his possessions—in a phrase, pleading with him as solely a loving father can.
—B. B. Warfield, “The Prodigal Son”

This text is tailored from the ESV Church Historical past Research Bible: Voices from the Previous, Knowledge for the Current.

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