IN this act there was a measure of faith in his father—a measure, I say, meaning thereby not much faith, but some. A little faith saves the soul. There was faith in his father’s power. He said, “In my father’s house there is bread enough and to spare.” Dost thou not believe that God is able to save thee; that through Jesus Christ He is able to supply thy soul’s needs? Canst thou not get as far as this: “Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean”?
The prodigal had also some faith in his father’s readiness to pardon; for if he had not so hoped, he would never have returned to his father at all; if he had been sure that his father would never smile upon him, he would never have returned to him. Do believe that God is merciful, for so He is.
Believe, through Jesus Christ, that He willeth not the death of the sinner, but, the rather that he should turn to Him and live; for as surely as God liveth this is truth, and do not thou believe a lie concerning God. The Lord is not hard or harsh, but He rejoices to pardon great transgressions. Ah, dost thou not believe that God will have mercy on thee if He can do so consistently with His justice? If thou believest that, I have good news to tell thee.
Jesus Christ, His Son, has offered such an atonement that God can be just, and yet the Justifier of him that believeth (Rom. 3:2626To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. (Romans 3:26)). He has mercy upon the vilest, and justifieth the ungodly, and accepteth the very chief of sinners through His dear Son (1 Tim. 1:1515This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief. (1 Timothy 1:15)). Oh, have faith in the atonement! The atonement made by the personal sacrifice of the Son of God must be infinitely precious. Believe thou that there is efficacy enough in it for thee? It is the only way in which thou canst honor Him. Thou canst honor Him by believing that He can save thee, even thee. The truest faith is that which believes in the mercy of God, in the teeth of conscious unworthiness. The penitent in the parable went to his father, too unworthy to be called his son, and yet he said, “My father.” Faith has a way of seeing the blackness of sin and yet believing that God can make the soul as white as snow. It is not faith that says, “I am a little sinner, and therefore God can forgive me”; but that is faith which cries, “I am a great sinner, an accursed and condemned sinner, and yet, for all that, God’s infinite mercy can forgive me, and the blood of Christ can make me clean” (1 John 1:77But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. (1 John 1:7)).
Believe in the teeth of thy feelings and in spite of thy conscience. Believe in God, though everything within thee seems to say, “He cannot save thee; He will not save thee.” Believe in God over the tops of mountain sins. Do as John Bunyan says he did. He was so afraid of his sins and of the punishment thereof, that he could not but run into God’s arms, and he said, “Though He had held a drawn sword in His hands, I would have run on the very point of it rather than have kept away from Him.” So do thou.
It is wonderful the power of faith over God. It binds His justice and constrains His grace. I do not know how to illustrate it better than by a little story. When I walked down my garden some time ago I found a dog amusing himself among the flowers. I knew that he was not a good gardener, and no dog of mine, so I threw a stick at him and bade him begone. After I had done so, he conquered me, and made me ashamed of having spoken roughly to him, for he picked up my stick, and, wagging his tail right pleasantly, he brought the stick to me and dropped it at my feet. Do you think I could strike him or drive him away after that? No, I patted him and called him good names. The dog had conquered the man. And if you, poor sinner, dog as you are, can have confidence enough in God to come to Him just as you are, it is not in His heart to spurn you. There is an omnipotence in simple faith which will conquer even the divine Being Himself. Only trust Him, as He reveals Himself in Jesus, and you shall find salvation.
In the next place, this act of coming into contact with God is performed by the sinner just as he is. I do not know how wretched the prodigal’s appearance may have been, but I will be bound to say he had grown none the sweeter by having fed swine, nor do I suppose his garments had been very sumptuously embroidered by gathering husks for them from the trees. Yet, just as he was, he came. Surely he might have spent an hour profitably in cleansing his flesh and his clothes. But no, he said, “I will arise,” and no sooner said than done! he did arise, and he came to his father. Every moment that a sinner stops away from God, in order to get better, he is but adding to his sin, for the radical sin of all is his being away from God, and the longer he stays in it the more he sins. The attempt to perform good works apart from God is like the effort of a thief to set his stolen goods in order. His sole duty is to return them at once. A sinner is never so well arrayed for pleading as when he comes in rags. At his worst the sinner, for making an appeal to mercy, is at his best. And so there is no need for you to linger; come just as you are.
The last point of all is this: That act wrought the greatest conceivable change in the man. He was a new man after that. Harlots, winebibbers, you have lost your old companion now! He has gone to his father, and his father’s company and yours will never agree. A man’s return to his. God means his leaving the chambers of vice and the tables of riot. You may depend upon it, whenever you hear of a professing Christian living in uncleanness, he has not been living anywhere near his God. He may have talked a great deal about it, but God and unchastity never agree.
Now, too, the penitent has done with all degrading works to support himself. You will not find him feeding swine any more. He has got away from that bondage. No more pig-feeding for him: there is a change in him in all ways. Now he has come to his father, his pride is broken down. He no longer glories in that which he calls his own; all his glory is in his father’s free pardoning love. He never boasts of what he has, for he owns that he has nothing but what his father gives him; and though he is far better off than ever he was in his spendthrift days, yet he is as unassuming as a little child.
He is a gentleman-commoner upon the bounty of his God, and lives from day to day by a royal grant from the table of the King of kings. Pride is gone, but content fills its room. He would have been contented to be one of the servants of the house, much more satisfied is he to be a child. He loves his father with a new love; he cannot even mention his name without saying: “And he forgave me, he forgave me freely, he forgave me all, and he said, ‘Bring forth the best robe and put it on him; put a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet.’”
Perhaps you are saying, “May I now go to God just as I am, and through Jesus Christ yield myself up; and will He forgive me? “Wherever you may be, try it. That is the best thing to do: try it; and if the angels do not set the bells in heaven ringing, God has altered from what He has been, for I know He received poor sinners in the past, and He will receive them now. The worst thing I dread about you is, lest you should say, “I will think of it.” Don’t think of it. Do it. Concerning this no more thinking is needed; but to do it. Get away to God.
Is it not according to nature that the creature should be at peace with its Creator? Is it not according to your conscience? Is there not something within you which cries, “Go to God in Christ Jesus”?
In the case of that poor prodigal, the famine said to him, “Go home!” Bread was dear, meat was scarce, he was hungry, and every pang of want said, “Go home! Go home!” When he went to his old master, the citizen, and he asked him for help, his scowling looks said, “Why don’t you go home?” There is a time with sinners when even their old companions seem to say, “We do not want you. You are too miserable and melancholy. Why don’t you go home?”
They sent him to feed swine, and the very hogs grunted, “Go home!” When he picked up those carob husks and tried to eat them, they crackled, “Go home!” He looked upon his rags, and they gaped at him, “Go home!” His hungry belly and his faintness cried, “Go home!”
Then he thought of his father’s face, and how kindly it had looked at him, and it seemed to say, “Come home!” He remembered the bread enough and to spare, and every morsel seemed to say, “Come home!” He pictured the servants sitting down to dinner and feasting to the full, and every one of them seemed to look right away over the wilderness to him and to say, “Come home! Thy father feeds us well. Come home!” Everything said, “Come home!”
Only the devil whispered, “Never go back! Fight it out! Better starve than yield! Die game!” But then he had got away from the devil this once, for he had come to himself, and he said: “No; I will arise and go to my father.” Oh, that you would be equally wise! What is the use of being damned for the sake of a little pride? Yield, man! Down with your pride! You will not find it so hard to submit if you remember that mighty God who so loved us and gave for us His own dear Son. You will find it sweet to yield to such a Friend.
And when you get your head on His bosom, and feel His warm kisses on your cheek, you will soon feel that it is sweet to weep for sin—sweet to confess your wrong-doing, and sweeter still to hear Him say: “I have blotted out thy sins like a cloud, and like a thick cloud thy transgressions” (Isa. 44:2222I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins: return unto me; for I have redeemed thee. (Isaiah 44:22)).
C. H. S.