The Prodigal Son (Part 3)

Sorry for the long delay, but I was gone for a week on a missions trip, and then I kind of got side-tracked. If you're lost, follow one of these links:

Part 1
Part 2

Otherwise, let's continue with part 3. As mentioned last time, the audience of the parable means that the parable has two focuses.

First of all, we're going to concentrate on the "prodigal son" which represents the repentant sinner.

To begin with, we're going to see the sin that this son committed.

Luke 15:12-13
12 And the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.’ And he divided his property between them. 13 Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. [ESV]

The younger son was definitely greedy in asking for his inheritance while his father was still alive. Proverbs even warns against such behavior in Proverbs 20:21:

"An inheritance gained hastily in the beginning will not be blessed in the end." [ESV]

After greedily requesting his inheritance prematurely, the son went out and squandered it all in "reckless living." 1 Peter 4:3-4 sums up this reckless living rather well:

3 For the time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and lawless idolatry. 4 With respect to this they are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery, and they malign you; [ESV, emphasis added]

The emphasized word here: "debauchery," contains the same root as "reckless" in Luke 15:13. The younger son asked for his inheritance, and then went out and spent it all on liquor, partying, and, as we learn in verse 30 of Luke 15, prostitutes. While not guilty of all the same sins, we as humans are all guilty of some form of sin that separates Us from God, our Heavenly Father; just like this son's sin separated him from his father in the parable. We take the free will that God gives us and "spend" it on sinning against God. But as we go on to learn further in the parable, the son's father, representing God, is always willing to forgive a repentant sinner, but that's for next time.