is made evident that a return to his father was the
son's last resort; he did not adopt it--he did not even entertain it,
until all others had failed. The grief which he must have known his
unnatural exile caused in the bosom of the family at home did not move
him: even want, when it came upon him like an armed man, failed to
overcome his stubborn spirit. He will be the servant of a stranger
rather than his father's son; he would live on swine's food, if it had
power to sustain a human life, rather than sit at his father's table. It
was not till death stared him in the face that he consented to return.
He encountered all extremities of privation rather than come home; no
thanks to him, then, for coming at last. Yet he was received with an
ardent welcome, and without upbraiding. The son's sullen, obdurate,
desperate resistance becomes a measure and a monument of the father's
forbearing, forgiving love. It is thus that sinful men return to God in
Christ to-day; and thus that God in Christ to-day receives sinful men.
Prodigals returning deserve nothing, and yet obtain all. Of even the
last rag of merit that the imagination can conjure up--the merit of
being willing to receive favour--they are utterly destitute. Though we
do not come back to our father until all other resources have
failed--although we come, as it were, only when we cannot help coming,
he receives us with open arms; he takes the sin away, and does not cast
it up.

"When he was yet a great way off his father saw him." He must have been
looking out. Often, doubtless every day, his eye turned and strained
wistfully in the direction of his son's retiring footsteps. While that
son was starving in a foreign land, his father was weeping at the
window, longing for his return; when at last the prodigal appeared, the
watchful father caught sight of his form in the distance, and ran to
meet him. Behold again in this glass another feature of redeeming love!
Jesus, looking down on Jerusalem, wept for sorrow, because its giddy
multitude would not turn and live; if they had with one accord come
forth to accept the pardon which he offered, he would have wept again
for joy. In his tears, as well as in his teaching he showed us the
Father.

The reconciliation is immediate and complete. The parable reveals an
extraordinary outburst of paternal tenderness. The son, melted, and in
some measure confused by the undeserved, unexpected warmth of his
reception, bethought of the sp