nature
essentially depraved, degraded, fallen, in the sense as was given to the
world long, long after his time in the doctrine of the Fall of Man, and
the need of redemption through some external source outside of himself,
in distinction from the truth that he revealed that was to make men
free--the truth of their Divine nature, and this love of man by the
Heavenly Father, and the love of the Heavenly Father by His children.

To connect Jesus with any such thought or teaching would be to take the
heart out of his supreme revelation. For his whole conception of God the
Father, given in all his utterances, was that of a Heavenly Father of
love, of care, longing to exercise His protecting care and to give good
gifts to His children--and this because it is the _essential nature_ of
God to be fatherly. His Fatherhood is not, therefore, accidental, not
dependent upon any conditions or circumstances; it is essential.

If it is the nature of a father to give good gifts to his children, so
in a still greater degree is it the nature of the Heavenly Father to
give good gifts to those who ask Him. As His words are recorded by
Matthew: "Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will
he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If
ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how
much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them
that ask him?" So in the parable as presented by Jesus, the father's
love was such that as soon as it was made known to him that his son who
had been lost to him had returned, he went out to meet him; he granted
him full pardon--and there were no conditions.

Speaking of the fundamental teaching of the Master, and also in
connection with this same parable, another has said: "It thus appears
from this story, as elsewhere in the teaching of Jesus, that he did not
call God our father because He created us, or because He rules over us,
or because He made a covenant with Abraham, but simply and only because
He loves us. This parable individualises the divine love, as did also
the missionary activity of Jesus. The gospels know nothing of a national
fatherhood, of a God whose love is confined to a particular people. It
is the individual man who has a heavenly Father, and this individualised
fatherhood is the only one of which Jesus speaks. As he had realised his
own moral and spiritual life in the consciousness that God was his
f