Luke 15:11-32 And he said, A certain man had two sons:… When a Christian of long standing and irreproachable character, who has known some degree of happiness in Christ, but has not had anything approaching to ecstasy, is inclined to be suspicious of the genuineness of the transport of him who has just been converted from a life of grossest sin, and is disposed, in envy, to ask, "Why should such experiences be granted to him, while I, who have been seeking to follow Jesus all my days, know nothing of them?" we have the working of the same disposition as that which the elder brother here displayed. When a minister of age and excellence, who is mourning over the apparent fruitlessness of his labours, is tempted to ask how it comes that a young brother, in the very outset of his career, is made instrumental in bringing multitudes to Christ, and permits himself to think, if not to say, that it is "mean" in God to pass by an old and faithful servant such as he has been, and to use and bless an inexperienced lad; or when a stickler for order and decorum murmurs that the Lord should honour with success the irregularities of a revival meeting, and the labours of some "converted burglar," in larger measure than he seems to bless the stated workings of the authorized ministry in the ordinary exercises of the sanctuary; or when some father, prominent in the Church for piety and usefulness, is led, in his haste and in his self-importance, to ask, "How comes it that the children of this one and that one — of little name among the brethren, and hardly known for their zeal and devotedness — are all converted, while my son is permitted to grow up in sin, and to become to me a source of constant anxiety?" — in each and all of these we have a phasis of that unlovely disposition which, in the elder brother, is here condemned. The Sabbath-school teacher who throws up the work because another seems more successful in it than himself; the labourer in any department of benevolent activity, who, because he thinks that more is made of some one else than of himself, gives way to personal pique, and will have no more to do with the concern; the over-sensitive, irritable, petted man, who is for ever taking offence, and manages somehow to exclude himself from every society with which he has been connected, and to estrange himself from the sympathy and co-operation of all with whom he has come into contact; may all look here, and in the elder brother of this parable they will behold themselves. (W. M. Taylor, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And he said, A certain man had two sons: |
    |