Luke 15:11-32 And he said, A certain man had two sons: He had not been gone long before his "gathering" comes to be "scattering." No doubt, he had his pleasure in all this wasting. There is a revelling and a merriment in these riotous passions. It is soon gone; but still there is pleasure, though it is short-lived, in sin and squandering. The passions soon grow dull the gilding wears off — the music and the dance grow insipid and wearisome, the drunkard's cups, in time, deaden, but don't intoxicate. Even Byron, before his life was half spent, was forced to acknowledge — "My days are in the yellow leaf, The flowers, the fruits of love are gone; The worm, the canker, and the grief, Are mine alone."There is the sinner, worn, weary, wasted; he has wasted his time — wasted his precious season for preparing for eternity — wasted his own energies and power — wasted his parent's care, and labour, and no shudder felt now when words of foul meaning pollute another's lips, or the name of God is uttered in blaspheming rage. Oh, how altered! But all this, very significant as it is, the parable passes by. It is not so much what he saw or heard in that strange land as what he wasted, and how he wasted it, that is here marked down "He wasted his substance with riotous living." (W. B. Mackenzie, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: And he said, A certain man had two sons: |
    |