The Prodigal Son examined

  • Christian Chat is a moderated online Christian community allowing Christians around the world to fellowship with each other in real time chat via webcam, voice, and text, with the Christian Chat app. You can also start or participate in a Bible-based discussion here in the Christian Chat Forums, where members can also share with each other their own videos, pictures, or favorite Christian music.

    If you are a Christian and need encouragement and fellowship, we're here for you! If you are not a Christian but interested in knowing more about Jesus our Lord, you're also welcome! Want to know what the Bible says, and how you can apply it to your life? Join us!

    To make new Christian friends now around the world, click here to join Christian Chat.
Dec 27, 2018
4,170
876
113
Jesus was referring to Israel and Judah as the two sons. (Two kingdoms) both loved by the Father. One wayward, one stayed at home (Judah- Jeruslalem), one knew they were sinners, the other refused to acknowledge the other brother and was resentful.

Jesus told this parable and the Pharisees recongnised they were the first son in the parable. Remember Saul was a pHarisee who came to Jesus so its possible he was like the first son. The second son was like the publicans and sinners the Pharisees despised...anyone who wasnt as religious and faithful as they were. Yet the publicans and sinners came back to the Father.

Yes christians can interpret the parable to mean the born again reality of knowing our Father but that isnt really the context of the parable. It does speak of a spiritual reality though...Ultimately all of us who were drawn to the Father will be at some stage adopted into Gods family and become his sons/daughters.
I agree with most of what you said, but not fully with the first paragraph. But definitely agree with the second and third paragraph.
 
Jul 23, 2018
12,199
2,775
113
Parable of Two Sons.

a. Setting (Matthew 21:23 Jesus entered the temple courts, and, while he was teaching, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him. “By what authority are you doing these things?”

1. Who the parable is directed to- Chief priests and elders
2. Occasion- Jesus' authority challenged by the chief priests and elders

B. Lead up to parable- (Matthew 21:24-27) Jesus asks them about John's baptism, origin from man or God, they avoid the question.

c. The parable- 28 “What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’ 29 “‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. 30 “Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go.

d. Question and answer- 31 “Which of the two did what his father wanted?”
“The first,” they answered.

e. The parable explained- Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. (religious leaders) 32 For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.

Observations-

a. First son- said he would not go work in the field, but afterward repented and went.
Second son, said he would but did not go.

b. Nothing said IN THE PARABLE about prostitures, tax collecters, chief priests and elders. They were two sons, one who first disobeyed, then repented, and one who payed lip service but did not obey. THAT IS ALL THE PARABLE Says about them.

c. Verses 31 and 32 interprets the parable for us. The CONTEXT explains the meaning of the parable.

d. The tax collectors and prostitutes were the first son, the religious leaders were the second. Just as I said all along.

e. The parable is found in verses 28-30. The interpretation of the parable is found in verses 31-32

f. This is the INTERPRETATION OF THE PARABLE. Jesus was speaking of tax collectors, harlots, and religious leaders when he was speaking. That is the interpretation.

But the parable can apply to us. That is called an Application

The parable of the Prodigal son

a. Setting (Luke 15:1-2)

b. One of three parables with the same setting and purpose. (lost sheep, lost coin, lost son)

c. Interpretation. The interpretation of the parables is found in the setting. LUKE 15:1-2 explains the parable. That is how we are to interpret the parable. Just like the context in Matthew 21 explains that parable.

d. Application- 1. Like the prodigal son, God shows mercy to us. 2. we should not be unloving and judgemental like the scribes and pharisees, but should rejoice when a sinner comes to God.

The three parables considered. lost sheep, lost coin, lost son.

Point of first two- (lost sheep, lost coin)

a. Jesus came to seek and save the lost.
b. There is joy in heaven when a lost person is found.


Point of last- (prodigal son)

it is fitting FOR THE RELIGIOUS LEADERS OF JESUS' DAY AND US to rejoice with heaven when a lost person comes home.

Two parables in Matthew 21 considered

a. Two sons- Sinners coming into the Kingdom of God before self righteous religious people do. Religious people going about to establish their own righteousness and not submitting to the righteousness of God.

b. Vinedressers parable- The kingdom of God is being taken away from the people Jesus is speaking (religious leaders) to and given to others. Which includes Gentiles.

OK, that is a full explanation. If you still want to argue about it, I don't have any reason to continue this discussion. If you want to discuss it further, that is fine.
It doesn't make any difference to me what you think.

I am here to report,not offer up verses to support a doctrine.
I apologize for mistaking you for marcello.
I already told you what happened but you are still all offended and holding my mistake hostage.
Get back to me when you can openly debate the topic,not whatever personal deficiencies you transcrbe to myself.
You need to move on past that.
You know what i posted concerning the meaning of those parables,and you can not refute it,so you spin off in going personal.
 
Jul 23, 2018
12,199
2,775
113
Luke 15: Then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners for to hear him.
2 And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.
3 And he spake this parable unto them, saying,

1. Let's see...the prodigal was lost and dead and returning to his father...

The publicans and sinners were lost and dead, and were coming to Jesus, and were now alive and found

The elder son was complaining about the prodigal coming home.

The scribes and Pharisees were complaining about the publicans coming home.

2. The Kingdom of God was about to be taken from the scribes and Pharisees and given to others in Matthew 21, SO IT HADNT BEEN TAKEN FROM THEM YET?

Matthew 21:Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof.

The scribes and Pharisees were still in the vineyard. They had not yet crucified the Son of the king

Matthew 21:38-39
But when the husbandmen saw the son, they said among themselves, This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance.39 And they caught him, and cast him out of the vineyard, and slew him.

who saw the son and cast him out and slew him. THE HUSBABNDMEN. Where were the husbandmen? In the VINEYARD.
What happened to the husbandmen that slew the son of the king?

Matthew 21:They say unto him, He will miserably destroy those wicked men, and will let out his vineyard unto other husbandmen, which shall render him the fruits in their seasons.

Who is this talking about?

Matthew 21:43 Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof.

Matthew 21:45 And when the chief priests and Pharisees had heard his parables, they perceived that he spake of them.

3. Not to mention, the two sons in Matthew 21:28-32, they were both sons. SO you don't think that as sons they had an inheritance too?

Were the Jews sons?

Romans 9:4- 4 the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption to sonship; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises.

does adoption make one a legal son? You bet your macaroni and cheese it does.

So the publicans and sinners had been sons, but they left God and died. But they came back and lived.

and the scribes and Pharisees thought they were with God, but forsook God in unbelief and perished, the kingdom of God being taken from them and given to sinners of Jew and Gentiles

The Publicans and sinners had been dead but now lived. The scribes and Pharisees thought that they were alive, but were dead as coffins.

What was the difference between the two? What they did with Jesus.
I am sure your comprehensive interpretation is as good as any
 
Jul 23, 2018
12,199
2,775
113
Jesus was referring to Israel and Judah as the two sons. (Two kingdoms) both loved by the Father. One wayward, one stayed at home (Judah- Jeruslalem), one knew they were sinners, the other refused to acknowledge the other brother and was resentful.

Jesus told this parable and the Pharisees recongnised they were the first son in the parable. Remember Saul was a pHarisee who came to Jesus so its possible he was like the first son. The second son was like the publicans and sinners the Pharisees despised...anyone who wasnt as religious and faithful as they were. Yet the publicans and sinners came back to the Father.

Yes christians can interpret the parable to mean the born again reality of knowing our Father but that isnt really the context of the parable. It does speak of a spiritual reality though...Ultimately all of us who were drawn to the Father will be at some stage adopted into Gods family and become his sons/daughters.
And yet nicodemus was wrong when he applied " born again" to some natural Jewish context.
What i am seeing is a methodology to place Jesus in A non prophetic box.

IOW, he didn't realize we would have his words as our bible,so he gave the real bible to paul.
So every concept of Jesus HAS TO BE confined to a " then only" prism.
Thus " who was his audience"& "what was the setting".

My "mistake" is reading it like it is alive and living,and to me
 
Dec 27, 2018
4,170
876
113
It doesn't make any difference to me what you think.

I am here to report,not offer up verses to support a doctrine.
I apologize for mistaking you for marcello.
I already told you what happened but you are still all offended and holding my mistake hostage.
Get back to me when you can openly debate the topic,not whatever personal deficiencies you transcrbe to myself.
You need to move on past that.
You know what i posted concerning the meaning of those parables,and you can not refute it,so you spin off in going personal.
Sorry, Buddy. You already said what doctrine you THINK I was supporting and were billions of light years off. I don’t care that you thought I was Marcelo, I
 
Dec 27, 2018
4,170
876
113
It doesn't make any difference to me what you think.

I am here to report,not offer up verses to support a doctrine.
I apologize for mistaking you for marcello.
I already told you what happened but you are still all offended and holding my mistake hostage.
Get back to me when you can openly debate the topic,not whatever personal deficiencies you transcrbe to myself.
You need to move on past that.
You know what i posted concerning the meaning of those parables,and you can not refute it,so you spin off in going personal.
have not been supporting any doctrine. I offered a simple exegesis of the text based on context.

You do not know my doctrine, because your description of it was light years off.

I do not even know what doctrine you think I am "supporting". You keep saying absurdities and crediting them to me.

I don't care about you mistaking me for Marcelo, and I did not bring it up again after you explained it. Go back and look. How is it that I am holding it hostage.

Your position CONTRADICTS JESUS' WORDS>

a. You say it is impossible that Jesus would liken unbelieving religious leaders to sons, because their father is the devil.

b. Yet Jesus likened religious leaders to sons in the parable of the two sons in Matthew 21:28-32

c. Therefore, your argument not only seeks to refute me, it inadvertantly seeks to refute Jesus.

You are the one who has been personal and issued false accusations by the bushel. Heres a list of some of the false accusations you've made.

1. You said that I need to make the gospel irrelevant to modern believers. No basis whatsoever for making that statement.

2. You accused me of rejecting the fact that Jesus said that one son represents sinners and one jewish leaders in the vineyard. I never rejected it at any time.

3. You accused me of believing that God changed His mind about the gospel. I never said any such thing.

4. You accused me of believing that God changed His mind about the gospel being to the Jew only. I neither said God changed His mind, nor did I ever say the Gospel was for the Jew only.

5. You accused me of believing in two gospels. Totally false.

6. You accused me of using a special looking glass to interpret the Bible. False, unless by looking glass you meant CONTEXT.

7. You accused me of having a one dimensional view.

8. You accused me of making things up.

9. You accused me of not taking parts of the Bible seriously. False accusation.

10. You accuse me of "cunningly" transposing doctrine onto a text.

You have been deeply personal in your attacks and you have been guilty of TEN FALSE ACCUSATIONS that you can't back up. I challenge you to back up any one of these ten statements of yours by showing that I did or said any of these things.

Pick any one

And to say that I have failed to debate the point but have only used personal attacks is an eleventh false accusation. I have answered every one of your objections with scripture.

and to say I personally attacked you is false, because I did not. I was responding to your blatant and excessive caricaturing me. The only wise thing for you to do would be to withdraw the ten false accusations listed above. But you probably won't, because you already have your mind made up about what I believe.

If you want to know what I really believe on the heretical things you have accused me of, ie accusations 1,3,4,5,6 which are heretical views in my book, and you accused me of them, read my posts in the thread "is the Jewish God and the Gentile God the same"

these are some of my statements there.

God chose Israel to receive His oracle's and through whom to bring Messiah into the world, but it was always His intent to be both the glory of His people Israel and a Light to the Gentiles

God does not change. His eternal purpose is immutable. What appears to us as change is actually the progression and gradual growth of what God ordained in eternity

Abraham and Noah and others found favor with God through faith. That is the same thing as Grace, is it not?

We are not under the Old Covenant, but under the New. But the New Covenant does not abolish or overthrow or cancel out the moral law. RATHER, the New Covenant ESTABLISHES the moral requirements of the moral law.

etc
 
Dec 27, 2018
4,170
876
113
What i am seeing is a methodology to place Jesus in A non prophetic box.
Who's doing that? I haven't seen anyone in this thread do that. Please tell me who you are referring to

And yet nicodemus was wrong when he applied " born again" to some natural Jewish context.
Who is applying born again to a natural jewish context in this thread? No one that I know of.

IOW, he didn't realize we would have his words as our bible,so he gave the real bible to paul.
Who said such a thing? Where? What post number?

So every concept of Jesus HAS TO BE confined to a " then only" prism.
Where? Where did any one confine anything to a "then only" prism?

Thus " who was his audience"& "what was the setting".
Considering context is not the same as confining a text to a "then only" prism. That is your error. You are arguing a false dichotomy, ie we either have to ignore context, ie audience, setting, purpose, occasion, etc or we are confining the text to a then only setting. That is both a false dichotomy AND a strawman extraordinaire.

You are making false assumptions about what is being said. You need to step back and throw away your preconceptions about me and others (because they are wrong) and just read what we are saying without apriori prejudice.

I think you are transposing other people's beliefs whom you have talked to onto me, but I assure you, the nonsense you accused me of believing in the some of the ten points in the last post above are light years removed from what I believe. You have deeply misunderstood my words.

Anyways, blessings to you and yours.
 
Dec 27, 2018
4,170
876
113
I do not need to prove that......it is not about both being saved......and the concept is simple......Mankind was always from one blood....the division came when God called Abram out and changed his name to Abraham <----who BELIEVED God and it was put to his account for righteousness.....when Jesus comes on the scene the first thing he does is go to the LOST sheep of the house of Israel....they on a whole, including the hyper religious Pharisees rejected him as the one, however the "sinful" whores, publicans etc. received him.....BOTH were lost and yet the "sinners" chose to believe and were saved....the Pharisees rejected and remained LOST.......

Humanity has always been divided into the lineage of faith and the children of the devil and is seen immediately between Cain and Abel.....and under the new covenant the TWO have become ONE....there is neither JEW nor GENTILE........

My point still stands and your are missing it. A son by birth is a son by birth.....
And every one in Matthew 21:28-32 is likened to a son. Meaning that son in parables doesn’t always mean what you are trying to make it mean

You don’t seem to understand what a parable is .org how symbolic terms are used in parables.
 

Nehemiah6

Senior Member
Jul 18, 2017
24,167
12,764
113
Jesus was referring to Israel and Judah as the two sons. (Two kingdoms) both loved by the Father. One wayward, one stayed at home (Judah- Jeruslalem), one knew they were sinners, the other refused to acknowledge the other brother and was resentful.
This is really S-T-R-E-T-C-H-I-N-G the parable of the Prodigal Son. Since both the kingdoms of Israel and Judah were wayward and disobedient, and subjected to God's wrath and judgment, you have obviously misunderstood the parable.

Just like the lost sheep and the lost coin, the lost Prodigal represents sinners who have not repented and turned to God, but are eventually saved. As to the brother who was resentful, it would appear that it applies to the Pharisees who believed that they were in God's good graces yet resented that Christ was mingling with the publicans and sinners.
 
Jul 23, 2018
12,199
2,775
113
This is really S-T-R-E-T-C-H-I-N-G the parable of the Prodigal Son. Since both the kingdoms of Israel and Judah were wayward and disobedient, and subjected to God's wrath and judgment, you have obviously misunderstood the parable.

Just like the lost sheep and the lost coin, the lost Prodigal represents sinners who have not repented and turned to God, but are eventually saved. As to the brother who was resentful, it would appear that it applies to the Pharisees who believed that they were in God's good graces yet resented that Christ was mingling with the publicans and sinners.
Ok,sort of plausable,but again,the prodigal came FROM the father. He was Whole at the beginning of the story. Left in rebellion and was RE-ESTABLISHED.
So....the huge elephant in the room is WHERE the story begins.
The produgal was;
1 family
2 whole
3 possessed an inheritance
4 possessed brethren with same status.
5 his father is God,in the story
6 the protocol of the story has the possession of inheritance before the testator's death as legitimate (no objection from the father)
7 his brother was older,and in the story never left.

All that points directly to a saved person departing his christian inheritance,or pulled into the world through sin,(willingly departing for pleasure sake) and finding himself in the inevitable hog pen.

The only other "half plausable" application is the younger as the jew and the older as the gentile ( "all israel shall be saved")
The problem there,again,is the starting place has to be corrupted.
 
Jul 23, 2018
12,199
2,775
113
And every one in Matthew 21:28-32 is likened to a son. Meaning that son in parables doesn’t always mean what you are trying to make it mean

You don’t seem to understand what a parable is .org how symbolic terms are used in parables.
Vs 32 is the interpretation.
No brainer
 

Lanolin

Well-known member
Dec 15, 2018
23,460
7,173
113
This is really S-T-R-E-T-C-H-I-N-G the parable of the Prodigal Son. Since both the kingdoms of Israel and Judah were wayward and disobedient, and subjected to God's wrath and judgment, you have obviously misunderstood the parable.

Just like the lost sheep and the lost coin, the lost Prodigal represents sinners who have not repented and turned to God, but are eventually saved. As to the brother who was resentful, it would appear that it applies to the Pharisees who believed that they were in God's good graces yet resented that Christ was mingling with the publicans and sinners.
The Pharisees actually belonged to the house of Judah. There was no Pharisee who didnt belong to Judah.
The rest, especially the sinners (prodigals) Jesus was reaching out to belonged to house of Israel. Relaise this...Jesus had not yet commssioned Paul to reach out to gentile at this stage. He was speaking the parable to all of Israel. In that he wanted them to be united as ONE kingdom. Not split and brother against brother.

It is no stretch...but if you think so, well thats you. Keep an open mind. I cant make you see if you dont really want to see.
 

Lanolin

Well-known member
Dec 15, 2018
23,460
7,173
113
To help you its imprtant that you do read the Old Testmant to see how the nation of Israel came about. Remember JAcob, who was renamed Israel had twelve sons.
 
Dec 27, 2018
4,170
876
113
Vs 32 is the interpretation.
No brainer
Yes, and it is a no brainer that the UNBELIEVING chief priests and elders, who the second son in THAT parable represents DO NOT have the starting point that you are trying to IMPOSE on the sons in the parable of the Prodigal. Neither does the elder son or the prodigal, who represent the scribes and pharisees and the publicans and sinners in the other parable have the starting point that you are trying to impose, unless you are talking about the fact that they are Israelites, Got it yet?
 
Jul 23, 2018
12,199
2,775
113
Yes, and it is a no brainer that the UNBELIEVING chief priests and elders, who the second son in THAT parable represents DO NOT have the starting point that you are trying to IMPOSE on the sons in the parable of the Prodigal. Neither does the elder son or the prodigal, who represent the scribes and pharisees and the publicans and sinners in the other parable have the starting point that you are trying to impose, unless you are talking about the fact that they are Israelites, Got it yet?
A parable is a story within a story.
They are not all alike,nor are they mental.
Jesus will always have the best interpretation.
If the Holy Spirit reveals,we are taught.
If not,we are untaught
Vs 32 is the interpretation.
No problems from me on that.