Parable of the Prodigal Son (7)

Last month we saw the prodigal son coming home. The father had seen him from a far distance and had run and embraced him. That is something — when we see the father running, embracing, and kissing his prodigal son! Then we see something which can never be missing. When we come, for the first time or by renewal, to know the love of God, the embrace from heaven, then there is something which can never be lacking. What is that? It is the sinner coming upon his knees, confessing his sins.

He said, “Father, I have sinned.” Notice that the prodigal son pointed to himself; he didn’t point to someone else. He didn’t say, “Oh, Father, it was the world that drew me away. It was the wicked people from that far country who took hold of me and brought me to the tavern. They took me along to wicked places.” No, he didn’t say that. But he did say, “Father, I have sinned. I have sinned.” He is lying at his father’s breast, saying, “I have sinned.”

That was a wonderful confession of guilt. When we think of confession of guilt, then we must realize that not every confession comes from a broken heart. Not every confession is the result of the drawing cords which have been laid from the Father’s house. There are confessions which do not flow from a broken heart seeking the love of God. There are confessions which flow because of fear, a fear of punishment. They have nothing to do with a broken heart, nothing to do with a longing for God’s communion. They have nothing to do with a bowing down and a feeling of unworthiness. We need to take notice of this confession, because in the days in which we live there is not much concern in this area anymore. There is a great difference between a true and a false confession. The difference is as between light and darkness, between life and death.

From the Scriptures we can bring out a few illustrations of confessions. Pharaoh made a confession. In Exodus 10:16 he said to Moses and Aaron, “I have sinned against the Lord your God.” He did not make this confession because he needed forgiveness. He did not make this confession because he felt unworthy and was privileged to bow before God. He made this confession because the punishment was heavy. He wanted the punishment to be taken away.

Balaam said to the angel, “I have sinned” (Numbers 22:34). But, even with this confession, he remained an enemy of God. He longed to die with God’s people, but he didn’t want to live with God’s people. He didn’t want the life of God’s people. He wanted something of the riches of Balak

You can never live with the world and die with God’s people. Never can you die as a child of God if in this life you have not become a child of God. If in this life God has not humbled you before Him so that as a child you say, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before Thee,” then you cannot die as God’s people die. You will die outside of God. What will it be to stand before God without any blood upon the post of the door? That will be something — to stand before God with no Jesus, who has taken the holy justice of God in place of sinners. What will it be to stand before God without that precious blood of Jesus and without that true confession having flowed from our mouths?

If Balaam would come back today, he would tell you about it. He would say, “I died with the wicked because I lived with the wicked. That was my life. That was the testimony of my life.” King Saul, in 1 Samuel 26:21, also cried out, saying, “I have sinned.” But with all that, he remained an enemy of David and an enemy of God. And when he finally died upon that small hill by falling upon his sword, then he went and stood before God. He had never had a true confession in his life.

The apostle Paul says there are those that have tasted the good Word of God and the powers of the world to come. They have only tasted it; it has never gone any further than this. They have tasted it with their mouth, but it never went into their heart, because God never opened their heart for it.

Convictions can go far. They can bring tears to our eyes and words into our mouths. We can go about and walk amongst God’s people with a confession of life and walk and yet not possess a single drop of grace and mercy. We can still be without that broken heart which brings a sinner on his knees.

Hebrews 12:17 says that Esau sought the place of repentance with tears and found it not. Do you know why he found it not? The love of God had never been shed abroad in his heart, and therefore the love of God could never cause him to return unto the Lord in a true and upright confession.

What is a true confession? Are you concerned about it? When the Lord comes in the moment of regeneration, then He breaks the heart open. When the Lord comes, then He crushes the heart that has been so hard, so indifferent. The sinner thought that nothing could ever crush his heart, but when God came, He crushed it. Then in the night he cries to the Lord, saying, “Lord, I have sinned. They are MY sins, Lord, they are MY iniquities.” We see this confession in the life of the prodigal son when he came to himself.

Do you know the confession of the prodigal son? Do you know the places and the times when you bowed before the Lord? It is so necessary for us. It is necessary that the Lord open our eyes, so that we may come to know, by the powerful operation of the Holy Spirit, that we cannot stay in that far country any longer, but that we must go to the Father’s house. At the Father’s house we may confess our sins. That is a wonder of the one-sided work of God.

Jeremiah 31:9 says, “They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them.” I think that is how the prodigal son felt all the way from that far country to his father’s house. I believe the prodigal son knew something of that coming with weeping and with supplications. It is the Lord Himself who is speaking here, and He is the one who is doing the leading. In other words, the weepers and the supplicating ones are never alone. When we view the prodigal son, then we see that the Lord doesn’t lead His people to a stranger. He doesn’t lead them to a place that is ever so dark and difficult. The Lord says, “I will lead them, not to a stranger, but to Myself. By My grace I will lead them so that they will come to know the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and that there is forgiveness with God.” It is there at his father’s breast that the prodigal son confessed his sins.

Try to lay your heart next to this. Do you know something of that leading, of that supplication? What a wonder it is if the Lord gives a little light upon your pathway.

We see the prodigal son standing there, just as the publican, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” We hear him saying, “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before Thee.” Do you know something of that? It was the Father who brought him out of that far country and to His house. It was the Father who embraced him. It is the Father who will begin to speak of the gifts.

The tender love a father has
For all his children dear,
Such love the Lord bestows on them
Who worship Him in fear.

— to be continued —

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