things.  It tells of the father’s gladness on his son’s return.  That represents God’s joy on the reformation of a sinner.  It tells of a banquet and a dance given to the long lost son.  That represents the sinner’s gladness when he first understood that God was reconciled to him in Christ.  There is a strange, almost wild, rapture, a strong gush of love and happiness in those days which are called the days of first conversion.  When a man who has sinned much—­a profligate—­turns to God, and it becomes first clear to his apprehension that there is love instead of spurning for him, there is a luxury of emotion—­a banquet of tumultuous blessedness in the moment of first love to God, which stands alone in life, nothing before and nothing after like it.  And brethren, let us observe:—­This forgiveness is a thing granted while a man is yet afar off.  We are not to wait for the right of being happy till we are good:  we might wait for ever.  Joy is not delayed till we deserve it.  Just so soon as a sinful man trusts that the mercy of God in Christ has done away with his transgression, the ring, and the robe, and the shoes are his, the banquet and the light of a Father’s countenance.

Lastly, we have to consider very briefly God’s expostulation with a saint.  There is another brother mentioned in this parable, who expressed something like indignation at the treatment which his brother met with.  There are commentators who have imagined that this personage represents the Pharisees who complained that Jesus was receiving sinners.  But this is manifestly impossible, because his father expostulates with him in this language, “Son, thou, art ever with me;” not for one moment could that be true of the Pharisees.  The true interpretation seems to be that this elder brother represents a real Christian perplexed with God’s mysterious dealings.  We have before us the description of one of those happy persons who have been filled with the Holy Ghost from their mother’s womb, and on the whole (with imperfections of course) remained God’s servant all his life.  For this is his own account of himself, which the father does not contradict.  “Lo! these many years do I serve thee.”

We observe then:  The objection made to the reception of a notorious sinner:  “Thou never gavest me a kid.”  Now, in this we have a fact true to Christian experience.  Joy seems to be felt more vividly and more exuberantly by men who have sinned much, than by men who have grown up consistently from childhood with religious education.  Rapture belongs to him whose sins, which are forgiven, are many.  In the perplexity which this fact occasions, there is a feeling which is partly right and partly wrong.  There is a surprise which is natural.  There is a resentful jealousy which is to be rebuked.

There is first of all a natural surprise.  It was natural that the elder brother should feel perplexed and hurt.  When a sinner seems to be