“Lost, and is Found”
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father he squanders upon harlots. The treasure of his young manhood
is wasted. The precious years of life, the strength of intellect, the bright
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visions of youth, the spiritual aspirations—all are consumed in the
fires of lust.
A great famine arises, he begins to be in want, and he joins himself
to a citizen of the country, who sends him into the field to feed swine.
To a Jew this was the most menial and degrading of employments. The
youth who has boasted of his liberty, now finds himself a slave. He is
in the worst of bondage—“holden with the cords of his sins.” (
Proverbs
5:22
.) The glitter and tinsel that enticed him have disappeared, and he
feels the burden of his chain. Sitting upon the ground in that desolate
and famine-stricken land, with no companions but the swine, he is fain
to fill himself with the husks on which the beasts are fed. Of the gay
companions who flocked about him in his prosperous days and ate and
drank at his expense, there is not one left to befriend him. Where now
is his riotous joy? Stilling his conscience, benumbing his sensibilities,
he thought himself happy; but now, with money spent, with hunger
unsatisfied, with pride humbled, with his moral nature dwarfed, with
his will weak and untrustworthy, with his finer feelings seemingly
dead, he is the most wretched of mortals.
What a picture here of the sinner’s state! Although surrounded
with the blessings of His love, there is nothing that the sinner, bent
on self-indulgence and sinful pleasure, desires so much as separation
from God. Like the ungrateful son, he claims the good things of God
as his by right. He takes them as a matter of course, and makes no
return of gratitude, renders no service of love. As Cain went out from
the presence of the Lord to seek his home; as the prodigal wandered
into the “far country,” so do sinners seek happiness in forgetfulness of
God. (
Romans 1:28
).
Whatever the appearance may be, every life centered in self is
squandered. Whoever attempts to live apart from God is wasting his
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substance. He is squandering the precious years, squandering the
powers of mind and heart and soul, and working to make himself
bankrupt for eternity. The man who separates from God that he may
serve himself, is the slave of mammon. The mind that God created for
the companionship of angels has become degraded to the service of
that which is earthly and bestial. This is the end to which self-serving
tends.