Back in the day, Jesus often spent time with people society—and particularly the religious leaders—disapproved of. His actions were often scrutinized by the so-called “religious elite.”

When Jesus told the story of the Prodigal Son, tax collectors and others considered “sinners” had gathered around to hear him. The Pharisees weren’t happy about it. Their complaint was essentially, “This man claims to speak for God, yet he welcomes people who have betrayed their own people and live far outside respectable religious society.”

We need to understand something about tax collectors in those days.

Under Roman rule, taxes and customs were often collected through contractors and local agents. A Jewish tax collector could be viewed as someone who collaborated with the occupying Roman government. The system also gave dishonest collectors plenty of opportunity to collect more than was actually owed and keep the difference.

In other words, these guys weren’t very popular.

So here was Jesus, hanging around with exactly the sort of people respectable religious folks thought he should avoid.

And Jesus tells them a story.

Let’s get into it.

A very successful man had two sons.

One day, the younger son went to his father and said, “I don’t want to wait until you die to get my inheritance. Give me my money now.”

Think about that for a minute.

He’s basically telling his dad, “I want what I’ll get when you’re dead. I’d just rather not wait for you to die.”

And Dad gives it to him.

The father divides his property between his two sons. Under Jewish inheritance customs, the older son would normally receive a double portion. So, roughly speaking, the older boy gets two-thirds of the estate, and the younger gets one-third.

Soon afterward, the younger son liquidates his share, gathers up everything he owns, gets in his car and leaves.

It doesn’t take long for him to waste everything his father gave him.

Basically, he blows it all.

Now he’s broke. He doesn’t have a job. He doesn’t have anywhere to live. Eventually, he becomes desperate enough to take a job feeding pigs.

That doesn’t sound particularly remarkable to us, but remember that Jesus was talking to Jews. Pigs were unclean animals. Feeding them would have been about as low as this Jewish kid could go.

Put it in today’s terms. He’s living on the street, begging for spare change and rummaging through restaurant dumpsters looking for something to eat.

He has hit bottom.

Finally, he comes to his senses.

He thinks, “The people who work for my father have more than enough food, and here I am starving. I’m going home. I’ll tell my father, ‘Dad, I have sinned against God and against you. I don’t deserve to be called your son anymore. Just let me work as one of your hired hands.’”

His car is long gone, so he starts hitchhiking home.

While he’s still a long way away, his father sees him coming up the road.

How would you react if this were your kid?

Remember what this boy has done. He essentially told you he couldn’t wait for you to die, took a third of everything you’d worked for, walked away from the family and blew every penny of it.

Now he’s coming home.

What would you do?

His father runs to him.

He throws his arms around his son and hugs him. As dirty, smelly and gross as the kid must have been, Dad doesn’t care.

The son starts the speech he’s been rehearsing:

“Dad, I’m so sorry. I have sinned against God and against you. I don’t deserve to be called your son anymore.”

But Dad doesn’t even let him finish.

Instead, he calls to his staff.

“Quick! Bring out the best clothes we have. Get him cleaned up. Give him the best room. Grill the best steaks we’ve got. We’re going to have a party!

“My son was as good as dead, and now he has come back to me. He was lost, and now he has been found.”

And the celebration begins.

But there’s another son.

The older brother has been out working. As he drives up the driveway, he hears music coming from the house.

He asks one of the staff, “What’s going on? Why the party?”

“Your brother came home. Your dad is celebrating because he got him back safe and sound.”

The older brother is furious.

He won’t even go inside.

So Dad comes outside and asks him to join them.

The older son lets him have it.

“Look at all the years I’ve worked for you! I’ve done everything you asked me to do, and you never even gave me a small party with my friends.

“But he wastes everything you gave him, living recklessly and doing who knows what, and the second he comes crawling home, you throw a huge party for him!”

You have to admit, big brother has a point.

Or does he?

His father tells him:

“Son, you have always been here with me, and everything I have is yours.

“But we had to celebrate.

“Your brother was as good as dead, and now he’s back.

“He was lost.

“And now he has been found.”

And that’s it.

Jesus ends the story.

We never find out what the older brother does.

Does he swallow his anger, walk through the door and celebrate because his brother has come home?

Or does he stay outside—angry, resentful and, in his own way, just as lost as his younger brother had been?

Now remember who was listening to Jesus tell this story.

The tax collectors were there.

The “sinners” were there.

And the Pharisees—the respectable religious people who were complaining that Jesus welcomed people like these—were there.

I suspect everybody listening knew who the younger brother was.

But did the Pharisees realize who the older brother was?

There’s one more thing that bothers me about this story.

Was Dad being fair?

The younger son had already taken his inheritance and wasted it. What remained of the estate essentially belonged to the older son. So Dad was throwing this big celebration using property that would eventually be his.

If I were the older brother, I think I’d be a little ticked off too.

Maybe that’s part of the reason Jesus doesn’t tell us what the older brother finally decided.

Instead, he leaves the decision hanging.

The father has forgiven the younger son.

The celebration has begun.

The door is open.

And the older brother is standing outside.

If you were him, would you go in?

© Jeff Lossau – September 6, 2026