Luke 15:29

“But he answered and said to his father, ‘Lo, these many years do I slave for you, and I never transgressed a commandment of yours, and yet you never gave me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends, but when this your son came, who has devoured your living with harlots, you kill for him the fatted calf.' ”

The elder brother could not hold back his fury. He pointed out belligerently how for years he had slaved, and had never transgressed against any of his father's orders, and yet when had his father ever thrown a party for him, or given him a kid so that he could invite his friends for a meal? But now that this worthless and dishonest son (note ‘this your son', not ‘my brother') had arrived back, who had cheated them and wasted so much of the family's wealth on prostitutes (the worst thing he could think of at the time) what happened? The fatted calf was killed in order to celebrate his return. It did not seem fair.

We note how extravagant his argument is. For in fact the younger son's friends had not been invited to the present celebration, and the probability is that if he himself had at some time wanted to invite his friends round he could have done so. He has patently manufactured a case in his own mind in order to make it seem as bad as possible. And we see how he saw his life, not as a joyful day by day life lived with his father as they worked together and enjoyed their privileges, but as a burden and a care and a trial, as something to be endured, the way in fact in which many religious people see it, especially those like the Pharisees. But before we criticise him too much we must remember that Jesus has drawn him like this in order that he might illustrate the Pharisees. It was probably one of the Pharisees' strongest arguments, both to themselves and to others, that all their slaving to keep the commandments and to ‘do what God wanted' would bring its own reward, a reward lost to those who did not live as they did. And that may well have been part of the reason for their antagonism against Jesus. He appeared to overlook all their hard efforts, and yet freely forgave those who had done nothing to deserve it. Like the elder brother they were unable to rejoice in the free grace of God to sinners. It did not seem fair. And it was in order to bring about a change in this attitude that Jesus was telling the parable. For He was as much concerned with bringing the Pharisees round to a new way of thinking, and to a sense of compassion, as He was to bringing the public servants and sinners to repentance.