Is the story of the prodigal son about Christian's or non Christians? I used to understand it as non Christians, but I have recently changed my mind.

[Thomas_Goodwin]

Reasons I can see it about Christians:
1. Though the son is unworthy as we are unworthy servants before God, he is still a son, which is a privilege only given to the elect through Christ.
2. He is able to see his father is greater, a greater treasure, a better Lord than the sin he is in, whereas non believers are dead in sin (ephesians 2) or as the greek would say one who has breather their last to sin. He was also with his father before and knew him.

Reasons I could see it as perhaps non Christians
1. The surrounding text seems to be about a non Christian who repents and knows Christ. We are all sinners so if God is describing 99 righteous persons, they are not righteousness by their own deeds and walk with God but through the imputation and clothing of the righteousness of Christ (just so as Jacob obtained the inheritance).
2.I dont necessarily agree, but I could see how one could make an argument that the prodigal shows signs of never truly knowing God, such as willful and unrepentant sin (though to counteract that point he does eventually repent, but I guess this lies in our understanding of willful sin. Is this of an apostate who truly repents for the first time?). Also this could be of a nonbelievers drawing to taste and see that Christ is good.

I wanted to leave a few quotes that I find encouraging.

CH Spurgeon:

• "there is the one condition "Where I see the blood I will pass over you." What a blessed condition! it does not say, when you see the blood, but when I see it"
• "Lord, have mercy upon me for the blood's sake. I cannot see it as I could desire, but Lord thou seest it, and thou hast said, 'When I see it, I will pass over you.' Lord, thou seest it this day, pass over my sin, and forgive me for its dear sake alone."
• But oh, my hearer, our greatest joy is, that the blood of Jesus has been once shed, and he has said, "It is finished."
• Trembling sinner! come to the cross again; thy sins are heavy, and many; but the atonement for them is completed by the death of Christ. Look then to Jesus, and remember that Christ needs nothing to supplement his blood
• He is a complete Saviour, full of grace for an empty sinner.
• The blood was accepted, and sin was forgiven. And now, soul, it is not possible for God to reject thee, if thou comest this day to him, pleading the blood of Christ. God cannot—and here we speak with reverence too—the everlasting God cannot reject a sinner who pleads the blood of Christ: for if he did so, it were to deny himself, and to contradict all his former acts. He has accepted blood, and he will accept it; he never can revoke that divine acceptance of the resurrection;

Isaac Ambrose

• Oh! how should all hearts be taken with this Christ? Christians! turn your eyes upon the Lord: 'Look, and look again unto Jesus.' Why stand ye gazing on the toys of this world, when such a Christ is offered to you in the gospel? Can the world die for you? Can the world reconcile you to the Father? Can the world advance you to the kingdom of heaven? As Christ is all in all, so let him be the full and complete subject of our desire, and hope, and faith, and love, and joy; let him be in your thoughts the first in the morning, and the last at night.
• In this knowledge of Christ, there is an excellency above all other knowledge in the world; there is nothing more pleasing and comfortable, more animating and enlivening, more ravishing and soul contenting; only Christ is the sun and center of all divine revealed truths, we can preach nothing else as the object of our faith, as the necessary element of your soul’s salvation, which doth not some way or other, either meet in Christ, or refer to Christ; only Christ is the whole of man’s happiness, the Sun to enlighten him, the Physician to heal him, the Wall of fire to defend him, the Friend to comfort him, the Pearl to enrich him, the Ark to support him, the Rock to sustain him under the heaviest pressures, “As an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest, as rivers of waters in a dry place, and as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land,” (Isa. 32:2).
• Christ is never precious in man’s apprehension, so long as the world seems glorious to him. As we begin to relish sweetness in Christ, so the world begins to be bitter to us. The more sweetness we taste in the, one, the more bitterness we taste in the other.
• We must look off the world in respect of its sinful honors; what is this honor but a certain inordinate desire to be well thought of, or well spoken of, to be praised, or glorified of men? As if a man should run up and down street after a feather flying in the air, and tossed hither and thither with the gusts and blasts of infinite men’s mouths, it is a question, whether ever be get it. But if he do, it is but a feather; such is the pride of life, honor, vain glory; it is hard to obtain it, but if obtained, it is but the breath of a few men’s mouths, that alter upon every light occasion; but that which is worst of all, it hinders our sight of Jesus Christ, “Not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called,” (1 Cor. 1:26).
• For confirmation of the point; this was the Lord’s charge to the Gentiles of old, “Look unto me, and ye shall be saved, all the ends of the earth. And I said, Behold me, behold me, unto a nation that was not called by my name,” (Isa. 45:24; 65:1). And according to this command was their practice. “Mine eyes are ever towards the Lord, (saith David) and they looked unto him and were lightened, and their faces were not ashamed,” (Ps. 25:15; 34:5). Thus in the gospel after this command, Looking unto Jesus, it follows, “Consider, him that hath endured much contradiction of sinners against himself,” (Heb. 12:3). And according to this command is the practice of gospel believers. “We all with open face, beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord,” (2 Cor. 3:18).
• if your souls were sound and right, they would perceive incomparably more delight and sweetness, in knowing, thinking, believing, loving and rejoicing in Jesus Christ, than the soundest stomach finds in his food, or the strongest senses in the enjoyment of their objects. Now, for shame never say, you cannot reach it; “I can do all things (saith Paul) through Christ that strengtheneth me,” (Phil. 4:13). Oh it is our sloth, our security, our carnal mind, which is enmity to God and Christ that keeps us off. Be exhorted! Oh be exhorted in the fear of God
• A learned divine can tell you, (Baxter’s Rest), Though God be the chief disposer of your hearts, yet next under him you have the greatest command of them yourselves: though, “without Christ ye can do nothing;” yet under him you may do much: or else it will be undone, and you undone, through your neglect; do your own parts, and you have no cause to distrust whether Christ wil

 

[Thomas_Goodwin]

I recommend the Tenderness of Jesus by Charles Spurgeon if you havent heard that sermon