Luke 15:11-32 And he said, A certain man had two sons:… This far country, then, is to be estimate by the distance of man's will and affections from the Lord, that is, Longinqua regio dissimilitudinis, for then is a man farthest from God, when he is most unlike unto God. So the Lord Himself expounds it; "What iniquity have your fathers found in Me, that they are gone far from Me, walking after vanity, and are become vain?" And the apostle to the Ephesians, comparing their former estate by nature, with that which now they were renewed to by grace, he saith, "Ye which once were far off, are now made near by the blood of Jesus Christ." Whereof we see it is sins that makes to be far from the Lord, grace again that brings us near unto Him. Things that are far off were they never so precious and excellent, either else we see them not at all, or then they seem far less to us than they are. The sun is many times more than the earth, yet do we account it less than ourselves. The reason is, that it is far from us when men travel so far to the south, that the north pole in their sight comes near to the earth, and at length the sight thereof is intercepted from them by the earth, it is a sure argument they are far from it; even so, when men esteem the incomprehensible majesty of God, who by infinite degrees surmounts the beauty of the sun to be but small in their eyes, or when in their imagination they draw down the Lord to assimilate or compare Him to anything in earth, or when in their affections the earth comes in between their souls and the sight of the Lord, and the love of the earth prevails; it is an argument such miserable souls are far from the Lord. (Bishop Cowper.) Parallel Verses KJV: And he said, A certain man had two sons: |
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