<p>15:17 <i>But when he came to his senses he said-</i>The sense that the prodigal had of having come to a complete end, realizing the ultimate wretchedness of sin, should be ours when we repent. The prodigal's repentance is ours. The prodigal among the pigs, rising up to return, should be a cameo of our repentances throughout each day. The allusion to the Septuagint of Prov. 29:21 shows how that despite having reached such an &quot;end&quot;, there is still a way back: &quot;He that lives wantonly from a child shall be a servant, and in the <i>end</i> shall grieve over himself&quot;. Yet we know that after that &quot;end&quot;, the prodigal returned. The son 'coming to his senses' implies that his life of sin was madness, lived in a haze of semi-consciousness of his real spiritual self. This spiritual anaesthesia is <i>always</i> present when we sin. Yet it does not mean that God sees and feels our sins as we do; He has a constancy of spiritual awareness. An appreciation of this may help us in our struggle to sense the true seriousness of sin.</p><p><i>How many of my father's hired servants have bread enough to spare, but I perish here with hunger</i>- The prodigal's perishing with hunger and desperately needing bread suggests a connection with Jn .6:35: &quot;I am the bread of life: he that comes to me (cp. the prodigal's return) shall never hunger... him that comes to me I will in no wise cast out&quot; (cp. the receiving back of the prodigal). This coming to Christ is both ongoing and also specifically at baptism.</p><p>God hoped through the hope of Hosea that 'Gomer' would say &quot;I will go and return to my first husband, for it was better with me then than now&quot; (Hos. 2:17). But Gomer / Israel would not; and so the Lord picked up the idea and puts it in the mouth of the returning prodigal son in Lk. 15:17.</p>