The parable of the prodigal. Containing, The riotous prodigal, or The sinners aversion from…

1. That an impenitent or unconverted man is a dead man [This ¹my Son was dead] The sinner is in Scripture sometimes styled, A fallen man. Hos. 14. 1. Thou hast fallen by thine iniquity: Yea, but this fall is a deadly fall; not like Eutychu's Fall, Acts 20. 29. in whom yet there was life, vers. 10. But like Ahaziah's Fall, which was deadly to him, 2 Kings 1. 4. A diseased man, (Isa. 1. 6. From the sole of the soot even to the head, there is no soundness) but this disease is a deadly disease; and therefore sin is called the Plague of the heart, 1 Kings 8. No disease is so deadly as the Plague, and no Plague is so deadly as the Plague in the heart. A wounded man (Luk. 10. 30. A certain man fell among Thieves, who wounded him.) But this wound is a deadly wound, like that which the King of Babylon gave to Pharaoh, which made him groan with the groanings of a deadly wounded man, Ezek. 30. 24. An enthralled man. 2 Pet. 2. 19. Of whom a man is overcome, of the same he is brought in Bondage; But this Bondage is a deadly Bondage; whether of sin unto death (saith the Apostle) of the servants of sin, Rom. 6. 16. A dead man; and this is the highest, unless you say, a damned man; frequently doth the Scripture Phrase this way. Psalm 106. 28. They did eat the sacrifices of the dead, because offered to dead Idols, and by dead Idolaters. Prov. 21. 16. The man that wandereth out of the way of understanding, shall remain in the Congregation of the dead, (.i.) of the ungodly, wicked, impenitent: The Ephesians, what were they before their conversion? See Chap. 2. 1. Dead in sins and trespasses. The Colossians, what were they before their conversion? See Chap. 2. 13. And you being dead in your sins, &c.