God Didn't Put You in the Hog Trough — Your Choices Did

Most people know the story of the Prodigal Son. But I want you to see it differently today. Most people read it as a story about the son. I want to show you it's actually a story about the father.

Because the son is just doing what people do — sewing his own fig leaves, convinced he knows better than dad, burning through the inheritance, ending up in a mess. We've all been there to some degree.

But the father? The father is a picture of the God who is in love with you. And what this father does — and what he doesn't do — reveals something about God's love that most people have completely wrong.

The younger son basically told his father he wished he were dead.

Luke 15:11–12:

A certain man had two sons. And the younger of them said to his father, “Father, give me the portion of goods that falls to me.” So he divided to them his livelihood.

Luke 15:11–12 (NKJV)

Let's not soften this. What the younger son said was essentially: "Dad, I can't wait until you're dead. Since that's taking too long, just go ahead and give me my share now so I can get out of here." He didn't believe in the way his father lived. He didn't agree with how his father ran things. He thought he knew better. He wanted the father's stuff without the father.

And the father? He divided the livelihood between both sons. No argument. No lecture. He honored the choice.

That's not weakness. That's love that respects agency. The ultimate expression of love is to honor choice. Even when the choice is wrong. Even when you can see exactly where it's going to lead.

The hog trough was not the father's doing — it was the son's destination.

The younger son took everything, left for a far country, and spent it all in prodigal living. Then came a famine. And because he'd burned through everything that would have carried him through the hard season, he had nothing left. He ended up feeding pigs — the most degrading work a Jewish young man could do — and was so hungry he wanted to eat what the pigs were eating.

And all the people who helped him party? Gone. Every one of them.

Now, I have to ask this plainly: did the father put him in that hog trough? Did he chase the boy down, drag him to the pigpen, and say, "Now you'll learn your lesson"? No. Not once.

The boy was in the hog trough because of his own choices. Period. But religious people have a habit of walking up to someone in their mess and saying, "God is teaching you something." They dress up a man-made disaster as though God arranged it.

God did not arrange your hog trough. Your decisions did. And there is a significant difference — because one says God is for you and the other says God is against you. And He is not against you.

Stop blaming your childhood — and stop letting parents blame themselves.

I want to speak to two groups here, because this story touches both of them.

First, to parents: some of you are destroying your quality of life over what your adult children are doing. You've moved out, you have your spouse, you have a life — and yet you cannot enjoy a single day of it because you're consumed with worry over a child who is making their own choices. Some of you are even beating yourselves up, convinced that whatever the child is doing is your fault.

God was the perfect Father. He raised His son on a planet He custom-built for him, gave him everything he needed, walked with him daily — and the son gave the planet to the enemy. That was not the Father's failure. That was the son's choice.

Even if you did everything right, your adult children still get to make their own choices. You cannot carry that weight.

Second, to the children — and I say this from personal experience. I tried to use my rough childhood as a spiritual excuse one time. I was being a complete jerk to people over a period of time, and when God confronted me about it, I gave Him what I thought was a good explanation. He said to me: "Can you show Me anywhere in My Word where a rough childhood gives you the right to be a jerk?"

I looked. I couldn't find it.

Your past is real. But it does not get the final vote on who you choose to be.

He came to himself — and that was the turning point.

Here's the verse I want you to see:

But when he came to himself, he said, “How many of my father's hired servants have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!”

Luke 15:17 (NKJV)

He came to himself. Not "when God finally sent a miracle" — when he came to himself. The turning point in this boy's story was not an external event. It was a decision. He woke up.

And in that moment, he remembered something: "My father's hired servants have more than enough. And I am here perishing." In other words — maybe Daddy did know how to live. Maybe the Bible does know what it's talking about. Maybe when God said "don't do this," that was worth listening to.

Coming to yourself means acknowledging that your choices are what brought you here — and deciding to make different ones.

That is the moment everything begins to change. Not when someone rescues you from the pigpen. When you decide to get up and go home.

The father didn't go drag him out — because the boy had to come to himself first.

Here's something that surprises people. The father — who is the picture of love in this story — did not go to the hog trough to rescue his son. He stayed at the house.

That sounds harsh until you understand why. If the father had gone down to the pigpen before the boy came to himself, what would he have retrieved? A boy who still thought he knew better. A boy who hadn't made the internal shift yet. A boy who would have ended up right back in the pigpen because nothing on the inside had changed.

The father loved him enough to let the consequences do their work. Not because he enjoyed watching his son suffer — we're going to see in the next part of this story exactly how the father reacted when the boy finally turned toward home. But he respected the choices the boy had made. You cannot rescue someone who hasn't decided to be rescued.

Are you in a mess right now? I want to ask you directly: have you come to yourself? Have you acknowledged that your choices are what brought you here? And are you ready to start walking back toward the Father's house?

Because the father in this story is watching. And we're going to see next time what he does the moment he sees his son coming down the road.

God loves you more than He hates your sin — and He is ready when you are.

Here's what I want you to take away from this today. If you're in a hog trough — if your life is a mess, if your choices have brought you somewhere you never wanted to be — God is not the author of that. And He is not standing at a distance hoping you suffer enough to learn your lesson.

He is the Father who gave the boy his inheritance and let him go. He is the Father who watched from a distance and waited. And as we'll see — He is the Father who ran.

His love did not stop when the boy left. His love did not stop when the boy spent everything. His love did not stop when the boy ended up wanting to eat pig slop. His love was there through all of it, waiting.

You cannot out-sin His love. You cannot out-run it. And you will never find yourself so far gone that the Father stops watching the road for you.

Come to yourself. Make the decision. Start walking.

"I will arise and go to my father." That's all it takes.

God loves you more than He hates your sin. And He will take you out of the hog trough — if you'll let Him. But you have to come to yourself first.

Get up. Start walking. He's already watching for you.

Fight To Win.