I believe it tells us that God has two responses to two fundamental types of human spirituality. It's not just that God is willing to forgive, rather it is that God has something specific and important to say to both brothers, each of whom represents a spiritual predilection which we may well find in ourselves and our community. When it comes to the life of the spirit, some go on a journey and some tend the garden. Yes, some go on a journey and some tend the garden. In our parable today, the first brother we encounter is definitely a journeyer.
Journeyers tend to look before they leap and rush out into the world to slay dragons.
What they often end up slaying, however, is their own false notions of themselves. The down side is that journeyers tend to do important spiritual work in the most brutal or dangerous ways. It is possible to go on the hero's journey and return with something good for the entire community. Even so, journeyers seem to need to go on their journeys and perhaps this is why the father in our parable so willingly facilitates his son's ill-fated adventure. The second brother we encounter is definitely a gardener.