Matthew 10:34-39

“More Than a Personal Savior”

Pastor Jerry Hoek

Introduction:

When I was in seminary, I had a professor who, when I first met him, sounded like he could have been a drill sergeant.  He had a rough, growling kind of voice and he had a rather mean look the first time I saw him.  However, when I got to know him in a small group both he and I were a part of, I learned something about him.  I learned about his heart.  I learned that although he had a gruff exterior, he had a tender heart.  I learned that he had a love for his students and for what they were doing that far exceeded that of others.  That being said, he still had high demands for his classes.  He expected excellence and graded accordingly.  However, we never questioned the fact that the bottom line was that he loved his students and wanted them to do well.

What is a your picture of Jesus?  Many people today think of Jesus purely as a loving and tender-hearted teacher.  He is a friend who never gets angry or who simply smiles at everything we do.  Others view Jesus as a stern Lord who looks down from heaven with a very serious and stern expression demanding perfection and being very unhappy each and every time we don’t measure up.   Still others view Jesus as the one who simply gives them a “get out of hell” pass.  He is the one who saves them but nothing much more.  Who is Jesus to you?

Well the fact is that Jesus is all of those things and more.  Jesus did suffer and die to take away our sins.  Jesus does love us tenderly and passionately and loves to be with us.  But Jesus also has very high expectations for us.  In fact, the one who changed water into wine to show just how radically he will change things, demands that we follow Him and give ourselves to Him in radical obedience.  This means that our lives as Christians will have a different look than what we might be thinking.  Let’s read Matthew 10:1-10, 34-39.

I. Peace or a Sword?

II. Fighting in the Family

III. Priorities

IV. Losing Our Lives

I. Peace or a Sword?

In verse 34 Jesus says, “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth…”  Jesus came to earth from heaven with a very specific purpose: to bring salvation to God’s people.

However, in this verse Jesus also makes it very clear that He did not come to bring peace.  Now that seems to fly in the face of what the angels sang when Jesus was born.  They sang, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.”

So what does Jesus mean when He says that we should not think that He came to bring peace?  The peace Jesus came to bring is not simply the absence of strife but a much deeper peace.  In John 14:27, Jesus says, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”  And in John 16:33, Jesus says, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

The peace Jesus is talking about is the peace we can have with God knowing that our sins are forgiven and removed because of Jesus’ death and resurrection.  Jesus says that in bringing salvation to us and also peace with God, He also comes to bring conflict with others who are aligned against God.

So Jesus adds, “I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.”  Jesus says this in a way that clearly implies that His coming was to bring division and hostility.  Jesus knows that those who believe in Him are part of a minority movement and so He wants to make it very clear from the beginning that it will be mean conflict for His followers.  That is why He said in Matthew 7:13-14, “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it.  But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”  As this minority movement of Christians moves into the majority who don’t believe in Christ, there is bound to be conflict, persecution and rejection.

So when we experience conflict because of our faith, Jesus says, “That is what I told you to expect.”  Dwight L Moody once said, “I thought when I became a Christian I had nothing to do but just to lay my oars in the bottom of the boat and float along. But I soon found that I would have to go against the current.”  Or as the late Ray Charles once said, “There’s nothing written in the Bible … that says if you believe in Me, you ain’t going to have no troubles.”  What Jesus says next, however, shows just how extensive this conflict can be.

II. Fighting in the Family

In verse 35, Jesus gives examples of just how deep the conflict may go when He says, “For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.”

The kind of conflict He has in mind may actually divide families.  The reference Jesus uses is from Micah 7:6 which describes the family unit in conflict because of Israel’s unfaithfulness.  “For a son dishonors his father, a daughter rises up against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law– a man’s enemies are the members of his own household.”  Because Israel was unfaithful to God, they had tremendous conflict within the family.  Jesus, however, is saying that such conflict will now arise simply because some will believe in Him and some will not.

The reference to the man turning against his father points to the fundamental family loyalty.  Since the father was the head of his household, the loyalty owed to him was above all loyalties.  To bring division between father and son was to offend one of the most deep-seated values in that culture.

Moreover, just as the son is set over against the father, so a daughter is set over against her mother.  The mother was the important person in the female section of the household.  Division among the women was another serious split but it does not stop there.

The daughter-in-law became a member of a new household upon her marriage.  It would be expected that she would enter fully into her role as a member of her husband’s family and that she would look to her mother in-law for guidance and affection.  To have division here would leave the bride very much alone.  Jesus makes it clear that the fundamental unit, the family, could be divided.

Jesus says further in verse 36 that “a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.”  The last place a person would expect to find enemies would be in his or her own household.  Divisions may occur where we least expect them because it is impossible to predict how people will respond to the gospel.  Jesus will not always make families happier by a family member’s Christian decision.

Now let’s make sure we understand this clearly.  There is nothing more beautiful than a close family.  And in fact, many families owe their closeness to the love and presence of Christ in their midst.  We urge husbands and wives to be united in the Lord and such a union is truly a marvelous thing.  And it certainly is not wrong to love the family.

However, what Jesus is saying here is that our life should not be our family alone or above all.  As precious as our families are, Jesus expects our loyalty to Him to be even higher.

For example, my father in law served in the Navy during World War 2 and when he came back he had a very close buddy, Humphrey, who died about four years ago.  My father in law and Humphrey stayed in close contact and up until Humphrey’s death a few years ago, my in laws would still visit Humphrey in southern Indiana.  They had gone through a war together and had a very close and important bond.  However, if my father in law had chosen to spend all of his time with Humphrey rather than his young family, that would be misplaced loyalty.  His family had a higher place even though his bond with Humphrey was very dear.

If it comes to choosing between family and Christ, Jesus makes it clear that He must be the one we must follow even though family is so beautifully important.  That is what Jesus makes even more clear in the next two verses where He establishes clear priorities.

III. Priorities

In verse 37, Jesus says, “Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”  Now let’s be clear that Jesus is not saying that we shouldn’t love our parents and our children.  Jesus, in fact, assumes that there will be such powerful and deep love within families.  But Jesus wants to make sure that the love within the family is not so strong that it pushes love for Him to the background.

That says a lot about who Jesus is.  Only Jesus has the right and the authority to demand such a love.  This underscores that Jesus is not just a human teacher, but that He is indeed the Son of God to whom we owe all allegiance and love.  If a person cannot love Jesus more than his family, Jesus says they are not worthy of me.

In verse 38 Jesus continues, “Anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.”  Taking up a cross has become not much more than a metaphor for enduring some kind of suffering.  If we have a chronic illness or a persistent problem of any sort, it becomes a “cross we must bear.”

But there was no doubt that when Jesus’ disciples heard the phrase “take up his cross,” the picture that came to their mind was a man carrying a cross to his execution to his death; he was not coming back.  We might say that we have to pick up our hangman’s noose and follow Christ.

To use another phrase, we must be willing to go to the wall for Jesus.  This saying comes from sword fighting in which you may find yourself cornered against a wall in the course of the fight with no escape but you fight to your death.  Jesus is saying that we are to go to the wall for Him and give up your life for Him.

Even more starkly, Jesus is saying that to follow Jesus is for a person to die to himself.  We, and all our self-centeredness and selfish sins, must die so that Christ can live in us.  Following Christ means complete self-denial.  But it is not all for loss, as Jesus concludes this hard teaching.

IV. Losing One’s Life has eternal benefits, as we see in verse 39.

Jesus concludes, “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”  If we strive to get the very best for ourselves, according to the world’s values, we will lose everything.

A man decided to enter the ministry as a second career after a very successful, six-figure-income in corporate America.  He had climbed the ladder as high as he could and then came to a startling conclusion.  He wrote, “Once I reached the top of the ladder and looked around, I realized that all the struggle, all the costs to my family and friendships, all the sacrifices I had to make to reach the pinnacle were not worth what I found there and the lack of meaning I felt there.  Suddenly it hit me: I had propped my ladder up against the wrong building.”  If it is a person’s goal to “make it in this world, they will be sorely disappointed.

If, however, we lose our lives for the sake of Jesus, we will find our lives.  The word for “lose” here has the idea of something being totally destroyed.  We have to lose ourselves completely, put ourselves completely to the side.

And we must do this for the sake of Christ.  The life that matters is the life that is lived for Christ.  It is living the life that is not concerned with the benefits we will receive here or in eternity, but with living in the service of God and serving others.  If we lose ourselves in love and service to God, we will find ourselves and our life in the fullest sense.

So while Jesus is our friend, our beautiful Savior, He is also the one who calls us, requires us to follow Him and go to the wall for Him.  But what does that mean specifically and practically?  What is the battle that Jesus calls us to engage in?  It is not, as we often hear, to make this nation into more of a God-fearing nation.  Nor is it to make our American way of life stronger and better.

No, it is much, much bigger and far more sweeping than those things.  Listen to what Jesus said when He read the scroll in the temple in Luke 4:17-21.   The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written: “The Spirit of the Lord is on me,  because he has anointed me  to preach good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”  Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, and he began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

Jesus did not say that He came so that we can become rich or successful or secure.  Jesus says that we are to go to the wall and do the things that He did when He was on earth.  We are to bring healing to those whom we can help.  We are to help those who are in distress or victims of oppression.  In short the coming of Jesus is not about just getting us to heaven but to do the things of God while we are here on earth.

I think many times today we have this idea of Jesus being our tender Savior and precious friend.  And as a result of that, we think that following Jesus means a life of soft fuzzy blankets and, as the old hymn says, “flowery beds of ease.”   Jesus does love us without question and has also saved us, thoroughly, completely and absolutely so that we are free from the punishment and penalty of sin.

However, Jesus also does lay out high demands for those who follow him.  It has been said the way to make it through life is to keep the main thing the main thing.  However, what then is the “main thing”?

Timothy Merrill writes: The “main thing” is that Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins.   The “main thing” is that God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, beating death down forever.   The “main thing” is that the human struggle entails suffering. Period. Struggle for justice? You’ll suffer. Struggle for peace? You’ll suffer. Struggle for truth? You’ll suffer.  But the “main thing” is also that you’ll not suffer alone. God suffers along with you.  The “main thing” is that if God be for us, who can be against us?  The “main thing” is that we are never alone, for there is no place in the universe we can go, there is no sin that we can commit, that will put us out of reach of the grace of Christ’s sacrifice, the gift of God’s love.

So what does this mean as we consider knowing Jesus more?  God did not send His Son to die just so that we could get a free pass to eternal life in heaven.  That is what we can look forward to, make no mistake; however, it’s more than that.  God wants to be in a relationship with Him and He wants us to confront the things in this world that need to be confronted.  He brings us peace, but in bringing us this peace, He calls us to action as we serve Him.

If love for our lives is stronger than our love for God, then there is something seriously wrong.  There’s an old story about a farmer talking to the Lord: “If I had a million dollars, I’d give it to you, Lord. If I had a thousand acres, I’d turn them over to you, Lord.”  The Lord said: “”Well, how about a pig?”  “Take it easy there, Lord; I’ve got a pig.”

God has lovingly given us many blessings as wonderful gifts from Him.  Now Jesus calls us to focus on Him alone as we follow Him and let the things of this life not overwhelm or determine our lives.

Luke 15:25-32
“The Other Sin”
Pastor Jerry Hoek

Introduction:

Over the past year one of the things I’ve been emphasizing is discipleship so that we can become better and more faithful followers of Christ. So this morning I want to give a check-up quiz to see how we are doing.

For each of the following things, give yourself 5 points and we’ll tally it up in the end. Ready?

1) You read the Bible every day.
2) You pray every day for at least 15 minutes.
3) You attend Sunday School regularly.
4) You attend worship services at least 3 times a month.
5) You serve on a Ministry Team, 5 points for each team.
6) You belong to a small group for study and prayer; 5 points for each group.
7) And for 50 extra bonus points, you’re going to Kenya next week!

Ok, how did you do?

Welcome to the world of the older brother!

These are the kinds of things an older brother today would have been thinking as his father threw the party for the wild rebellious son who has just returned. He was doing all the right stuff that a good person should be doing. Yet we see today, as we conclude our study of the parable of the Prodigal Son that he too, in his own way, is rejecting the love and grace that his father has to offer.

If we are honest we may feel that the older brother has a point, but the point is not getting what we deserve. The point is that we get what we don’t ever deserve and that is God’s love and grace. Let’s read this story once more so we can see the amazing love and grace of this father. Read Luke 15:11-32.

I. The Older Brother
II. The Older Brother’s Problem
III. The Father’s Grace
IV. Our Need for Our Father’s Grace

I. Let’s first briefly look at The Older Brother in this story.

Now again realize that this story is not about the sons primarily. The prodigal son and the older brother play a very important role in the point that Jesus is making, but their role is only a part of the larger point. We have seen over and over that the story Jesus tells is primarily about the father’s great love.
The younger son had rebelled against his father and now has returned to his father. The father is thrilled to see him, accepts him as his son even though he did rebel against him. And the father orders a calf to be killed for there will be a celebration!

Now all kinds of activity begins as preparations are made. Then, just as the meat was finished roasting, loud and joyous music would be played. This would announce to the whole village that there was going to be a great celebration and that everyone was invited. This would likely begin just as the workers would be coming home from working in the fields. The party has not yet begun even though the music is playing.

And it is at this point that the older brother comes home. When he comes he meets a servant, or more accurately one of the young boys gathered outside of the home, and asks what the occasion is. The verb for asking implies that he is asking a number of probing questions of the young boy. A son with a normal relationship to a father would simply go in and join the party, not linger outside filled with suspicion.
The boy explains the cause for celebration is the fact that his younger brother has returned home. The older brother, however, has a major problem with this, becomes angry and refuses to join the party.

II. What was The Older Brother’s Problem?

This son is doing more here than just pouting. When there was a banquet, the oldest son was to greet the guests and make sure that the feast went smoothly with the guests as far as their needs are concerned. By refusing to go in he is neglecting his duty as the oldest son.

Even more, he is publicly embarrassing and humiliating his father by refusing to go in. Even if he had a problem with how the younger son was received, he should still go in to the party and take up his grievances with the father later on. He should not be making a scene so publically in front of the father’s guests. Based on Eastern culture, this is almost as serious a break with the father as the younger son’s.

Notice also how the older son condemns himself as he describes his relationship with his father. “Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you.” He doesn’t address his father as father but as a subordinate by saying, “Look!” He sees their relationship as “master-slave” rather than “father-son.”

He goes on to say that he never disobeyed his fathers orders. He always did all the work that was given him to do. This too is something that a slave would say rather than a son. Moreover, this is simply false since he has just greatly insulted his father!

Then he accuses his father of favoritism: “You never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends.” He doesn’t ask that his father throw a party for him with the family; he wants a party with his friends; he wants nothing more to do with his real family and disowns them in effect. What will make him joyous is not the return of this brother but a party with HIS friends.

Moreover, the charges against his brother are exaggerated. The older brother accuses the younger of being with prostitutes, but that was never said. He is trying to get his father to reject his younger brother by exaggerating his guilt.

The older son is operating on the basis of not the relationship, but works. He has done all the right things but now someone else gets the reward. He has done all the right things in his eyes, but it is still not enough to obtain the father’s favor.

Now we can understand the older brother’s problem to some extent because it doesn’t seem fair. The father is not only welcoming him home but there is a financial aspect to this. The younger son may again receive a third of the inheritance, but it is now greatly diminished. This may be cutting into the older brother’s share! And that doesn’t seem fair.

More than that, he has been doing all the right stuff by working hard in the fields. He’s been obeying his father to the letter of the law and now the rebel gets a party? But Jesus’ point again is that what matters is not what we do but what our relationship with God is.

The older son is a picture of what many Christians are like today. For many Christians, the Christian faith is not so much a relationship with God as a set of things that you should do and be. You should be a good, loving, caring and moral person. You should do good things, do work in the church, do the right things with your family. Christianity for many is working hard in the fields but feeling like a slave instead of a child.
And then because we have worked so hard and devoted our time and energy to our Lord and Master, Jesus, then He had better reward us accordingly. Tim Keller writes, “You can avoid Jesus as Savior by keeping all the moral laws. If you do that, then you have ‘rights.’ God owes you answered prayers, and a good life, and a ticket to heaven when you die. You don’t need a Savior who pardons you by free grace, for you are your own Savior.” We want to be in control of our lives and what happens to us.

Moreover, if the rewards are not forthcoming, then we feel that we have reason to complain. “Lord, what’s the deal? Haven’t I been involved in church programs and activities, haven’t I done all the right things?” “I’m doing all kinds of work and it doesn’t seem to matter.” There is rage and confusion for older brothers instead of joy when things doing go well.

The problem is self-righteousness and that leads to all kinds of other issues and problems. It leads to feelings of being superior to others and when you feel superior it becomes very difficult to forgive others for doing things you would never do. It leads to attitudes of prejudice because good people only act a certain way and not like others.

And finally, we can end up being trapped in a performance type of Christianity. We try to live a good Christian life and try to do all the right things and it isn’t good enough.

In his book, The Spirit of the Disciplines, Dallas Willard tells of man by the name of Simeon Stylites who lived from 309 to 459 AD. He built a column six feet high in the Syrian desert and lived on it for some time. But he soon grew ashamed of its small height and found one sixty feet high, three feet across, with a railing to prevent him from falling off in his sleep.

Now with a warning to the potentially squeamish, listen to what Dallas Willard writes: “On this perch, Simeon lived uninterruptedly for 37 years, exposed to the rain, sun and cold. A ladder enabled disciples to take him food and remove his waste. He bound himself to the pillar by a rope; the rope became embedded in his flesh, which putrefied around it, and stank and teemed with worms. Simeon picked up the worms that fell from his sores and replaced them there, saying, ‘Eat what God has given you.’”

The problem is sixty feet isn’t enough; nothing is good enough! What we need to see is beautifully stated in the father’s response.

III Let’s look at The Father’s Grace.

Notice first of all that the father goes out to meet the older son in spite of the terrible offense to him. The father had every reason to be angry and cut the son off, just as he could have with the prodigal. But he goes out to him, just as he did with the prodigal son. He calls him his “child,” a term of dear compassion and tenderness as he accepts him as his son.

Not only that, notice that the father pleads with him to come in and join the party. The older son belongs there not because of the work he has done. He belongs there because he is the father’s son, his child.
Then the father explains the reasons for his actions with the younger son. First, the older son has not been forgotten. He still will receive all of his inheritance from the father’s estate. He still will receive all that has been promised to him.

But the father wants the older son to understand the basis of what he receives. It is not because he has been working so hard that he will be blessed. It is because he is the father’s son.
The same thing is true for the younger son. Based on what he did, he should have been made into a servant. But he is in fact a son and because of the father’s grace, he will be accepted and treated as one. The basis of the father’s actions is grace for the younger and older.

The point that Jesus is making is that both sons were rebellious. The younger was outward in his rebellion. He obviously rejected being a son, but he came back. The older son rebelled internally. He was hypocritical in that he lived with the father even though he didn’t feel like a son. Nevertheless, the father is willing to reach out in love and compassion to both. The younger gladly accepts the offer of grace and lives in it. What about the older?

Jesus deliberately leaves off the ending to this parable. Jesus is speaking to the Pharisees who were obsessed with keeping the law. They were deeply religious people, but they had lost the relationship with their Father. Jesus is inviting them to come back and to live in God’s grace.

The same invitation comes to us today as well and we would do well to heed it. God has poured out his grace on us abundantly and so we should live for him in that grace. It’s not about what we do, but it’s all about the outrageous, prodigal grace God shows to us.

IV. Our Need for Our Father’s Grace

We tend to live by works not by grace with similar resulting problems. We work very hard at the Christian life. There is, after all, a lot of work that needs to be done. I’m not disputing that at all and it is important work. The problem comes when we work not out of love and devotion but because we feel we have to in order to be a Christian.

And what’s worse is that when that begins, then we have fallen into a trap that keeps getting tighter and tighter because our work is never good enough. We read the Bible and pray, but we should read the Bible and pray more. We get involved but we should really be doing more. And when we don’t do more or don’t do things better or perfectly, as God really wants them, then we feel guilty and we despair.

We may be as obedient as we can imagine, but it will never be enough. The story is told of a rather nominal church member had lived with the philosophy that his good works would be more than enough to get him into heaven. One night he dreamed of the final judgment and was standing behind Mother Teresa. The saintly nun was called to stand before the Lord and this presumptuous sinner overheard God say, “Teresa, I was really expecting a lot more out of you.” We cannot impress God with how obedient we are for we all fall short of what God requires.

Instead we need to have God’s grace flowing abundantly in our lives every day. We need to understand that grace is not just a term that we find in the Bible, but a reality that we should experience in every part of every day. God ‘s grace should be a reality when you are taking care of your children. God’s grace should be a reality when you are working in your job. God’s grace should be a reality when you are making demands on yourself that no one else would expect from you.

Grace is something that should enable us to look at ourselves honestly but through God’s eyes. We aren’t perfect, but God already knows that and He accepts us anyway because of Jesus. We aren’t going to be able to do all the things that Christians are supposed to do, but that’s O.K. because God accepts us because of Jesus.

We aren’t going to be perfect spouses, parents, workers, bosses, children, whatever you are. God knows this too, but He accepts us anyway if we accept his gift of grace in Jesus. God’s grace says to us, “You will fall, but get up and keep on trying; I accept you because of Jesus, not because of what you are doing.” God’s grace says, “I know that you are sinners. That’s why Jesus came.”

We often say we believe God’s grace but sometimes find it hard to live in it in our daily lives. My mother came from the old school of math. Many years ago, we were talking about balancing the checkbook and I said how nice it is to have a calculator to do this job. She said that she uses a calculator as well but then said, “I still figure it out on paper after I’m done just to make sure the calculator did it right.” The calculator is nice to have, but she doesn’t really rely on it. It’s not as good as doing it yourself.

“It’s nice to have our Father’s grace but I had better do all the good stuff just to make sure.” It’s at that point that we have to hear our Father say, “Stop it now. Stop all the stuff that you think is making me happy and trying to earn my favor.” “I sent Jesus to take care of all of that and now you are my restored and dearly loved child.” “Come into the party and live a joyous love with me.”

Luke 15:20 “A Father Who Runs”

Introduction:
There are some things that dignified people just don’t do. For example, in April this year President Obama had an audience with the Queen of England. Everything for such a meeting is carefully choreographed for there are certain things you must do and also things you must never do when you meet the queen. The meeting is filled with all the proper protocols.
Now imagine as President Obama and the First Lady walk into this room, instead of waiting for them to walk to her and greet her, she stands up, runs to them and gives them both a high five! That would be on the evening news that night and on YouTube forever! That is just not something the Queen of England does. It is not fitting nor proper for a person of such a stature to do something like that.
Today, as we continue our study of the parable of the Prodigal Son, we look more closely at the actions of the father. He does things that Jesus’ listeners would have been surprised by. He does things that are totally unexpected and wonderfully reassuring to his lost and now returning son. In this we see a picture of our own heavenly Father and how He responds to us as well as lost and beloved children of Him. Read Luke 15:11-20.

I. The Community Setting
II. The Father’s Actions
III. Our Father’s Compassion

The Community Setting
It’s important at this point to understand more about the physical setting of this story. I always used to picture this father and family living on a farm similar to the one I grew up on. There is a house and other buildings like a barn and the like, all of which are near the house. Then the fields would be surrounding the buildings or the farm yard. So until recently, I pictured the son walking down this road when the father saw him from a distance and ran down the road to meet him. The two then walked back to the farm yard and had the welcome home party in the farm yard.
However, a landowner such as the father, would not live way out on his farm away from the village. He would live in the village itself. The area around the village would have the fields of the various farmers, but all the people would be living together in the small town.
And that fact adds to the complexity of the son’s return. The father knows his son will have to walk through all the town’s people in order to get home. He will have endure the scorn, the ridicule, the judgmental looks as he slinks back home. The father is very aware of this and does something extraordinary to protect his son from this scene.

II. The Father’s Actions are highlighted in Jesus’ story.
The father sees his son while still a long way off. He is likely out in his fields working the land at this point. But while working, he’s looking up, hoping and praying for this son to make his way back home. He doesn’t know if his son will come back home or not, but he is still watching and hoping.
Can you imagine the feelings that must have surged through that father when he saw his son? He really had no idea if that son would be coming back at all! There was a really good chance that the son would die in that distant land! But the father has been looking, waiting, hoping and then he is there!
In the years following my father’s death 24 years ago, I would have very vivid dreams about him. I would have dreams where he would be very much alive and doing the things that he used to do. I remember waking up from those dreams with a mixture of sadness and happiness. It was sad because it was another reminder that my dad was indeed dead. But it was comforting as well in that I had a taste of seeing him again, even if it was only in a dream. This father must have blinked, rubbed his eyes and then felt his heart soar as he saw his son, frail and weakened, but still very much alive walking home.
And then Jesus says that this father had compassion on his son. Some fathers would be angry toward the son or the feelings of betrayal would be hard to overcome. They might be glad to see their son, but inside they would also want some measure of punishment. Moreover, the whole small town dynamic now comes into play here as well. This betrayal and abandonment has not just been a family issue. This has been something the whole small town would have known and been scandalized by.
Some of you have lived in a small town and know how fast the word of something spreads. You know how the gossip spreads and how vicious it can be. This father knows that the son will have to enter the village and run the gauntlet of humiliation on the part of the other villagers.
And so this father runs out to his son! Quite simply, fathers in that day didn’t run. New Testament scholar Kenneth Bailey who is an expert on this parable, observes, “An Oriental nobleman with flowing robes never runs anywhere. To do so would be humiliating.”
This attitude continues to this day in the middle east. A pastor friend of Bailey was not accepted as a pastor of a particular church in the middle east because the elders saw that he walked down the street too fast. So you have to picture Jesus’ listeners hearing this and thinking, “Not a chance!! Fathers don’t do that! That is so completely out of character for a father to do!”
Yet this father runs out to his son. Why? He shows his love and compassion by running out to him. However, he also runs out so that he can return with him and go through the village with his son. He will not allow his son to go through the abuse and humiliation by himself.
But before that happens, the father throws his arms around him and kisses him. Kenneth Bailey envisions this occurring on the edge of the town. In so doing, the father makes a public demonstration of his love for his son in front of everyone. This father will not heap on shame and judgment but love and compassion.
There is also something very significant about this very public kiss. The son, as he approaches his father, would likely be kneeling in front of him and would likely kiss his father’s hand, or more likely his feet. This father doesn’t allow this and by kissing his son first, prevents him from subjecting himself to kissing his father’s feet. The word for kissing here means that the father kissed him again and again.
The father’s kiss is a sign of reconciliation and forgiveness. In a first century community, if there had been a serious quarrel, part of the ceremony of reconciliation is a public kiss by the men who were involved in the quarrel. This father is stating in this kiss that there is reconciliation even before the son says anything!
That must have been an overwhelming thing for the younger son to have happen to him. Steve Brown tells of a Catholic priest who experienced such forgiveness and reconciliation. Rev. Thomas Quinlin is a 71 year old chain smoker who seems to go out of his way to offend people through his unconventional actions. He once rode a police motorcycle down the center of his church during a Palm Sunday procession to make a point. He hates the trappings of power and God was using his offbeat ways in a powerful way. Six years ago, he was arrested for drunken driving. He went to his church and confessed, telling them that he would leave willingly. But instead they said, “We don’t want you to leave; we want you to change.” A newspaper reporter summarized it powerfully when he said, “Those dear folks loved him into sobriety.”
Can you imagine how overwhelming that must have felt to that priest to be loved and accepted like that? That is just a hint of the picture of forgiveness and acceptance that this father gives his son.

III. What I want us to remember this morning is this picture of Our Father’s Compassion to us.
This is not just a story about a loving and forgiving father, but a picture of God who ran to us in our sin. If you are a believer, God saw you as you struggled with the sins and problems in your life. He was watching as you tried one thing after another trying to find the happiness that you so eagerly were seeking after, but not really finding it. He was watching you as you sank lower in the mud in that distant land trying to find happiness. We know from other passages in the Bible that the Holy Spirit worked in your heart and helped you to realize that whatever you were doing wasn’t working out for you. He was waiting for you to come to your senses so that you could go home.
And once we recognized our sin God ran to us. He was so glad that you wanted to come home and have that relationship and peace with God. He wrapped His arms around us and welcomed us home.
But there is one element that this story doesn’t cover that becomes very clear in the rest of the Bible. God welcomes us home, throws aside our feeble attempts to fix things and points us Jesus. He points us to Jesus, our true older brother and tells us, “I’m glad you are home.” “You cannot repay or fix all the problems you caused.” “But I have the plan that will fix it” and He points to Jesus on the cross. Our older brother, Jesus, wrapped his arms around us and suffered the punishment and ordeals we should have suffered as a consequence of our sinful rebellion.
That is what we celebrate today in communion. We will gather around the table, celebrate the dinner of fellowship with our Father against whom we sinned and rebelled. And we will be reminded that it was through Jesus’ bruised and broken body that we can have this restored relationship with our Father. It is through Christ’s spilled blood that we can sit here and enjoy the feast of reconciliation and forgiveness with our heavenly Father. In our story, it is not the fattened calf that is killed but our older brother, Jesus.
And remember that we are so utterly undeserving of this gift. Steve Brown writes, “If you’re a Christian and can take communion, can worship and be involved in ministry without wondering why in the world God would forgive, love, and save you, you simply have not understood the gospel.” We don’t deserve to be here, but God welcomes us, wraps us up in His arms and tells us that the body and blood of Christ was given so that we can be in His loving arms. Today as we eat and drink, let’s truly give thanks to God for the amazing blessing and gift that our Lord is to us.
However, this picture of God running to us and wrapping his arms around us continues to be true for us in all of our struggles and trials in life as well. God is not a distant ruler in heaven who doesn’t care what happens to His people. He is not removed from our pains and struggles, nor does He watch at a safe distance from heaven as we weep tears of sadness, anger or frustration. God is not saying, “Well, you deserve this because you’ve been disobedient.”
God continues to run to us now and wraps his arms around us in compassion. God gathers us in His arms and tells us that He knows our pain, our frustration, our sorrow. He knows how hard it is or how hard it has been because He has been watching us every step of the way.
God wraps His arms around us, comforts us and tells us that while things may seem to be upside down or backwards, He is in control. God has all things in His all-powerful hands and is very much the King and Ruler of all. He looks us in the eyes and tells us that He loves us and that all things – all things – will work out for good for those who love Him. Life may have many pains, hardships and trials, but we can always be confident that our God, our Father loves us deeply and will always, always hold us and never let us go.
Gordon Balfour tells of a time when he was when he was a young boy in public school, his father worked part time as a driver and guard for Brinks Armored Car Service. Once, when his shift was ending early, he and the other guards stopped the truck at the school yard to give him a lift home. Balfour came out of school and there in the parking lot was the shiny grey armored car, complete with gun-ports and bullet-proof glass. Gathered in a circle around it were all the 3rd grade boys, gawking at this mysterious vehicle. Balfour pushed his way through the circle, went up to the truck and climbed up inside the cab. As he did, the other pupils stared and held their breath at his boldness, but his dad was in the cab, and he knew that he was welcome.
He comments, “Even though I could boldly approach the truck, I knew that any disrespectfulness on my part would not be tolerated by my father. And here is the beautiful balance. I could come respectfully, knowing that my father had standards that were to be obeyed. But at the same time I could come boldly, for he was my father and he loved me.”
Today we can boldly approach God’s throne and know that He has everything, the world’s treasures and the world’s pain, in His hands and He will never let us go. Let’s gather around the table to celebrate God’s grace and ongoing goodness and fellowship in our lives.

Luke 15:17-19 “Fixing Our Sin”

Introduction:
I once watched my neighbors cut down a huge oak tree in their back yard. They brought chain saws ropes and ladders. They carefully laid out their plan and started cutting. At one point they were ready to cut off a large limb. They had a rope over another branch above, tied it around the lower limb to be cut off and then had someone holding the rope to lower the branch to the ground.
It was a great plan until the laws of physics took over and they learned that the limb weighed more than the person holding the other end of the rope. The limb fell down, the man went up and both just narrowly missed colliding in mid-air. A great plan that didn’t quite work out.
Of course bad plans are not restricted to back yard tree cutters. Five years ago, Oprah Winfrey gave away a new car to each member of her studio audience–her entire audience–for free one day. Audience members were thrilled and the car maker planned on a huge boost for the name recognition it would give them.
Most people remember the car give away, but who actually today remembers what the car given away was? It was a Pontiac. Everybody applauded Oprah Winfrey for her generosity, but they forgot all about Pontiac, which came up with the idea for the giveaway. A great plan that didn’t work out the way they had planned.
This morning we continue looking at the story of the Prodigal Son and we see how the younger son makes a very careful plan as to how he will fix the desperate situation he is in while in the distant land. His plan, however, was flawed in two ways: he thought he could fix it himself and he completely underestimated the love of his father to forgive him and accept him back home as his son. Let’s read Luke 15:11-20.

I. The Son Comes to His Senses
II. The Son’s Plan
III. The Father’s Response

I. The Son Comes to His Senses as we see in verse 17.
As Jesus continues the story, the son is in the distant land feeding the pigs when he “came to his senses.” The son’s change of heart is first a realization of how foolish he has been.
I’ve mentioned before that we like to use the line, “Let me know how that works out for you.” Usually it is said when someone has an idea that we think is not really going to work. For example, imagine someone telling me they were thousands of dollars in debt and their solution to their financial mess is to go to Vegas and win a million dollars. If they would not listen to reason or any other counsel, I would likely say to them, “Well, let me know how that works for you;” in other words, that won’t ever work!
At this point the son, in effect, asks himself: “So how is your plan working for you?” He has to admit that his plan to enjoy life by spending all his money has not worked well at all.
So he starts thinking back to his father’s farm and knows he has been foolish. He is standing there in the mud with the pigs, hungry and slowly starving to death. He realizes that even his father’s servants have a place to sleep and good food to eat. The motive for his return is not profound, but it is at least a start.
In the first century, there were three levels of servants on a Jewish farm. There were bondsmen who were slaves but part of the estate and were almost part of the family. There were slaves of a lower class who would have to answer to the bondsmen. And then there were the hired servants who were outsiders and did not belong to the estate.
These hired men were free but had nothing invested in the farm and didn’t really care about what happened at all to the farm or the owner. They were simply hired hands to do some work for a short time and was easily expendable. Even the ones who were hired on to do temporary work are eating better than he was. What is important to note at this point is that while he may be admitting, he is not yet repenting.
We do that at times, don’t we? We come to the realization that whatever we have been doing to try to find happiness is not working. At times we stand there in the mud and realize this just isn’t the answer!
When I was in college, I had a couple “come to my senses” moments. When I was still a bit of a rebel, I remember my sister talking to after I had hosted a party in my parents’ house while they were gone. She said, “Don’t let your actions mess up your scholarship or your school plans.” In other words, how is this working for you? My answer was, “Not so good.” Later on when I was still had hopes of becoming a doctor, I was standing in the midst of calculus and genetics and realizing I was truly in a distant land and I needed to do something different.
That is what is going on with the son. He realizes that this isn’t working for him and he needs a better plan. True repentance and reconciliation are not on his mind at this point as of yet. Instead he comes up with a plan to fix it himself, which is what we see next.

II. The Son’s Plan is described in verses 18-19.
The son carefully rehearses what he is going to say to his father when he returns. He will say, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you.” He recognizes that what he has done was actually a sin against God. But he also realizes that he has sinned against his father for he has caused great heartache. It is quite likely that he is acknowledging that he has put his father at risk by removing his means of support for his father as he gets older.
So at this point, he acknowledges that this has all been his fault, which is commendable. He knows that he is not just the victim of a bad set of circumstances or bad breaks. He is the one who has messed up and he admits this.
There is a lot we, in our culture, could learn from this attitude on the part of the son. We live in a culture in which people don’t like to think that things are their fault. Some will say they are having problems it’s because of their upbringing. Some will blame their bosses or their companies for the bad situation they are in. Some will say it’s the current government that is the cause of their problems. Many people today will blame anyone and everyone they can think of because they don’t want to say that they made a mistake.
However, we need to honestly come to terms with our sins and our mistakes. We have to stop blaming other people and simply say that it is our sin that caused the problems. Let’s stop blaming others and accept the responsibility for where we are now. This son not only realizes his situation but admits that it was his doing and no one else’s fault. Confession is a great starting place and great to do, but then the son goes off track in his plan.
Notice how he carefully still tries to be in control of the situation. In his rehearsed speech to his father, he admits that he is no longer worthy to be called a son. He says that he will take on the status of one who is not the father’s son. He still calls his father his father since he is clinging to some vestige of what they had before and wants to have that relationship.
However, notice that the son is really telling the father what he should be doing with him and in doing so, he is setting the terms for the renewed relationship. He disowns himself because he knows he has that coming. But that is something only the father could do.
Moreover, he tells the father to make him like one of the hired men. Now remember the classifications of the servants on the first century farm. He is saying that he will be an outsider, someone that is hired only for temporary work. He will have nothing invested in the farm but only would hope to be paid.
So what is likely his plan in this regard? First, he is still maintaining his independence and considers himself to be an equal to his father. He has no ownership in the farm and he also is still not under the umbrella of sonship.
Second, by having this position of a hired man, he will be paid for his work and that will make it possible for him to repay his father for all the money that he lost while he was partying. He can maintain his pride and his independence. And he can try to fix the problem he made in the first place.
Notice that he doesn’t ask his father to do this for him; he will tell him. He, in effect, is telling his father, “Ok, I have made a huge mistake and I sinned against you. However, I have a plan that will fix it. I will earn money by working for you, pay you back what was lost and we’ll be even.” In other words, the son is saying, “I’ll save myself from my injustice to you.” He wants no grace.
We would say that he is acting like a good responsible person at this point. He will live in the village and not on the farm so he won’t be a burden. He won’t be taking anything away from his brother for he will work for whatever he needs. He knows that the farm belongs to his brother and he is not asking for any part of that. He views this solution primarily as a financial solution and a justice issue.
We sometimes do what this son does when we sin against God. We recognize that we have done wrong, carefully determine what damage has been done by our sin. In other words, we confess our sin to God. In sorrow, we admit that what we have done is wrong.
And then we go about trying to fix it. “I’m sorry for what I did God, but I have a plan!” “I’ll read the Bible an hour more a day! I’ll pray 30 minutes more a day!” “I’ll go to church more often and not kick any dogs when they get in my way.” “If I’ve stolen anything, I’ll pay it back and if I have hurt anyone, I’ll make it right as well.” In effect, we say, “Don’t worry God, I’ll take care of this! I can fix this and we’ll be good!”
Bryan Chapell tells of a family where he lived where the mother of the family had had enough. The young mom, tired of all the whining, back talk and lack of cooperation from her family declared herself to be on strike. In fact, she put a sign in the front yard that said, “Mom on Strike!” and moved out of the house and was living in the tree house in the back yard. From there she vowed not to come down until things had changed. A local television station heard about this and went out to interview the family and got the mother’s take on things.
However, Chapell wanted to hear how the father would respond. Hoping to get the sympathy of husbands everywhere, he shrugged at the camera and said, “I have the kids doing the chores again. I’ve told them to cool it with the sarcasm. We are trying to make amends and do whatever we can to get her to come down.” He was hoping that the right words and actions would fix the wrongs that had been done.
That is what we try to do with God in our sin. We confess our sins and we say we are sorry, and that is good. And then we tell God all the things we are going to do to fix it and make things better again. We say, “Just watch me God and I’ll show you I can be good!” But when we do this, we forget about our Father’s nature or don’t understand our Father’s true nature.

III. What is the Father’s Response?
We will look at the father’s response in more detail next week, but for now let’s look at two things he does. He goes out to meet the son with joy and compassion. He won’t let his son come back into the village community all by himself. He runs out to him which is something a father in the Middle East would never do.
And we’ll see that the father doesn’t even let him finish his carefully prepared speech. In other words, the father takes the son’s carefully worked out speech and plan and throws it out. He makes it very clear that this plan will not be needed nor will it work.
And clearly this is not how the son thought his plan would be received. The son likely envisioned the father listening with grave seriousness to his plan and then after careful consideration, he would hopefully agree to it. The son would endure the humiliation in the village, find a place to live and slowly but surely work himself back into some semblance of respect. But all the while maintaining his independence and pride and he would fix it! If we are like this younger son when we sin in a big ways, we are even more like him in coming to terms with all of our sins.
And so we need to see again that God doesn’t do business with us in that way. God doesn’t look at our meager efforts to make things right with him and accept them. God looks at our efforts to be more spiritual and more godly and shakes his head with pity. God looks at our attempts to prove to God that we can fix this and is filled with compassion.
Bryan Chapell tells of a friend of his whose daughter had disobeyed them and handled the family car in a way that caused an accident. The daughter could not afford to pay for the repairs or the traffic ticket and so the parents paid both costs with the understanding that the daughter would pay them back over time. However, she learned that it was difficult to do and she struggled to keep making the payments. Her parents had to keep reminding her of her responsibilities and obligations, which frustrated both the daughter and her parents.
Finally after one of the reminding sessions, the daughter exploded: “Daddy, don’t you and Mom know that I realize what I did was wrong? I know I was irresponsible. I know it’s my problem. I wish you would just get off my case so that I can figure out a way to fix this!” Her father responded: “Honey, what I really want you to figure out is that by yourself you can’t fix this!” We simply can’t fix our sin by ourselves and that will become evident as the story proceeds.
What does God do for us instead? He runs to us, grabs us and says to us throw all those things away! He looks at us and tells us, “You can’t fix this! Stop trying!” He is the only one who can fix this; the only one who can take away the sin and the offence.
He looks at us in our pious attempts to be holy to show God how sorry we are and says, “Stop it! That is what I sent Jesus to do.” If we want to be right in God’s eyes, then the one we have to look at is Jesus, not ourselves! That is whom God looks at. He looks at Jesus and His actions and instead of seeing Jesus doing all those wonderful things, He sees us being perfectly obedient and He says “perfect!”
It is so easy for us when we sin to try to fix things ourselves. The women from By Faith know how well that works, right? What do you have to know about coming to terms with your addiction? There has to be a higher power. Someone in the grip of addiction cannot fix it themselves. They could tell us many stories about how they were going to fix it and get themselves straight. But until they get to the point where they realize they can’t do it with God, they are lost.
And here is the thing: they are not alone! Whether it’s addiction to drugs, alcohol, sex, money or whatever is your addiction or sinful behavior, we can’t fix it ourselves! We can recognize that we have a problem, we can admit it, but we can’t fix it ourselves.
But here is the good news: we don’t have to because we have a prodigal, lavish Father! God, in His lavish and wild grace, has fixed it already through Jesus. All we need to do is come to him, admit our sins and our sinfulness and He says, “I know. I’ve been watching. That is what Jesus had to die for. I’m glad you’re home.”

Luke 15:13-16

I enjoy eating chocolate ice cream.  When I was younger, I could eat a huge bowl of ice cream before bed every night and I could get away with it.  Now I have to be careful and I restrict myself to a small bowl every once in a while.  Now eating ice cream is not a sin by any means but it is something that I have to watch out for because if I eat too much, it won’t be good for me.  But it’s hard to do.  Why?  Because I really like chocolate ice cream!  If I didn’t like it, it wouldn’t be a problem for me.  We could have a freezer full of strawberry ice cream and it’s not a problem.  I could avoid that all day and not be a problem But it’s chocolate ice cream!

Why am I telling you about chocolate ice cream?  Because we need to be honest about our sins.  Very frankly, we enjoy sin.  I mean, we really enjoy sinning!  Often we try to convince ourselves that our sin is something we don’t like to do and so we are surprised when we do sin.  Quite simply, we sin because it’s our nature to sin and sometimes, many times, we sin because we like to sin.  It’s not like the devil is forcing us to do something we find abhorrent and we are fighting him tooth and nail. More often than not, it’s our own sinful nature seeing something that is wrong and we say, “Ok!”

That’s important for us to recognize as we continue looking at the parable of the father and two sons.  We can look at the younger son as being foolish – and indeed he was –  but he represents us in so many ways.  He ran away and lived apart from his father because that is what he really wanted to do.  We often do the same.  Let’s read Luke 15:11-16.

I. The Betrayal

II. The Sins

III. Our Father

I. The Betrayals

First, the younger son rebels against his father by asking for his share of the estate.  And, as we saw last week, in a real sense he was wishing his father to be dead.  Pastor Viken Galoustian, a pastor in Iran, tells of a Christian father who called him one night and said, “My son wants me to die!”

Galoustian found out that this man’s son had asked the same question as the younger son.  Three months later the father, who previously had been in good health, died.  His wife said, “He died that night!” meaning that the night the son asked him for his inheritance the father had died then.  The shock was so great that his life was over that night.

Some of you have experienced the pain of rejection when your child has rejected you by what they have chosen to do.  Others of you have perhaps done that to your parents or another of your family and you now know the pain that such rejection causes.  This is the pain the younger son causes to his father.  This son is rejecting the one who loves him completely and unconditionally.

But there is even more going on than what we may realize and we see that in the first part of verse 13 where we read that “Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country…”

Now there were many Jews at this point in history that did go to distant countries to start businesses.  If that were the case, the father would have given him some “bus money” and sent him.  This son gathered up all he had on his own because he never intended to come back.

And the son is showing callous disregard for his father because he gathers all he had and leaves.  In the ancient world, even if a son were to get his part of the estate before a father’s death, it would be expected that part of his obligation is to use that to care for the father with that money.  The son instead gathers up everything, leaves and spends it wildly in a distant land.  The father is left without the support that he could expect but still gives his son all he asks for.

We are often like our son in our lives.  Sometimes we do what this son does in a big way.  Often in our youth, we reject everything our parents may have taught us and leave it all behind.  Others may dabble in such rebellion but keep it somewhat hidden.

When I was in high school, that described me.  I had rather long hair, smoked and drank occasionally and partied frequently.  I still showed up for church with my parents but my heart wasn’t in it.  I thought the things my parents believed were rather lame and out of date.  I guess you could say I was a partial prodigal and I thank God that He rescued me from such a life that could have hurt me or derailed me.

However, if we are honest, we should all admit that we still do the prodigal thing from time to time.  We may not leave our families or leave our beliefs, but we still will take the blessings that we have from our Father and spend them recklessly.  We have freedom in Christ and so who cares if we engage in a little – or a lot of – sin?  God will forgive me, right? So what’s the big deal?  And the fact is that God will forgive and doesn’t ever stop loving us, but he is also saddened and hurt by our betrayal and our wanton use of His blessings.

And some times we simply go off the deep end and get totally wrapped up in ourselves.  It may even appear harmless or we may justify it somehow, but in our heart of hearts, we know we are doing certain things because it makes me happy; or at least, we think it will make us happy.  We live for ourselves, defining our happiness in terms of what the world says will make us happy.

Now let’s be very honest here with this: We love doing this!  We love sinning!  Yes, I know there are things that we feel terrible about after we do them; I understand that.  But the reason we did sin in the first place is because we wanted to do and loved doing it.

We sin because we love sinning!  No one stands over us and has to convince us to sin.  All we need is our own nature to whisper in our ear to sin and we gladly say, “OK!”  We don’t look lustfully at another person because someone forced us to do it. We want to do it!  We all do things that we think will make us happy but that we know are wrong.  We see next that this is what the younger son did.

II. The Sins

Verse 13 simply says that the son then “squandered his wealth in wild living.”  Jesus does not mention specifically what this “wild living” consisted of.  The older brother describes it as lavish living and being with prostitutes, but there is no way he could have known that since he hadn’t talked with his brother and he may be overstating the case.  Jesus says he wasted his money in lavish living, but it does not necessarily means immoral living.  He had no one to tell him what to do; he could live as he pleased and he did so with gusto!

Two doses of reality brought his new life of freedom to a screeching halt.  First, he soon discovered that money continually spent without being replenished is soon depleted.  He evidently did not find a job and so had no other money coming in.  With all his wild living, it took little time and he was broke.

The second dose of reality was a famine hit the area where he was, making food scarce and expensive.  This also meant that those who might have otherwise helped him were not able to help him.  It’s like the old blues song, “Nobody loves you when you’re down and out.”  When you can’t buy the things your “friends” want anymore, they don’t want to be your friends anymore and you’re on your own.  His life of luxury soon turned into a life of misery because he was by himself in a distant land.

Just how bad it became is seen in the job that he had to take.  He hired himself out as a beggar to someone else to feed pigs which was one of the lowliest jobs a Jew could hold because pigs were unclean.  In the ancient world, beggars would often stop at the homes of landowners asking for help.  A landowner would often offer to give them the most menial job that they could think of.  We might say today that we’ll help you but you have to clean our toilets first.  Feeding the pigs was the lowliest of all the possible jobs and the landowner may have simply hoped that the son would say, “I won’t do that!!” and walk away.  But the son is so desperate that he agrees to feed the dirty pigs.

But even then, the son discovered that he could fall even further.  He still didn’t earn enough to feed himself and he was slowly starving to death.  He found himself wanting to eat the carob seed pods that he was giving the pigs.  These seed pods were likely the fruit of a wild carob plant and tasted horribly bad.  As such it was suitable for pigs but it would provide no nourishment for a person.  He is so poor that he longed for the nasty tasting fruit the pigs were eating.  However, no one would give him any of those either or at least not enough to survive.  He had hit bottom and felt absolutely miserable.

Now before we scoff at this young man and say it serves him right let’s realize that this picture also describes us as sinners before God. Simply because of our sin, we are like this young son without Jesus.  We may think we are really good people but the Bible says, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”  We were not always good; we were sinners in need of repentance.

And still today many of us today are looking for the things that will make us happy and affirmed.  Only today, our culture approves of it; it is not obviously stupid thing to do.  We are told that it is okay to get all kinds of money and spend it any way you want.

Henri Nouwen writes that as long as we let the world around us define our happiness, we are going to be sadly disappointed.  Nouwen wrote, “The world says ‘Yes, I will love and accept you IF you are good-looking, intelligent and wealthy.  I will love you IF you have a good education, a good job, and good connections.  I love you IF you produce much, sell much and buy much.’”

The world is filled with such IF statements and we cannot possibly begin to fulfill them all.  Nouwen continues, “As long as we keep looking for my true self in the world of conditional love, I will remain ‘hooked’ to the world – trying, failing, and trying again.”

Nouwen describes it in terms of addiction for it is easy to become addicted to the values of the world.  The world says you need to accumulate wealth and power, status and admiration.  You need to have lavish consumption of food and drink and of sexual satisfaction.  The problem is that all these addictions create expectations that will never satisfy our deepest needs.

Fortune magazine quotes a comment made by billionaire H. Ross Perot: “Guys, just remember, if you get real lucky, if you make a lot of money, if you go out and buy a lot of stuff – it’s gonna break. You got your biggest, fanciest mansion in the world. It has air conditioning. It’s got a pool. Just think of all the pumps that are going to go out. Or go to a yacht basin any place in the world. Nobody is smiling, and I’ll tell you why. Something broke that morning. The generator’s out; the microwave oven doesn’t work….Things just don’t mean happiness.”

Robert Wuthnow of Princeton University conducted a survey of U.S. workers, which shows how we can end up being very confused about our attitudes and feelings about money and thus living in a distant land.  It reported that while 89 percent agree that “our society is much too materialistic,” 84 percent also say, “I wish I had more money than I do.”  71 percent believe “being greedy is a sin against God,” yet 76 percent say, “having money gives me a good feeling about myself.”   69 percent admire those who “take a lower paying job in order to help others.” And 52 percent want to reduce their work hours. Still, 68 percent would be willing to work longer hours if it meant more pay.  Society could be improved, say 71 percent, if people placed less emphasis on money.  At the same time, 80 percent admire those who “make a lot of money by working hard.”

As long as we are confused by attitudes like this, we are in that distant land of the younger son.  So what do we do?  We must simply look to the Father.

III. Now let’s look again at Our Father in this setting.

In spite of this son’s rebellion, the father still shows much love and care for him in two ways.  First, in spite of the son’s disrespect, the father still gives him the inheritance.  As we saw last week, a “normal” father would have kicked him out of the family.  This father, though pained and hurt, still gives the son the freedom to pursue what he desires even though he knows well what may happen.

Second, the father begins his vigil, waiting for the son to return.  The worst case scenario would be his son would die in a distant land.  The best case scenario is that he would come back but probably come back a beggar.  Nonetheless, he is watching because Jesus says that when the younger son returned, his father saw him when he was a long way off; the father never gave up on his son.

What we see in this father is a picture of our heavenly Father.  God still gives us freedom and blessings even when we don’t deserve them.  It is not true that wealth and success are always a sign of blessing and favor from God.  The son had all the wealth he wanted and was far from being blessed and in the father’s favor.  God will give us the freedom to use His gifts in the way we desire.

Sometimes we use such blessings in a way that honors God and many times we use them for ourselves.  God has given us the blessing of living in a wealthy nation where we have more than the vast majority of others in the world, but this does not mean that God is pleased with us.  He may in fact be seeing what we will do with this gift from His hand.  And many today, including ourselves, in our culture are being very prodigal in that we are spending these gifts on lavish living that is focused on ourselves.  God has given us the gift of health and we squander it by doing things that hurt our bodies.

But God our Father is always waiting to see if we’ll realize the blessings of life with Him.  And in our case, there is no question as to what condition we were in: we were dead, hopelessly dead in sin and rebellion against God.  And so God sent His Son to us to die instead of us so that we won’t have to die.  And then God, through His Holy Spirit, guides us back to Him and throws us the biggest welcome home party you can imagine!

The story Jesus tells is a story about the father and it is a story about our Father in heaven.  The word prodigal is, of course not used in the story; it is a label given to this story.  The word simply means lavish or wild and so it is said that the younger son was wild and lavish in his spending.  But the parable would be better called, as in a book by Pastor Tim Keller, “The Prodigal God.”  God is lavish and wild in providing for us when we don’t deserve it.  God is lavish and wild in providing the means for our salvation in Christ.

So what?  If you are living in a state of rebellion, whether mild or severe, realize that God is there, He is still loving us, having given His Son for us and still providing for us.  He is sad when we don’t want to be with Him and live with Him.

Steve Brown tells of a time when he was in high school and he didn’t care how he did in school.  He said that all changed one day when his teacher talked with him after class about a test he had failed.  She said, “Stephen, you can do a whole lot better than this!” Then she started weeping.  Do you know what happened? The next test he got an A, not because he was so smart but because he had a teacher who loved him so much that she shed tears over his failure.

If we are failing, God, who loved us so much that He gave up His Son, is looking and waiting for us to come back and do better because we love Him.  He is wanting us to come to him, providing His Spirit to bring us back to Him because He is the Prodigal God.

Luke 15:1-2, 11-12 “The Two Brothers”
Introduction:
I knew my parents for 30 and 50 years respectively.  I grew up with them and knew what they were like.  However, as I get older I wish I had known them better. I wish I had taken advantage of the time I had with them to ask them questions about their lives, their upbringing and their stories.  They were very familiar to me but I wish I had taken the time to learn about them more and to plumb the depths of their insights and wisdom.
The story of the Prodigal Son, which we are looking at today and over the next 5 sermons, is also very familiar.  Most of us have heard it more times than what we can remember. You’ve heard a lot of sermons on this story. Yet I want us to sit down with this parable in the next 5 sermons and really look intently at it.
Henri Nouwen once saw a copy of Rembrandt’s painting of the Prodigal Son and was captivated by it.  When he finally got a chance to look at it in the museum in St. Petersburg in Russia, he spent literally hours just looking at it. He didn’t just look and then move on.  He studied it intently to let the images soak in.  That is what I want us to do with this story because there is so much for us to learn about ourselves, our culture and our Lord.   We will see what this says about what our relationship should be to our God as we live in His amazing grace. Let’s read Luke 15:1-2, 11-32.
I. The Setting of the Parable    II. The Two Brothers   III. The Two Approaches to Life

I. The Setting of the Parable
To understand what Jesus is doing in this story, we really need to go back to the first two verses of Luke 15.  Luke writes, “Now the tax collectors and ‘sinners’ were all gathering around to hear him.  But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, ‘This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.’”  This setting is not at all uncommon for Jesus.  Jesus often hung around with the poor, the outcast, the ones on the fringe.  Jesus was like a magnet and people loved to gather around Him.
There are two primary groups that Luke points out in this setting.  First are the tax collectors and “sinners.”  The tax collectors were the people that everyone hated.  They regularly gouged the people as they collected taxes for the Roman Empire.  If you didn’t pay them enough, they could make your life miserable.
The “sinners” were those who did not meet the standards that the Pharisees had laid out.  The sinners ranged from prostitutes to people who just weren’t not as good as the religious leaders were or expected others to be.  Some, like the prostitutes and tax collectors, were immoral but most were normal people going about their business but not very “religious” about how they were living their lives.
The Pharisees and the teachers of the law, on the other hand, were on the far other extreme.  These were the people who knew how to live a thoroughly religious life.  They knew the law and they knew exactly what needed to be done in order to obey the law.  In fact, they added layer upon layer to the Old Testament law of Moses just to make sure that every single aspect of life was covered under their rules and regulations.
What compounded the problem was that the sinners and tax collectors were eating with Jesus.  It is important to realize that in this culture, to invite someone to eat with you was a great honor.  To eat with someone meant that you wanted to share your life with that person.
Moreover, Luke said that the Pharisees accused Jesus of “welcoming” the sinners and tax collectors.  So it is possible that Jesus had invited these people over for dinner and was eating with them.  It may be comparable today of someone who lives in a nice neighborhood going out to invite the drug dealers, the prostitutes, the street people and the gang members to his house for a meal.  Imagine the reaction if all these “kinds” of people showed up in a nice quiet neighborhood!  These are not the kind of people you see in the Christian bookstore!  What kind of person associates with people like that?
So, we have Jesus meeting with all these people, talking with them and associating with them.  We have the Pharisees observing this, shaking their heads with disapproval.  Clearly this teacher Jesus is going straight to hell for associating with these awful people.  Within this setting “Jesus told them this parable about the father and two brothers would have a big impact for both groups in this setting.

II. We read about The Two Brothers in verse 11.
Jesus begins this story by simply saying: “There was a man who had two sons.”  Jesus simply introduces the characters which will communicate his point to His listeners.  The father, as we will see, is loving and very patient, and will do anything for his sons.  The sons, in turn, each disrespect the father, but in two very different ways.  Let’s look briefly at the two brothers for a moment.
We will find out later that the older brother is the good boy who always did what he was supposed to do.  He was clearly a “pleaser” in the family.  When there were chores to be done, he did his chores faithfully and with great diligence.  And he probably always did it without complaining because that is what good sons do.
He had it figured out that the way to get what he wanted was to obey his father.  If you are a good child, then you will end up with the inheritance and a life that is good.  Moreover, as the first born, he knows that if he keeps his nose clean, he’ll end up with double the amount that his younger brother will get when his father dies.
He knew that he wanted what his father had, and he knew that strict obedience was the way to get it.  He doesn’t really enjoy the relationship with his father but wants the stuff that comes with it.  This will become evident when we reach the end of the story.
Then we have the younger brother who said to his father, “Father, give me my share of the estate.”  This son also knows what he wants in his life and wants what he has coming to him.  The problem is that he wants his share now!  He doesn’t want his father, but he too wants the stuff.
The money he asked for was the money he would receive at his father’s death.  And so in a real sense, he was wishing his father to be dead.  One scholar tested this on several people he visited with in various parts of the Middle East.  He asked if anyone in their village had ever asked for their inheritance before the father had died.  The response was always, “Never!”  “Could anyone makes such a request?”  “Impossible!”  “If anyone did, what would happen?”  “His father would beat him, of course!”  “Why?”  “This request means –he wants his father to die!”
Moreover, it soon became apparent that the son wanted his share of money so that he could get away from his father’s values and influence.  His wild lifestyle in a distant country makes it clear that he wanted to get away from his father.  He gathered up all he had because he never intended to come back.
What is often lost at this point is what the father does: “So he divided his property between them.”  Jesus’ listeners must have looked at him with disbelief because a father would never do that!  Again, if a son asked this of a father in the Middle East today, the father would almost certainly respond to such a request by driving the son out of the family with nothing except physical blows.  But this is not what this father does.
This father simple gives his rebellious son what he would have received at his death and lets him go.  This father patiently endures this loss of honor as well as the pain it inflicted.  This father simply bears up under the pain and keeps on loving his sons in spite of their actions.

III. What we see in this part of the parable are Two Approaches to Life that we still see today.
There is first the way of moralism and legalism that is represented by the older brother.  The Pharisees of Jesus’ day knew that they were in a special covenant relationship with God.  They also knew that the way to maintain that relationship, and more to the point, obtain the benefits of the covenant relationship, was strict obedience to the law.  You want a life that is blessed and successful?  Obey the law and it will happen!  What matters most is obedience to God’s law and conformity to human traditions and laws.
We have the descendants of the Pharisees very much alive and well today in our culture.  These are the people who believe conformity to the rules of the land are what makes things good.  The problems in the world are caused by all the immoral people who run around doing their own thing.  If everyone just would behave themselves and do what is right, this world would be just fine!
We have such people in the Christian church as well.  If you want to be a good Christian, obey the rules and the law and God will give you want.  And if you are unsure what is the right thing to do, create more laws and rules to make it clearer so that you don’t have to even think about what is right and wrong.
In my upbringing, you could know if you were a good Christian if you obeyed the following:  Don’t go to movies, drink, play cards and certainly don’t dance!  Never go to the store on Sunday and never work on Sunday or watch TV on Sunday..  Do send your children to Christian schools and always go to church twice on Sunday.  Obey these laws and God will be pleased with you and things will be fine.
Bryan Chapell tells of a church in South America where this is taken to its logical extreme.  Evangelicals are best known in Las Mesetas for their strict observance of rules such as no drinking, no dancing, no drugs and no smoking.  Members are required to tithe their earnings and attend all church services – six or seven nights a week in most churches.  Some churches prohibit men from wearing jeans or shorts.  Most churches do not allow women to wear pants, shorts or short skirts.  They also prohibit women from wearing jewelry, using makeup or cutting their hair.  A number of churches require women to wear head coverings in church.
One woman there said, “My friend told me that I have lost my salvation since I cut my hair.”  This attitude, as Steve Brown would say, “is a lie from the pit of hell and smells like smoke!”
On the other hand we also have the descendants of the younger son as well.  In this view, the world would be a far better place if tradition, hierarchical authority and other barriers to personal freedom were removed.  This person says that the way for him to find happiness is to be an individual.  No one can tell him what is right or wrong. “I’m going to live as I want to live and find true happiness that way.”  They believe that everything will be just fine if everyone could just do their own thing and have everyone else leave them alone.
Tim Keller gives an example of the clash between conformity and individual freedom from the movie “Witness” where a young Amish woman, Rachel, falls in love with a very non-Amish policeman.  Rachel’s father-in-law Eli warns her that such a relationship is forbidden and that the elders could have her punished.  He then adds that she is acting like a child.  Rachel retorts, “I will be the judge of that!”  Eli responds, “No, they will be the judge of that.  And so will I if you shame me.”  She replies, “You shame yourself” and walks away.
So which approach is right?  The point of Jesus’ parable is that both are equally wrong because both are not taking the relationship with their father seriously.  Both approaches are missing that it all hinges on God and what He is doing.  As we watch the story develop, we will always be looking at what the father is doing.  At this point, he allows both sons to have what they believe is the way to their happiness.  However, as we will see, they will both learn that what they are missing is the father’s love.
There are many older brothers and younger brothers today.  Some want to maintain tradition and obedience through righteous living and legalism.  “I will be a good Christian, pray and read my Bible, never swear and help others.”  “I will be a model Christian citizen and God will be so proud of me and bless me!”
Others want to be free spirits and doing what they want to do.  “I can do whatever I want and it doesn’t matter as long as I’m doing what I want to do.”  “The way to find Christian happiness is through what I want.”  Both find that something is missing in their pursuit of happiness.
Many people move back and forth in their approaches to life.  Some act like they are upright and moral but deep within their heart and in their secret lives they are living an indulgent, immoral life, trying to find happiness that way.  Others act very independent but inwardly long for the structure and comfort that rules and obedience bring.  But in these cases as well, they are missing the true answer.
The answer to our needs is the Father.  The Father, who no matter what our attitude is toward Him, gives us what we need and even far more than what we need.  The Father, who when we rebel or disrespect Him, stands there watching, waiting for us to come to our senses and see Him for who He really is.  The Father, who rejoices and throws a huge celebration when His children come to their sense and realize that His love has never stopped in spite of their actions.
So what do we do?  First let’s realize what our tendency is; which brother and which brother’s sin are we more like?  Are you a believer who wants to make sure that you are always doing everything right?  You make sure that you have your 30 minutes or hour of quiet time or you’re afraid God will be upset or angry with you?  You make sure that you always do whatever is the acceptable “Christian” thing to do?
Or are you a believer who knows you are wandering away, pushing the envelope, trying to get away with things you know are wrong.  You rebel against the church or any kind of authority.  You don’t like or want anyone to tell you what you should or shouldn’t do.
What are your tendencies and be honest with yourself.  Then realize that whatever you are doing is likely focused on yourself and what you want.
Then once you realize that, look at the Father’s steadfast love for you no matter what.  He is watching you working so hard being faithful and waiting for you to realize that’s not it.  He is watching you in your rebellion and your independence, waiting as well for you to realize that isn’t it either.
What He is waiting for is for you to look to Him.  He is waiting for you to realize that no matter what you do, His love for you is there regardless.  Whether you have left and have returned, or whether you have been so busy working, the fact is that when He wants to have a party with us.  At the end of the story, it’s not about either of the son’s behavior; it’s about the father’s response.
Robert Farrar Capon writes, “You’re worried about permissiveness- about the way the preaching of grace seems to say it’s okay to do all kinds of terrible things as long as you just walk in afterward and take the free gift of God’s … While you and I may be worried about seeming to give permission, Jesus apparently wasn’t. He wasn’t afraid of giving the prodigal son a kiss instead of a lecture, a party instead of probation; and he proved that by bringing in the elder brother at the end of the story and having him raise pretty much the same objections you do. He’s angry about the party.  He complains that his father is lowering standards and ignoring virtue-that music, dancing, and a fattened calf are, in effect, just so many permissions to break the law.  And to that, Jesus has the father say only one thing: “Cut that out! We’re not playing good boys and bad boys any more. Your brother was dead and he’s alive again. The name of the game from now on is resurrection, not bookkeeping.”
Our lives as Christians are about now about resurrection and living in that freedom and God’s grace for us.