You've made it, week number three,
the last sermon in our sermon series, you are,
and maybe you're here and you say,
you are not Pastor Josh.
And that is correct.
My name is Caleb.
I'm one of the teaching pastors here,
and I love to be able to share with our church family,
teach, matter of fact, every Sunday night
is normally my time to teach, and I teach students,
middle school, high school students.
We gather here in our youth ministry called the Ascent.
It's actually a pretty cool thing to see.
We take out about half the rows in the back,
we stack the chairs, push them to the side,
and we turn this auditorium into a student center,
and we bring all the students in and just have a good time.
We're actually in the middle of a series
with our students called Reasonable Doubts.
What to do when your faith looks less like faith
and more like doubt, you know?
We've all walked through that time.
Matter of fact, tonight is a special service for our teens.
We're bringing in a pastor, speaker, and Christian apologist.
His name is Nate Sala.
Nate grew up in church,
and then walked away from the church for a little while.
Didn't feel like he had a compelling reason.
We're seeing a lot of young people do that,
and he said nobody could answer my why questions.
Now this is what he does for a living.
He's a Christian apologist.
So if you're a student and I haven't met you yet,
we haven't had a chance to hang out, I would love.
You're invited, open invitation.
Come on out tonight right here.
The Ascent starts 6 p.m., we'll be done by 8 p.m.,
and then of course, next week,
you already heard about Grad Night.
We wanna celebrate you.
If you're graduating this year, congratulations.
We're excited for you.
This morning is the third and final series in our
You Are series, and this morning is an awesome one.
We've been walking through the 15th chapter of Luke,
so the text that we arrive at today
is the story of the prodigal son.
We've walked through the story of the lost sheep.
We've walked through the story of the lost coin,
and today we arrive at the third and most well-known
of this chapter.
Matter of fact, if you ask someone,
what is the 15th chapter of Luke?
If they know, if they're a student of scriptures,
they'd say, man, that's the story of the prodigal son.
It's not only a famous Bible story,
it's actually a famous piece of literature as well.
It's known across the literary community,
Anna Jenneken from Johns Hopkins University,
writes that Luke 15, 11 through 32,
presents the well-known parable of the prodigal son,
a story of opposites, arrogance and humility,
a fall into sin and then redemption,
betrayal and forgiveness, poverty and wealth,
as well as waywardness and homecoming.
She writes nearly two millennia have passed
since the parable was spoken, retold and then recorded,
yet it captures the imagination
and offers multiple lessons from various perspectives
and interpretations.
This morning, as we dive into this famous well-known story,
the reality is we can't fully unpack
all of the historical significance and unique perspective
and possible applications that Jesus offers us here.
However, we can strategically ask ourselves the question
we've been asking for the last couple of weeks.
Who am I in this story?
Better yet, who is Jesus saying you are?
Who is Jesus saying I am?
Let's read it together, Luke 15,
we'll work our way through the text,
it's a beautiful passage of scripture
with a poetic nature to it.
Luke 15, verse 11, the Bible says,
then he said, 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
and not many days after the younger son gathered altogether,
journeyed to a far country and there wasted his possessions
with prodigal living.
But when he had spent all,
there arose a severe famine in that land
and he began to be in want.
Then he went and joined himself
to a citizen of that country
and he sent him into his fields to feed swine
and he would gladly have filled his stomach
with the pods of the swine ate
and no one gave him anything.
But when he came to himself,
he said, how many of my father's hired servants
have bred enough and despair
and I perish with hunger, I will arise
and go to my father and we'll say to him,
Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you
and I am no longer worthy to be called your son.
Make me like one of your hired servants
and he arose and came to his father.
But when he was still a great way off,
his father saw him and had compassion
and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him
and the son said to the father, Father,
I have sinned against heaven and in your sight
and I'm no longer worthy to be called your son.
But the father said to his servants,
bring out the best robe and put it on him
and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet
and bring the fatted calf here and kill it
and let us eat and be merry.
For this my son was dead and is alive again.
He was lost in his found and they began to be merry.
Now his older son was in the field
and as he came and drew near to the house,
he heard music and dancing.
So he called one of the servants
and asked what these things meant and he said to him,
your brother has come and because he has received him safe
and sound, your father has killed the fatted calf.
But he was angry and would not go in.
Therefore his father came out and pleaded with him.
So he answered and said to his father,
Lowe, these many years I've been serving you,
I've never transgressed your commandment at any time.
And yet you never gave me a young goat
that I might make merry with my friends.
But as soon as this son of yours was come
who has devoured your livelihood with harlots,
you killed the fatted calf for him.
And he said to him, son, you are always with me.
And all that I have is yours.
It was right that we should make merry and be glad
for your brother was dead and is alive again
and was lost in his found.
What a beautiful poetic, incredible story
that I wanted to take the time to read
and let the scripture capture your heart again.
Today I want you to see this passage for what it is,
a story with far reaching implications
that Jesus told to a very diverse, multicultural
and multi-ethnic group that was struggling
with religious issues and an oppressive religious system
and behind each worldview of each person
that was represented in the crowd
that Jesus was talking to,
stood earnest individuals who were searching
for connection to God and true fulfillment in life.
Today I don't know what you're struggling with
or what your experience with the religious world has been.
Maybe you grew up in church and there's nothing but fond
memories of church for you and you look back on it fondly.
Maybe you're here today and you can sympathize
with those who have experienced the oppression
of rigid religious systems.
Sometimes in order to discover the truth at work
in our own hearts, it's necessary to look into the mirror
of someone else's story.
The mastery of this story is that Jesus is introducing
to his listeners a cast of characters
that were undeniably recognizable to them.
The crowd that Jesus was talking to knew
where they fit into this story.
The potency of this parable is that we too,
either will have or perhaps have had already
the opportunity to play these characters in our own life.
As we walk throughout this passage,
we'll look at each person and ask this question,
who is Jesus saying these individuals are?
The first character, the first person that we see this question
asked to that we can apply it to
is in the beginning of verse 12, the Bible says,
and he said to him, a certain man of two sons,
and the younger of them said to his father,
Father, give me.
The first person we see is the younger son
who is lost in sin.
Who is the younger son that Jesus is portraying
and telling the story of?
It's the younger son lost in sin.
The reality is it's difficult for us to imagine
the magnitude of the story that Jesus is telling
for a couple of reasons.
First, it's a really poetic, it's a nice flowing story,
and the probability that you've heard the story before
is pretty high.
But the most major reason, the second reason
that we struggle to understand all of the implications
of the story is because we are 21st century Westerners,
at best 21st century Christians,
who are reading a story that was given
to first century Jewish, cultural,
either immigrants or Jews,
those born into the Jewish culture.
And as Jesus tells the story,
the crowd is very aware of what he's saying,
but sometimes we miss it.
First, we need to realize the audacity of the younger son.
He goes to the father and says,
give me the portion of goods that falls to me.
The reality is this was not his portion
and none of the wealth belonged to the younger son yet.
All of the wealth was owned by the father.
Secondly, in Deuteronomy,
we see specifically, if you wanna look it up,
Deuteronomy 2117, we see that the younger son's share
was a one third portion.
The law taught that the first born got a double portion
and then every child after that got an equal portion.
So with two sons, the younger son got a one third
and the older son got a two thirds portion.
The problem is the father doesn't have his wealth
stored in the bank or a safety deposit box.
In this time and culture, the wealth of the father
is in land and livestock.
So as the son goes to his father and says,
give me the portion that falls to me,
the father now has to make a choice of will he scramble
and short sell a lot of his stock
or a lot of his livestock and a lot of his lands
that he's gathered, the wealth that he's amassed,
will he short sell it, take the loss
to equal the one third portion
that the younger son was asking for.
During that time, people also held family honor
in high esteem.
Every son was expected to honor his father
and respectively carry his name.
On top of the personal detriment to the wealth of the father,
the son was also dragging the name of the father
through the mud in that culture.
The father's name was now tarnished
as the son went out from the family
and rejected the cultural mandate
that was placed upon him.
What the youngest son did would be unthinkable
in the eyes of the Jews.
When he cashed in his share,
he destroyed one third of his father's profits
for his own selfish gain.
Even worse, there was a rejection of the father.
It was also a rejection of the entire family lineage
and its generational care of the inheritance.
Exodus 20, 12 clearly teaches us that
he was breaking the third commandment
in dishonorings his father and going his own way.
Culturally, as Jesus tells this story,
there's a quietness among the crowd
because everybody knew what this younger son was saying.
And then, not many days after, Luke 15, 13 says,
the younger son gathered it all together.
Notice how it took time for the father to sell
and make all this happen.
The younger son gathers it together,
goes to a far country,
and there wastes his possessions with prodigal living.
Let me tell you something about sin.
Sin is always selfish and sin always stains.
There is always a residue left over
when we choose our own way,
when we choose our own selfishness,
and when we go our own way,
and eventually he ends caring for the pigs,
which was an ultimate sacrilegious defilement.
To the Jewish listener,
there was little to no hope for redemption in this story.
The son would have become
the most defiled human being imaginable.
And once sin produces selfishness,
and once sin produces stain,
we see that sin always ends in shame.
Now the son has wasted everything,
hangs his head in shame,
and the Bible says, and no one would give to him.
It's like he went to a far country,
made some friends,
made some bad deals,
fell on hard times,
and his friends helped him out.
No, no, no.
He was so selfish that even in the far country,
he gained no friend.
Rich Volodius, a pastor, says this about the sin,
and specifically the topic of sin in the Bible.
He says, one of the reasons it's important
to have a robust theology of sin
is to help us live beyond self-deception.
Too often we see our sins as small
and the sins of others as egregious,
but as Jesus told this story,
there was no question whether or not
the younger son was shaming his father.
What lesson can we learn from the example
of the younger son?
Simply, spending your life away from the father
isn't freedom, it's actually bondage.
The younger son thought,
if I get out of the presence
and the power of the father,
I'll be free to do whatever I want.
And little did he know that he was enslaving himself
to his own self-indulgence.
When the chains of the younger son's sins finally bind him,
he realizes that what he's been looking for this whole time
is actually in the presence of the father,
not absent from it.
He comes to himself and devises a plan
to work his way back into his father's good graces,
but little does he know what awaits him upon his return.
Here is where Jesus introduces to us
the second character of our story,
where the return of the son is not greeted with judgment,
but instead with the joy of the father.
If the son is lost in sin,
we see that the father is love in action.
Watch at the return of the son.
The Bible shows that he arose and came to his father,
but when he was still a great way off,
his father saw him and had compassion
and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him.
I remember as a child hearing an old preacher teach
on this passage and say,
I wonder how many times the father came to that spot
on the property that looked down the road
off of his property where the younger son had left from
and the father came to that spot and stood there
and looked at the horizon and hoped
that his son would come back home, but not that day.
And then one day, the father goes to the spot
on the property and looks at the horizon
where a small dust cloud is starting to rise
and sure enough, he peers into it and it's getting bigger
and all of a sudden he can make out the figure
of an individual and he says, yes, I think that's him.
I think that's my son that was gone
and the father against all cultural awareness
picks up his robes and runs down the road
to meet his younger son who's returning home.
Watch this, maybe you're here this morning,
you say, I don't even know the way back to God.
That's okay, just start and God will meet you in the middle.
God will find his way to you.
Listen, he wants you to come home.
If the lesson we can learn from the younger son
is that spending your life away from the father
isn't freedom, it's actually bondage.
The truth we can learn from the father is this,
you may feel a great way off from home this morning,
but know that the father sees you only with compassion.
God's love looks through the earth to and fro
to find sons and daughters who are willing to come home.
I love how the NLT puts this verse 15, Luke 15, 20.
So we returned home to his father
and while he was still a long way off,
his father saw him coming filled with love and compassion.
He ran to his son, embraced him and kissed him.
Philips Cragendine, a group of pastors in a musical group,
re-recorded a song entitled When He Ran,
and they say, and then he ran to me.
He took me in his arms, held my head to his chest
and said, my sons come home again, lifted my face,
wiped the tears from my eyes with forgiveness in his voice.
He said, son, do you know I still love you?
He caught me by surprise and he brought me to my knees
when God ran to me.
Again, the historical significance cannot be lost on us.
First, for a man of wealth and stature,
this was not the status quo.
He was in no need to hurry anywhere.
He was of a position of significance
where he did not run to the world, the world ran to him.
The father had the full cultural rights
to wait for the son to come to him.
He had the full cultural rights to allow the son to grovel
and beg for redemption and restoration
and then to cast the son from his presence
and say, I don't know you, you're no son of mine,
but he doesn't do it.
Next, we see culturally, the father doesn't even question
the motivations of the son.
See, sometimes it's really easy to see this passage
and think, oh, but I know the application,
but I know the story and we miss the incredible truth
in this passage that as the father sees the son,
he doesn't even think, do you mean it this time?
Are you sure?
No, the father runs to him, embraces him,
welcomes him home.
He doesn't question his motivations.
There's no rehearsed speech that can be uttered.
It reminds me of 1 Corinthians 13
where it says love suffers long and is kind.
Does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth.
Bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails.
We can learn this truth.
Perhaps God is more concerned with our return to his love
than with the fact that we left it in the first place.
Friend, hear the word of the Lord this morning.
1 Timothy 2, 3 says, God, our savior, verse four,
who desires all men to be saved
and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
2 Peter 3, 9, the Lord is not slack
concerning his promise as some count slackness,
but is long suffering toward us,
not willing that any should perish,
but that all should come to repentance.
The Father loves it when a son comes home.
Couple of weeks ago, I guess a month ago now,
time just flies.
It's almost summer.
It's supposed to be 98 degrees today.
What's happening?
I guess a month ago now, yeah, we're ready for it.
Pull weather, bring it on.
You know, we live in Las Vegas, all right.
So, about a month ago, the Sunday before Easter,
April 2nd, Palm Sunday, we had a baptism service
for 28 people across three services, got baptized.
It was absolutely incredible.
Isn't that just awesome?
Pastor meets with most of the people
because he needs sermon illustrations.
I'm just kidding.
He does it because he has a heart.
He has a heart to meet with people.
And so, I met with one, her name is Raluca,
and she'll probably be here this morning
either the 10 or 1130s of Raluca, you're here, hi.
And we met at a Starbucks and we talked through it,
and Raluca's journey is incredible.
She grew up in Romania, was born Romanian family,
Romanian born, and her grandfather was a seventh day
at Venice, had an old black Bible that he would read
every morning and pray and read through it.
And Raluca's journey through faith was incredible.
We sat down at that Starbucks and she had come to the states
and immigrated here, and then now she lives here
in Las Vegas, and she wrote these words
as we walk through that incredible process of baptism.
She said this, as a little girl,
I've been brought up in the tenets of the Old Testament
bearing creed to my grandparents' Adventist faith.
My religious story is one of connection,
loss, and reconnection to God,
of praying to Jesus for salvation
since I made America my new home in 2007.
I've been coming to Southern Hills
for a little under two years now,
and it's the church which places my heart at home.
God's presence is to be celebrated within his home,
that is Southern Hills church,
and I have humbly asked Jesus, my savior,
to accept my soul in salvation.
She said, as she moved here and was looking for a church,
she tried a few, and she said,
I was looking for a church where I knew my grandfather,
even though he's not alive anymore,
he could look down and see me,
and he would be thankful that I was in a Bible teaching,
a Bible teaching, a Bible teaching,
and a truth teaching church,
and she said, I came into Southern Hills,
and she said, I immediately knew
this is where my grandfather would go.
And I thought, man, what a testimony.
She got baptized on Sunday, April 2nd, Palm Sunday,
and now she attends here faithfully with her son.
I thought, what a testimony, but not just of her story.
What a testimony of the love of a father
that chased her, not just in Romania,
but followed her as she migrated here to America,
and then here to Las Vegas, then here to this community,
and then in here to this church,
the love of the father that continued to pursue her.
What a truth.
May you know this morning that God's love
is in pursuit of you.
Now, this is where the story that Jesus is telling
is different from the first two.
If it were to mirror the first two in literary style,
it would end here.
The lost sheep was found by the shepherd, the lost coin
was found by the woman, and now the lost son
has been restored to the father.
But Jesus has a deeper lesson to teach the crowd.
Jesus continues to tell the story,
and while the father is celebrating the son who has returned,
we see the next character is the third character,
the elder brother, who is lost in self-righteousness.
Luke 15, 25 says, now his older son was in the field,
and as he came and drew near to the house,
he heard music and dancing, so he called one of the servants.
He finds out what's happening in verse 28,
but he was angry and would not go in
and look again at the heart of the father.
Therefore, his father came out and pleaded with him.
The word there, plead with him, is actually in the Greek,
pericle, which is the same word we get Holy Spirit from.
It means that he came out and advocated for him,
said, come back in to my fellowship,
come back in to the family.
Now, before we dive too deeply into the meaning
of this interaction and why it matters,
you need to understand, again, a few cultural things.
I've sat in different rooms and been very aware
of different perspectives on the older brother.
It's easy to look at him and be like, yeah, but he stayed,
yeah, but at least he was faithful,
and at least he was, he didn't waste his substance
with harlots as he points out.
At least he was moral in his living.
What could really be wrong with it?
You've got to understand why the older brother was upset.
The first reality you have to understand is,
when the younger brother went out,
he spent his one third inheritance that the father gave him.
He went out and wasted it, it was gone.
When the father welcomes the younger son back into the family,
the younger son is now eligible to receive his portion
from the riches from the inheritance that is left.
The elder son knows this and is realizing
he's watched firsthand at how much the younger son
has cost the father.
Secondly, you could at least argue that the livestock
that was short sold in order for the younger son to go
live out his, you know, wild youth,
the wealth of the land and livestock that was short sold,
it could have matured and could have increased
the wealth of the father and the wealth of the family
even more significantly.
The second, according to Jewish custom,
is that as he reinstates him back into the will,
the younger brother is eligible and entitled
to the inheritance once again.
What was really frustrating, the older brother,
in his book, Timothy Keller writes,
in his book, Prodigal God, which I'd highly recommend
to anyone who wants to study this specific passage
in more depth, he gives two quick illustrations
to help us peel back the layers of the elder brother's heart.
What is happening in the elder brother's heart?
The first story he gives is about a gardener
who grew an enormous carrot over in England,
the like of which he had never seen before.
He decided as a true and honest citizen
that the carrot was fit for a king.
So he made his way to the palace
and presented the carrot to the king.
Upon presenting it, the gardener said,
oh king, this is the greatest carrot
I have ever grown or ever will grow,
and therefore I would like to give it to you
as a token of my respect and love.
The king was touched and discerned the man's heart.
The gardener went to leave and the king said,
I have a plot of land right beside yours.
I can see that you are good and an honest steward.
I would like to gift you this piece of land
so that you can be a good steward of both yours
and now your new piece of land.
The gardener was amazed and delighted
and went home rejoicing.
Nearby a nobleman had observed the whole thing.
My, he thought, if that is what you get for a carrot,
what if you gave the king something better?
The next day the nobleman brought a beautiful stallion
before the king, my Lord, he said, I breed horses.
And this is the greatest horse I have ever bred
or ever will, therefore I'd like to give it to you
as a token of my respect and love.
But the king, discerning his heart,
accepted the gift and dismissed the nobleman.
The nobleman was perplexed.
And so the king said, let me explain.
The gardener was giving me the carrot,
but you were giving yourself the horse.
The reality is oftentimes in life,
it's not so much where we're at as it is why we're there.
Jesus is teaching a specific crowd this story.
And in case you forget, the crowd that he's teaching,
if you look at the passage, the very first part of Luke 15,
25, it says that the tax collectors and sinners gathered around,
crowded around to hear Jesus.
And the scribes in the Pharisees said,
this man allows and has company and community with sinners.
They had a problem, they had an issue
with who Jesus allowed to come to him.
Jesus has now very clearly illustrated the younger brother,
sinners who have left the presence of the father
and the father is now willing for them to be restored.
Jesus is now illustrating the self-righteousness
of the elder brother.
As he teaches this truth to the crowd,
as he illustrates it to the crowd,
the Pharisees knew exactly what he was saying.
The truth that we can learn from the older brother is this,
while the younger brother left the relationship
to spend the inheritance,
the older brother stayed for the inheritance
and not the relationship.
It matters why you do what you do.
And Jesus was teaching the Pharisees who were standing back
in their pride and their arrogance,
saying, no, we won't allow sinners and tax collectors
to come into our religious system.
And Jesus was saying, you have no idea how arrogant and prideful,
how farisac was the word we now use to describe them,
that you're actually being.
He was saying, why you do what you do matters.
The third character in the story that I see is the elder brother
who is lost in self-righteousness.
I think sometimes we're confused on this parable for this reason.
The story of the prodigal son is most often told
in the father's house.
And in the father's house, prodigal sons often leave,
but elder sons often stay.
I'm afraid that as a church, oftentimes we miss the truth
that Jesus is saying, because I, me, as I read this passage,
I can sit in the seat of the elder brother and say,
look how faithful I've been, look how I've stayed,
at least I haven't done that.
And Jesus here is rebuking the self-righteousness of their heart.
But there's a fourth and final character.
The fourth and final character in this story is missing.
We see the younger son and the older brother,
and we see the father, but the fourth and final character
is missing and it's on purpose.
We could say that the fourth and final character
in the story is you.
The fourth point is you are invited,
and here's how we deduce that.
Scholars tell us that the biblical writing
of the story is actually a poem.
This type of writing has eight stanzas, or strophes,
with a parallel matching eight stanzas.
Remarkably, the second half of Jesus' story ends,
not with eight, but with seven stanzas.
Let me illustrate it for you.
If you look at the passage Luke 15, 24, it says this.
For this my son was dead and is alive again.
He was lost and is found,
and here's the response to that teaching.
And they began to be merry.
But when we get to the elder brother, look at verse 32,
for your brother was dead and is alive,
was lost and is found, and that's the end.
There's no response in the way Jesus was teaching.
It's he was lost and is found, and they began to be merry.
And then the elder brother, he was lost and is found,
and you can imagine just a blank space there.
Why?
This is the way the rabbis would teach.
They would teach in eight stanzas,
and then if they wanted to have an accompanying thought,
they could teach another eight stanzas,
or they could teach eight and then seven.
And the implication was you have to answer the question
for yourself.
Every person in the crowd, specifically Pharisees and scribes,
knew the rabbinical style that Jesus was using,
and they knew that Jesus was not teaching them a story
as much as he was asking them a question.
If you are standing outside of the Father's love
in your own self-righteousness,
or in your own habit, and hang up, and addiction,
if you're standing outside, you must answer for yourself,
will you step back into the Father's presence?
Jesus was inviting the elder brother, not just in the story,
but in the room to step back into the presence of the Father.
They knew they had to write their own ending.
Would they humble themselves and step into the feast,
or would they remain pride-filled, arrogant,
and outside the ministry of Jesus?
But there's a second missing element.
Jesus told three stories.
In the first story, the parable of the lost sheep,
the shepherd went to find the sheep.
In the second story, the parable of the lost coin,
the woman searched diligently to find the coin
until she found it.
But in the third story, the younger son left for the far country,
and nobody went after him.
In the first two, someone goes out
and searches diligently for what was lost.
So by the third story,
one would expect someone to go out and search for the lost son,
however no one does.
It is startling in the Jewish culture as Jesus teaches,
and Jesus meant it to be that way.
The reason is Jesus knew the Bible thoroughly.
John even says, in the beginning was the word,
and the word was with God, and the word was God.
John introduces us to Jesus as the word of God.
Jesus knew the Bible thoroughly.
And so when he began to teach the Pharisees
and the scribes in that moment,
Jesus starts the story by saying,
a certain man had two sons.
Every student of the Old Testament knew
there were parallel stories in the Old Testament
where a certain man had two sons.
The very first story where a certain man had two sons
was a story of Cain and Abel.
In the story of Cain and Abel,
God looks at Cain and says,
where is your brother?
The Pharisees knew that what Jesus was saying
was in the story, when the younger brother goes out,
the elder brother should go out
and search for the younger brother
and bring him back into the house of the father,
but he doesn't do it.
It makes our heart ache.
It makes our heart yearn for a true elder brother.
And this is the point Jesus was making,
because friend, you and I have a true elder brother,
and his name is Jesus.
While we were afar off, Jesus came out after us
and searched for us at great cost to himself.
He paid for our sin penalty.
He paid the price, not a finite amount of money,
but the greatest cost of all, his own life.
Our true elder brother paid our debt
and brought us back into the family.
Jesus on the cross was stripped naked of his robe
and dignity so that we could be clothed
with the robe of righteousness that we do not deserve.
And the dignity of sonship and being admitted back
into the family on the cross, Jesus was treated
as an outcast so that we might be invited into the family.
And then Jesus drank the eternal cup of God's justice
so that we might have the cup of the Father's joy.
Friend, Jesus taught this story to help us realize
we need an elder brother.
We need someone who would come searching after us.
This morning, may we be moved by the sight
of what it cost to bring us home.
We've all played the role of the younger brother
who have left in our own sin, ended up in our own shame,
and God still comes after us.
So this morning, we're gonna end it a little bit differently.
Often, we're given the truth of God's word
and then sent out to carry that truth with us
to a world that needs it.
Today, we've observed a truth
and we're being invited into it in a deeper way.
We will observe the Lord's table or this morning,
the Father's table.
We'll be invited to partake and to remember the cost
of bringing us back into the family.
The price that our elder brother paid
so that we could once again come home.
There'll be a music track that is played
and as we do it, rather than having a time
of challenge and charge where we go out
and the truth is laid upon us,
we'll have a time of reflection and introspection.
We'll have a time where you can answer the question
that Jesus is asking all of us today.
Will we step into the Father's feast?
I don't know where you're at.
I don't know if you're the younger brother this morning
and you feel so far off.
After the 830 service, I had a young man come up to me.
He was sitting with one of our other young adults.
His name was Axel and he said,
this is my first time back in church in a long time.
And he said, today all I needed to hear was,
I don't know how to get back to God.
I needed the picture of the Father running to the younger son
to remind me, I just need to start
and God'll meet me where I'm at.
Maybe that's you here this morning.
You just need to remember, God'll meet you where you're at.
Maybe this morning, you're a little bit outside
of the Father's love because you're a little bit upset.
Life hasn't happened the way you expected it to.
I can't take away in that pain.
I can't say that I understand it any more than you do,
but I can say that God invites you into the elder brother.
God runs to the younger brother and God goes out
and pleads with the elder brother.
As the music plays this morning,
we're gonna take a time of that reflection.
I'm gonna pray.
Then I'm gonna give you some instruction.
We're gonna allow you just to come forward
and I would just ask, please be aware.
If someone in front of you is going,
just please be aware of how you're gonna make it back to the seat.
If there's two of you and you wanna send one
to grab both elements, that's fine.
But as a church family, we're gonna take some extra time
to reflect and meditate on the price that the elder brother paid
to bring us back into the family.
I'm gonna pray.
As you take the elements, take them back to your seat,
thank God for the gift that He's given you
of bringing you back in.
Then I'll come back up and as a church family,
we'll take the elements together.
Let's pray, Heavenly Father,
thank you for your goodness and thank you for your grace.
God, thank you for being the Father
that always welcomes us home.
God, thank you for the true elder brother in the story
that he was telling it,
that Jesus, you paid the price that only you could pay.
And God, you welcome us back into the family.
God, my prayer is that your goodness and your grace
would overwhelm us this morning.
As we take time to reflect, meditate,
do some introspection on who you are and what you mean to us,
that our souls would be calmed.
And as the author of Hebrews puts it,
we would once again realize that you are the anchor
for our souls.
Whatever storms may be blowing in our life right now,
God, you will sustain us and see us through.
God will love you and praise you for it.
We ask you things in Jesus' name. Amen.