1.0 What Does Jesus Want (Luke 15:11-24)?

Luke 15:1-3; 11-24-”1Now the tax collectors and ‘sinners’ were all gathering around to hear him. 2But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, ‘This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.’

3Then Jesus told them this parable:

11 Jesus continued: ”There was a man who had two sons. 12 The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them.13 ”Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. 14 After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. 15 So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. 16 He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.

17 ”When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! 18 I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. 19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.’ 20 So he got up and went to his father.

”But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

21 ”The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’

22 ”But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. 23 Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. 24 For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ So they began to celebrate.”

1.1 Jesus wants us to really know God’s heart.

  1. A) A prodigal son [Prodigal means ”reckless extravagance; lavishly abundant”]
  2. A son who’s wasteful with his father’s goods-his inheritance.
  3. A son who wanders away and discovers the wages of sin and the impact of repentance and restoration.
  4. The missing son is representative of us-sinners-in our waywardness to God.
  5. B) A unique father
  6. His loving heart towards his son is undeniable and exemplary.
  7. A father who patiently waits for his son’s return and restores him back to the family after his public bout with sin.
  8. The father’s heart is representative of God’s heart towards us. It’s forgiving, restorative, accepting, merciful, generous, and celebrative. It’s unique.

The story has three major movements: (1) The son Craves His INDEPENDENCE; (2) He Blows his INHERITANCE; and (3) He Flees Insanity.

2.0 Let’s Explore the Story (Luke 15:11-13).

2.1 He craves His INDEPENDENCE.

Luke 15:11-12-”11 Jesus continued: ”There was a man who had two sons. 12 The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them.”

  1. The son became lost while at home. Life became routine, mechanical, almost scripted.
  2. The allure of the world became overpowering, fascinating, and captivating to him.
  3. The grass began to look greener on the other side.
  4. He craved independence, which started from thoughts like:
  5. ”There is something better that I’m missing.”

”There is more elsewhere that I’m missing out on.”

Timothy Keller writes: The prodigal son may have thought: ”I’m the only one who can decide what is right or wrong for me. I’m going to live as I want to live and find my true self and happiness that way.”

Source: The Prodigal God page 31.

  1. The son’s craving for independence grew.
  2. His attitude and desires towards his father began to change.

The son began to interpret the father’s love as unfulfilling and limiting; and he took it for granted.

The security of the father’s love became confused with limitations.

The provision of the father’s love became confused with entitlement.

His faith was no longer personal. It was his father’s faith. So, it too was rejected.

D) The day came when his craving for independence and self-discovery got the best of him.

Luke 15:12-”12 The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them.”

Culture and Customs:

(1) Asking for his portion of the inheritance was akin to wishing that his father was dead.

(2) Though the prodigal was given ownership, he was not given the right to dispose of his share.

(3) The prodigal pressed his father further into granting him the right of full and immediate dispossession of a portion of the estate.

The Father’s Heart is Seen: i) He doesn’t hold onto his son; ii) He gives his erring son his portion of the inheritance; and, iii) faces the gossip of the community.

2.2 He blows His INHERITANCE (15:13-14).

Luke 15:13-14–13 ”Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. 14 After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need.”

  1. He moves to a distant country.
  2. He moves away from the watchful eye of his father and his family.
  3. He doesn’t want them to cramp his style.

He needed freedom to experiment with the things he had been fantasizing over while at home.

iii. Self-discovery is the road to happiness he mistakenly thought.

  1. A distant country is not measured by distance. It’s measured by how disconnected you are from God.
  2. The distant country is a world where God is forgotten.
  3. A distant country is a world where God is not factored into your thinking, living, or actions.

iii. The distant country is where you get disconnected from your faith. It also proves your faith was never genuine in the first place.

Luke 15:13-14–13 ”Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. 14 After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need.”

He blows his inheritance in wild living; sex with prostitutes, etc. (v. 30).

Sin lures you into dark places because it promises more than it can deliver.

It promises satisfaction but delivers disappointment.

It promises happiness but delivers sadness.

iii. Sin promises pleasure but delivers disgust.

Dr. R. C. Sproul said: ”We want to be saved from our misery, but not from our sin. We want to sin without misery, just as the prodigal son wanted inheritance without the father.”

Kite Story. There’s a story of a kite that was flying and the kite began to talk to itself. The kite said, ”If only I could get rid of this string. If the string wasn’t holding me back then I could really fly. I could go above the clouds and fly as high as I want, up to the heavens. However, it’s the string that’s holding me back. One day he got his wish. The string broke and the kite came crashing down. What the kite did not realize was that the same string that kept it down, kept it up. The Prodigal wanted to cut the string to gain his own independence and like the kite learned an invaluable lesson.

  1. Severe famine hits his country.
  2. He gets a job with a Gentile feeding pigs, which renders him constantly unclean.
  3. He has to ignore his feelings to work with pigs, which creates a numbness of soul.
  4. He’s constantly in a state of shame and self-condemnation having been raised with the knowledge of Scripture about pigs.

Leviticus 11:7-8-”And the pig, though it has a split hoof completely divided, does not chew the cud; it is unclean for you. You must not eat their meat or touch their carcasses; they are unclean to you.”

Luke 15:16-”16 He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.

  1. He’s hungry all the time.
  2. He wants to eat the pods which the pigs ate.
  3. The pods were considered ”a poor man’s food”. They came from the Carob Tree.

iii. The seeds, when eaten, were bitter and without nourishment.

The Father’s Heart is Seen: i) He patiently awaits his son’s return; ii) The father keeps his heart in a pure state, as he does not allow bitterness and anger to find its home in his heart.

2.3 He Flees Insanity (15:17-21)

Luke 15:17-21–17 ”When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! 18 I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you.

19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.’ 20 So he got up and went to his father. ”But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

21 ”The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’

  1. A) His eyes were opened to his insanity.
  2. His poor choices caused him to leave the security of his father’s house, father’s love, and father’s protection.

Charles H. Spurgeon said: ”The prodigal son had played the madman, for sin is madness of the worst kind. He had been demented, he had put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter, darkness for light and light for darkness; he had injured himself….”

  1. His mind reflected on how good he had it back home in his father’s house.
  2. My father’s hired men have more than enough food to spare, he thought.
  3. ”I never starved or needed food when I was living in my father’s house,” he must have thought.
  4.  He then desired to return to his father’s house.
  5. His confession to his father would be: ”I have sinned against heaven [God] and against you.”
  6. He took ownership of his sin.
  7. No one else was to blame. He was going to man up to his insanity brought on by sin.

iii. He was going to repent to his dad!

Repentance is the key to unlock your private prison of shame, guilt, and self-condemnation.

Chrysostom said: ”Repentance is a medicine which destroys sin, a gift bestowed from heaven, an admirable virtue, a grace exceeding the power of laws.”

  1. The moment the boy decided to repent of his sin, the grip of insanity was broken over his life.
  2. He took ownership of his moral responsibility towards God.
  3. He was going home to humbly face his father and ask for forgiveness.

iii. It took a lot of courage to repent. 

Repentance is a game-changer; a defining moment. It allows you to flee insanity.

It took even greater courage to make the journey home.

Luke 15:20-24–20 So he got up and went to his father.

”But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his

son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

21 ”The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’

22 ”But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. 23 Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. 24 For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ So they began to celebrate.”

  1. D) The father is insanely in love with his son.
  2. The father’s compassion for his son caused him public embarrassment by running to meet him. A crowd gathers.

Culture and Customs:

(1) ”It is so very undignified in Eastern eyes for an elderly man to run. Aristotle says, ‘Great men never run in public.”’ Pg. 181 Poet and Peasant

The father’s insane action of love demonstrates how the village ought to accept his son despite his insanity brought on by sin.

Culture and Customs:

(1) ”If a Jewish son lost his inheritance among Gentiles, and then returned home,” writes Williams, ”the community would perform a ceremony, called the kezazah [the cutting off]

They would break a large pot in front of him and yell, ‘You are now cut off from your people!’ The community would totally reject him. ”So, why did the father run? He probably ran in order to get to his son before he entered the village.”

  1. B) The son repents of his sin.
  2. The boy’s act of repentance went beyond contrition and sorrow for sin. It demonstrated an immediate and drastic action of change.

Luke 15:21-”The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.”’

The Need for Forgiveness. During a QandA at the Family Leadership Summit in Ames, Iowa in July 2015, Moderator Frank Luntz asked Donald Trump whether he has ever asked God for forgiveness for his actions.

”I am not sure I have. I just go on and try to do a better job from there. I don’t think so,” he said. ”I think if I do something wrong, I think, I just try and make it right. I don’t bring God into that picture. I don’t.”

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/18/politics/trump-has-never-sought-forgiveness/

There are some who feel the same way as Donald Trump-asking God for forgiveness is not on their radar.

Rom. 3:23-”for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

The son gets it though. He admitted wrong. His repentance signified a reversal of lifestyle and belief towards God and his father.

C) The son sees the full extent of his father’s forgiveness.

The father interrupts his son’s speech, which would have concluded with these words: ”make me like one of your hired men (15:19).”

  1. The father kisses him [on the cheek] to indicate he’s his equal and not a slave. Slaves kissed their master on the hands or the feet.
  2. The father orders the best robe be put on him to signify that his sins have been forgiven and to view him in an honorable manner.
  3. The father puts a ring on his finger to represent his restored trust and authority to his son. He can transact business within the community.
  4. The shoes were an item of luxury and are a sign of being a free man; and he’s not to go about shoeless like slaves.
  5. The father celebrates the return of his son by throwing a party filled with festive music and dancing for the entire village by killing the fatted calf.
  6. The father’s heart of mercy, compassion, and love is seen and experienced by his son. This is the father’s way of saying, ”All is forgiven! WELCOME HOME!
  7. The Bible provides firm answers on salvation and the great forgiveness.
  8. How can we be saved? Three steps:

Respond to God’s initiative.

It was God who gave him the mental clarity to come to his senses.

The father ran towards the son. He took the initiative.

Repent of your sin.

The son said, ”Father, I’ve sinned against heaven and against you.”

Make no excuses. Own it. Man up!

Receive the Father’s forgiveness.

The son received the Father’s full pardon.

The son received the Father’s celebration marking his change and restoration.

Have you experienced God’s great forgiveness?

 If not, you can.

Take these 3 Simply Steps:

(1) Respond to God’s initiative.

(2) Repent of your sin.

(3) Receive the Father’s forgiveness.

When you do, the very next words are:

Welcome Home!

 

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