This ought to be said, and I
want to say it, and I'm afraid I might forget it, so I'll say
it at the outset here. You know, God's controversy with
this world has to do with His Son, the Lord
Jesus Christ. That's the point of contention.
It's not the communist movement, or it's not the saloons, the
liquor traffic, and the atheists, but the controversy that God
has with this world is his Son. That's where it's all at, the
Lord Jesus Christ. This is my beloved Son in whom
I am well pleased. hear ye him." It's not that you
don't have any option, no choice or alternative. He said, hear
ye him. In other words, as the brethren
have said throughout this week, the message is, is bow. Bow to him. Bow to him. This
is my son. Bow to him. And I think, too,
that Some of this was in the mind of the Apostle Paul when
he said, God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our
Lord Jesus Christ. And John answered that. He told us what that meant there
this evening. What does it mean? What does
it mean to you? Think about it a little bit. We banter that
scripture around a good bit. God forbid that I should glory
in the cross, or save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.
What does that mean to you? I'll tell you what I believe
that it meant to the Apostle Paul, and I believe that this
is the right interpretation to it. The Bible says, His own self
bare our sins in his own body on the tree, not in the manger. Not in the garden, not in the wilderness, but on
the tree. Now, what am I saying? I'm saying
this. I'm saying that that is where
God dealt with sin, right there. That's where God dealt with human
sin, human shame, and human guilt. And Paul knew that. Thank God
I know it. That's what God preached to us
here. That's where God dealt with sin, was on that cross.
And I'm so glad that I was here to hear that, so glad. I'm glad
that I was here these last few days and heard these brethren
who did not offer a cheap discipleship. You know what's being offered
in evangelical circles tonight and tomorrow and days to come
through the media, through public speaking, through the television
and newspapers and books and word of mouth, house to house,
is a cheap discipleship. They offer a bargain. They offer
a bargain, and that's exactly what it is. And who wouldn't
take it? This generation is willing to
trade with God. Who wouldn't take Jesus if he's
so little that you could take him, and he couldn't help you
much if you got him? Brother Barnard said this. He said that the gospel that
is preached today And I believe that this generation has been
deceived. But he said that the gospel that
is preached today by this generation, unto this generation, is a gospel
that is so slick that you can swallow it and never know it,
and you can lose it and never miss it, and you can go to hell
and never regret it. Now, that kind of a gospel that
you can lose and never miss it and go to hell and never regret
it is not the kind of gospel that Don preached to us here
this evening. The gospel of our Lord Jesus
Christ of this Bible is a gospel that
will bring men to their knees in complete submission and surrender. And the gospel of the Lord Jesus
Christ, or the gospel that does not bring a man to submission
at the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ, is not the gospel that
God hung his Son on a cross to pay for. No, sir, that's not
it. And I'll tell you this. You'll surrender your sword,
which is a symbol of authority, or God will send you to hell.
You'll bow to him. You'll yield to him. Turn with me this evening for
just a few moments to the fifteenth chapter of the book of Luke. Luke chapter 15. I want to talk
to you for just a little bit in regard to this 20th verse
and use a basis for our talk or remarks here. The last two
words, and we'll make it three words, He kissed him. He kissed him. And try to tell
you what that means to my soul. He kissed him. Now, let me read
here verse 18. It says, I will arise and go
to my Father. This is a very familiar story
to all of us. I will arise and go to my Father,
and will say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven
and before thee. and am no more worthy to be called
thy son. Make me as one of thy hard servants.'
And he arose, and he came to his father. But when he was a
great way off, his father saw him and had compassion and ran
and fell on his neck and kissed him. All right? Before he receives
these kisses of love from his father, he had said while he
was in the far country here, he said in verse 18, I will arise
and go to my father. Well, but he had done more than
that. the Father's kisses would have
never fallen on his cheek. You see, when he said, I will
arise and go to my Father, the resolution or the resolve in
his heart had become a deed, and he arose and he came to his
Father. Now, the determination to return
home is good, but it is when the boy begins the business of
really carrying out his resolution, or his resolve, that he draws
near the blessing. He said in verse 18, I will arise,
I will arise and go to my Father. And in verse 20 it says, And
he arose, and he came to his Father. Let's go on with it now. It says, But when he was a great
way off, his father saw him. Now, I don't
know if the prodigal son saw the father, but one thing I'm
sure of is that the father saw the son. I'm sure of that. That's what Don told us. Well,
you were down under that tree, Nathaniel. I know you was out
there because I saw you out there. Well, I'll tell you this, I don't
know if the prodigal son saw the Father, but I'm sure of this,
that the Father saw him. Someone said that the eyes of
mercy are quicker than the eyes of repentance. The Bible said
the Father ran. The Father certainly is representative
of God Almighty. And this is the only way in the
scriptures that I know of that it indicates an action on the
part of God the Father to the extent that God is so disturbed
and so concerned that He runs. It says that he ran. God ran. He was interested in
this thing. His heart was in it. And when
a man's heart is in something, it'll cause him to do something. It'll cause him to move. He'll
move into action when his heart's into it. If it's just in his
head, it won't go very far. It won't mean much, but if it's
in his heart, and this is important, brethren, it's important for
you to remember here this evening that in the salvation of a sinner,
God's heart is in it. We talk about the love of God
as if it was a calculated thing, that it was something to do with
numbers or ABCs or some mechanical thing, 1, 2, 3, 4. But when God
does something for a sinner, when God saves a sinner, God's
infinite heart, His compassionate heart is in this thing. It's in it. God ran. when he saw his son a grave way
off. It says, the father ran. Ah, brethren, it says, someone
has said, that the eyes of mercy are quicker than the eyes of
repentance, and slow are the steps to repentance, but swift
are the feet to forgiveness. Swift is God Almighty. Swift. The father ran. And what did he do? The father
fell on his neck and he kissed him. Do you know what that means
when it says he kissed him? It means that he kissed him eagerly. It means he kissed him tenderly. It means he kissed him earnestly. It means he kissed him often. And it means he kissed him much. That's what it means. He ran
and he fell on his neck and he kissed him much, God the Father. My soul, he kissed him much. I heard one of the brethren here,
you remember, was it Jack Shanks who said that we ought not ever
to be enticed by the wiles of the devil and the things of this
world. and liberal preaching for us
to come down from our position of truth and defense of it. We ought to remain firm and not
come down. And he said that the world is
eagerly speaking to us as Christians and believers, Come down! Give
this up! Give that up! Come down! And
I thought about that. when Jack was preaching, and
I didn't know that I was to preach then tonight, but I was looking
at this particular portion of Scripture when he said, Come
down. And I thought here, I thought
here, it's just the opposite here. The God of heaven must
come down! God must come down! The Bible
said there in the book of Isaiah that Isaiah saw Him high and
lifted up. Where did you see Him, Isaiah?
I see Him on a throne, high and lifted up in all of His glory,
all of His beauty, all of His splendor. You must come down,
come down, come down where I am in all of my filth and all of
the muck and all of the mire. Come down! God Almighty come
down! My soul, this is something here
that the God of heaven, you get the picture here now. If I don't
say nothing more, this will be sufficient. This will do it right
here. Listen to me now, get the picture.
God Almighty on a throne, coming down on the neck of a sinner.
What do you think of that? Almighty God! God! Why, we ought not to even mention
His name without worship. There's nothing worth talking
about. Then God Almighty, in His glory,
in His honor, in His love, and God come down, come down and
fell on the neck of a sinner. He ran. He looked out. He saw. And He came, and He ran,
and He fell on that poor sinner's neck. He fell on his neck. God
falling on a poor sinner's neck. I'm telling you now, when we're
talking about the love of God and the compassionate heart of
God Almighty, we're not talking in numbers here. We're talking
that He felt it. God's heart. God's heart. Well,
He's not a man, but I like to say that God's heart began to
leap inside of Him when He looked off there. And he seen that sinner
come. Was it Henry that said today
that Armas couldn't stop him? Armas couldn't stop him. All
the power in heaven and earth combined and multiplied couldn't
stop him, but one poor sinner. One poor sinner by the wayside
begging. One poor sinner. He said, Who
is it that's coming? They said, One Jesus is coming.
And he began to cry out. Thou Son of David, Thou Son of
David, have mercy upon me!" And the Lord Jesus Christ stopped! That staggers me every time I
think of it. Oh, He stopped! God stopped! He didn't have to
stop. He could have sent us all to
hell. You talk about the love of God, my soul falling on the
neck of a sinner. not just fallin' there and holdin'
on, but kissin' ya, not one time, but kissin' ya as much, smotherin'
ya with kissin's. My soul, can you imagine that
God of Heaven on the neck of a Drew Garner was telling us this
morning what God's like. I remember that, Drew. Drew said,
if you want to know what God's like, He said, like His Son. He said, you see God in the face
of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of Him. This is what God's
like right here. This is what He's like. If He's not like that,
I'd better get out of this business. I'd better quit. If you can prove
to me that God's not like this, I'll give her up. You can prove
it. You're going to have to take
something else aside from the Bible to prove it to me, though, I'll
tell you that. You're going to have to get some other scheme,
because this is what God's like right here. He's willing. He's willing. It's you that's
unwilling. He's willing. It's you. Yeah, it's you won't. You're going to resolve in your
heart. In a crowd like this, there's
some here. There's some here. You may not be as far off as
this fellow was. You may not be in the muck and
the mire to the degree that this fellow was in the pen, in the
pig pen, but I'll tell you this, if you're a member of the human
race, you've been down there. You've been down there if you're
a member. Right, Herman? You've been down
there. You've been down there. You may not have got as deep
as he did, but you've been down there. Maybe you'd better start
making a resolve right now. Maybe you better say, I'm going
to rise and come to my... The invitation has been given
since Don started to preach and the brethren started to sing.
The invitation has been given. You need to resolve in your heart
where you're at right now. I will rise. I've come to the
end of myself. I'm helpless. I'm hopeless. I'm
mired down in self and in sin, and I'm a rebel against God. Oh, I'm sorry I hate all of this. I resolve. I resolve right now.
Right now I resolve." But yet you say, Well, I can't. I can't. Well, I'm blind. I can't see.
Well, you come. He'll give you sight. You come. You come, just like you are.
Don't wait until you can see. No need to come in that order,
Henry. Well, I can't see. Well, listen, there's no need
coming. If you can see, just resolve,
I will arise and go to my Father. All right. It says, "...he arose
and came to his father. But when he was a great way off,
his father saw him." His father saw him. I tell you now, there's
a whole lot in that word, saw. His father saw him. First he
saw who he was. That's the first thing. He saw
who he was. My sheep, they hear my voice
and they follow me, and I know them. I know their names. He
knew who he was, and he saw where he had come from. He'd come from
a far country. It says down there somewhere,
that says, and not many days after that, that the younger
son gathered all together and took his journey into a far country. And I said that the father saw
here, he saw where he had come from, it had been a far country,
a far country. And you who sometimes were afar
off in a far country have been brought nigh and made nigh by
the blood of the Lord Jesus. Someone asked me one time, they
said, Well, how far off? Can a man go? Well, I really
don't know. Now, you take a fellow that's
a drunkard, just an old, downright drunkard. He just can't stay
away from it, and just abuses himself, his family, his neighbors,
and everybody else. Now, he's far off. He's far off
from God, isn't he? You take a fellow that's a thief,
he's far off from God, and he gets worn down the line. They're
far off from God! You take a self-anxious man,
he's farther off than they are. But I'll tell you this, brethren.
You want to know how far? They've went so far. Don't make
it any more serious. They went so far, they can't
come back on their own accord. Don't make it any more serious.
Everybody outside of the Lord Jesus Christ. It doesn't make
any difference how far off you are if you're only three feet.
You're so far that you can't come back on your own accord.
You just can't do it. You can't do it. God must send
for you. He must send and say, Fetch him. Fetch Mephibosheth in all his
lameness and bring him to me and set him at my table. Fetch
him. Fetch him. All right, the father
saw. He saw who he was. He saw where
he had come from. He saw him in tattered robes. He saw the filth on his hands
and on his feet. And he saw what he had been. And he saw what he was now. And he saw what he soon would
be. And brethren, and when he saw
this, he had no anger in his heart towards that boy. No, sir. No, sir. If he'd have kicked
him, he'd have got what was coming to him, wouldn't he, John? He said, Father, give me the
portion of good that falls to me, and I know I'm going to get
it when you die. Give it to me now. I've been
here a long time, and I've labored hard. I've done all right for you.
How about giving me that money I got coming to me?" Well, I'll
give it to you. He'd give it to him and says that he squandered
it. He spent all, wasted his substance
with riotous living. If he'd have gotten what he deserved,
his father would have kicked him. He would have kicked him
as hard as he could have kicked him. That's probably what I'd
have done. That's probably what you'd do. My soul, we ought to
have the Spirit of our God. We preach sometimes like we're
mad at sinners, don't we? We preach like we're mad at them
rather than love them. We ought to be compassionate
and concerned and have a big heart for sinners. Christ died
for them. Well, he didn't look upon that
boy through icy eyes or a cold heart. No, sir. But the Bible
says his father saw him, and he had compassion. And I looked
that word compassion up, and it means that he felt for him. That's what it means. It says he saw him a great way
off, And he had compassion. He felt for him. He felt for
him. His heart went out to him. He felt for him. My soul, he
had nothing but pity for that poor boy. It was the state that
he was in, poverty stricken, pale face. them rags tattered
and torn, come a long ways off, struggling, had his head between
his legs. He had already said, My soul,
if I can get up there, he said, I won't even, I won't even ask
to be received as son. He said, I'll just be like a
hard servant. Here it comes, slipping in, slipping in. And
brethren, when he seen him, when he seen him and had compassion
upon him and seen the state that he was in, this touched the quick
of the Father's heart." Now, what did he do? He kissed him. He kissed him much. He kissed
him eagerly. He kissed him tenderly. He smothered
him with kisses. Let me tell you now, Quinn, what
this kissing means. It means much love truly felt. That's what it means. When the
father kissed his wayward son who arose and came back to his
father, it was much love truly felt for God. Now listen to me. For God never gives an expression
of love without feeling it in his infinite compassionate heart. He never does. That staggers
me. Oh, did God ever kiss you? Did
God ever kiss you? If He did, He meant it. He wasn't
fooling around. He wasn't fooling around. He
meant it if He ever kissed you. Listen, there's no hypocrisy
with God. There is with you and me, a whole
lot of it. Remember I told you about old
Brother Coal Iron down there in Tennessee, North Carolina? I said, Brother Coal Iron, I
said, once you come to see what I've seen, it'll take the brag
and boast out of you. He said, not all of it, not all
of it. That's right, isn't it, huh?
Hypocrisy, no hypocrisy with God, none with God. Listen, he never kisses those
for whom he has no love. Never does. He kisses those that
he loves, and when he kisses them, this love is creeped out,
and he does so out of a compassionate heart. He'll never give a Judas
kiss and betray whom he embraces. He won't do that. There's no
way for me in my limited ability and talent to be able to attempt
in any way to measure the love of God towards poor, helpless,
hopeless sinners. I can't do it. But the Bible
does say that he loved us from before the foundation of the
world. What more can I say? That says
it all, doesn't it? Well, I'll tell you. It means,
secondly, much love understood. Much love understood. First it
means much love truly felt. Now it means much love understood. When his father kissed him, When
his father kissed him, this poor prodigal, this poor boy knew,
if never before, that his father loved him. And there's no doubt
about it. He had a clear perception of
it when his father kissed him. He may have doubted before, but
now his father began to smother him with kisses. mother, earnestly,
sincerely, not one time, but again he pressed his lips upon
the cheek of that wayward boy. Maybe he pressed his lips upon
his lips! Oh, it was clearly felt, Brantley.
Oh, it means much forgiveness. It means your sins are gone.
Thank God for the Lord Jesus Christ who stood in our stead,
place, and room. He who knew no sin but became
sin in our behalf that we might become the righteousness of God
in Him. We are made accepted in the beloved
by and through the meritorious sacrifice, that vicarious sacrifice
that the Lord Jesus Christ made on the cross. God himself provided
himself a lamb. And it's only by and through
the Lord Jesus Christ that God can be just and justify a sinner. God cannot justify a sinner at
the expense of his justice. He can't do it. He cannot look
over. He cannot bypass his justice. Justice must be satisfied. Justice must be satisfied. The Lord Jesus Christ stood in
our stead, place, and room and bore and bore the poor brunt
of the broken law of God for you, if you're a sinner. If you're
a sinner, a poor, hopeless, helpless sinner. He did it for sinners.
Sinners, if you're a sinner, a hopeless sinner, let me tell
you this, the more that you can prove to me that I'm a sinner. I never get offended at the preacher
when he insists upon my sinnerhood. The more he can prove to me that
I'm a sinner, the more he establishes my right and title to the Lord
Jesus Christ, who died for sinners. He died for sinners. You can't—why? You—I know, I've done this and
that, and you just can't make me mad by telling me. You can
just criticize, and you say this and that. Well, that's right.
That's right. I agree with you. I agree with you. Christ died
for sinners. You ever get beyond that, you've
missed it. You've missed it. It means much
forgiveness. It means that our sins are all
gone. They're all gone. They're all
taken away. It means they're tasked behind
the back of God. It means that they're as far
as the East is from the West, and I'll remember them against
you no more. That's what it means. It means
full restoration. That's what it means. In the
far country, you know, this poor boy, he meant to make requests
like this. He said, Make me one of your
hired servants. But the kiss of sonship there
was owned. And he knew that only a kiss
like this is reserved for a son. Sonship is owned. And I can hear
the father whisper in his ear, and he said, my boy, you're my
boy. You're my boy. You're mine. You're
mine.