The Lord may graciously help
me. I'll turn your prayerful attention to the verse that we
had before us this morning from Luke's Gospel, chapter 15. Luke
chapter 15 and verse 2. Luke 15 and verse 2. And the
Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners
and eateth with them. These words spoken against the
Lord Jesus have a glorious truth, that this man, the Lord Jesus
Christ, was one that received sinners. Instead of rejecting
them and despising them, he came to seek and to save that which
is lost. And then he gives a parable which
has three parts to it. We looked at them this morning,
the first part was the hundred sheep and one went astray and
that shepherd found that sheep and brought it back on his shoulders.
And it's focusing there on the work of the shepherd, the work
of God to bring his people back. And then he brought it back and
there was a rejoicing over that lost sheep. And the same with
the lost coin. There was a focus on the fact
that God is seeking the lost coin, as it were, and finding
it and then rejoicing over it. But then we looked more at the
third scene, as it were, in this parable, which is the scene of
a certain man that had those two sons. Two quite different
sons. One, as it were, stayed at home
with his father, helped to run the farm and work in the place
of the father, and the other wanted to go far away and to
leave his father and to spend and waste all the inheritance
that his father had given him. But as in the others, there was
a bringing back, you see, of that which was lost. And this
younger son, who wanted to have his fling in this life, he wanted
the portion of this life, he went away and then he came to
a place of poverty and how that is a picture of how sin always
brings us into want and it will always rob us of that which is
good. Satan, following Satan's dictates
will only bring us to where Satan is and ultimately if we are not
rescued by the grace of God we will go and be with him in a
pit, a fire forever and ever. That is the prospect of following
a life which is in accordance with Satan and his hellish hosts. Well, thankfully we read that
this younger son came to himself and came to realize the foolishness
of his sin and then sought to come back with repentance. So
we have the thoughts of this young man going through these
difficulties and you young people as perhaps you go through things,
the thoughts that was going through his mind and he wasn't aware
as it were that God was working in his heart or as far as he
was concerned it was just his natural logic of the fact that
here I have no food and yet back in the father's house there's
plenty and that drew him to think well should I not go back and
we read you see that the repentance is a gift from God and God gave
this younger son uh... that gift of repentance and so
that son who we read the other parable tonight uh... about those
two sons and one said he would go uh... he would not go into
the vineyard and yet he repented and went and another son that
said he uh... would go and then didn't go which
one actually did it so it's not what we say it's what we actually
end up doing that ultimately uh... has the most important
aspect and this son therefore this younger son ended up by
the end of this account of being united with his father in love. And as he returned to his father,
he found that his father had mercy and love totally beyond
his wildest expectations. He just thought, if only I could
have a place in my father's house. But actually, he had much more
than that. He had a robe put round him so that would cover
all his shame, you see. And we noted how Christ covers
his people with a robe of righteousness so that they are accepted in
the beloved. And yet he has borne the shame
and the ignominy of Calvary. He has borne the shame on that
accursed tree. He hung there naked in the flame
of his father's wrath. so that his people could be clothed
with the robe of righteousness to cover their shame. Was ever
love like this? Behold what manner of love the
Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the
sons of God, to be brought into that family of God whose Father
fills the throne. Well this younger son then returns
to his father, he finds that welcome, he finds that robe,
he finds the ring on his finger, he finds the shoes, and then
there is this celebration, this rejoicing. And the point is,
the same as the other two stories of the sheep and the lost coin,
there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth. This is
what delights the father. It's not a case of, well, there
is this way back, but he's really quite cross with these people
that come back. It's not really a point of rejoicing. No. The
whole emphasis here is the This is a time of rejoicing as a church,
isn't it, when you have one that comes to confess that the Lord
has worked in their heart and shown them the emptiness of a
way of living to self. There's rejoicing, isn't there,
in the church? there's rejoicing that one has the Lord has worked
in this one's heart and brought them back from from far away
perhaps and brought them to love the Savior that they perhaps
have despised earlier on in their lives. Well that is what we had
there so there's rejoicing for this my son was dead and is alive
you see all we by nature in Ephesians it talks about you were by nature
the children of wrath even as others, dead in trespasses and
in sins. Well this son was dead to truly
loving his father or truly serving his father, this one that had
gone far away and yet now had been brought back and there was
rejoicing. But then we come to verse 25
when we look at the elder son. There was two sons, And we look
particularly at the younger son this morning. As the Lord helps,
let us look at the older son. There was two sons. And both,
if you look carefully, I think both of them desperately needed
mercy. They needed the mercy of God.
Now his elder son was in the field and he came and drew nigh
to the house and heard the music and dancing. So no doubt he was
working in his father's fields, doing his father's bidding. And
he called one of his servants and asked what these things meant.
What was the rejoicing about? And he said unto him, thy brother
is come back. So you see, the servant describes
this younger one as his brother. But it's interesting, as you
go through the account, the oldest, the youngest, sorry, the oldest
son never refers to the youngest son as his brother. See, there's
a something, there's something close about a brother, isn't
it? My brother, that's a lovely term. You see, he doesn't talk
to him about his brother. There was this distance between
the two sons. And he said unto him, thy brother
is come, and thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because
he hath received him safe and sound. Safe and sound. So that
is in peace. So that the younger son from
all his wayward ways has come back with repentance. The father
is rejoicing, and the whole idea is that the whole family would
rejoice, isn't it? It's like that, isn't it? In
a family, if you've got some rejoicing going on, but one person
perhaps goes off and is really upset, it can really damage the
rejoicing. And when here, we have this that
we read in verse 28, a very sad verse. And he was angry. This day was something that the
father had been looking for, for perhaps years. looking for
that wayward son to return, looking for this one that had gone away
from him and despised him and ruined his reputation as it were. He was looking forward to that
time when he would come back and now this time had come, this
was a time of rejoicing. But you see this was the time
when the older son was angry. And here, you see, surely Jesus
was pointing the Pharisees and the scribes to see a reflection
of themselves. Here were these publicans and
sinners rejoicing in the grace of Jesus Christ, that they could
be washed and cleansed and come back to God through the way of
the gospel. They could obtain a righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ and so be accepted in the beloved.
And yet they were rejoicing and yet the scribes and Pharisees
were upset. As I said this morning, what
do we think of the mercy of God? You might think, well, everybody
likes God's mercy. But clearly, as we read scripture,
everybody did not like God's mercy. there were those that
hated God's mercy because it went right against their own
self-righteousness. It meant that it would degrade
heaven because these filthy people, these far off people would be
able to come to heaven too. This is going to ruin the whole
select nature of heaven as far as they were concerned. But you
see They hadn't got, at that time, an understanding of the
heart of the Father that rejoices in sinners returning from their
ways. But you see, the Lord Jesus changes
the heart so that these that have been wayward sons, they
come to love the Savior. And you see, they come to serve
the Lord out of love. See, the kingdom of God is a
kingdom of love. And all the subjects love their
Savior. That's the nature of the kingdom
of God. And yet you see, as we go on,
we see that this older son really didn't love the father. He served
the father, but I don't think he loved him. You look what happened. And he was angry and would not
go in. He refused to go in. What a sadness
that must have been to the father. Just rejoicing that this one
that he'd been praying for and longing for for so long has now
returned. And his oldest son, that had
been around him for all the time, refuses to come and join in. It wasn't that he wasn't able
to. It wasn't that he wasn't allowed to. He refused to go
in. There was something that was,
he found it wrong. He found it, and so often we
can be like that, you see. we can be taken up with with
ourselves and not want others to be blessed to. Therefore came
his father out and entreated him. Here we have the mercy of
the father. This father who had these two
sons when the first son he showed great mercy to in receiving him
back and now the oldest son who has been a faithful servant to
him for so long. Now he comes out and entreats
him. He doesn't angrily remonstrate
with him back. He entreats him. There's something
here of love and mercy and drawing. And surely here is not this something
of the heart of the Saviour. You see in that what we read
in Matthew's Gospel, Matthew 21, when there was his parable of
the two sons and working in the vineyard. Jesus says this in
verse 32 of the chapter that we read, for John came unto you
in the way of righteousness and you believe not. But the publicans
and harlots believe they were the sinners. They were the recognized sinful class believed him and
ye when ye had seen it repented not. So you see there was a possibility
after they'd seen that these people had attained mercy that
they could come too. But no they rejected it you see. And how here then we have that
in this account and he was angry and would not go in therefore
his father came out came his father out and entreated him
and he answered him so then the then the the young the older
son gives his reason why he would not come in this is his reason
this is his and really when you look at what he's saying is he's
saying i'm right and father you are wrong you are wrong for having
this celebration for your younger son in this way, you are wrong. And this is the very nature of
self-righteousness, isn't it? We make our self-righteousness,
we make our self to be the standard of righteousness and we actually
say that God is unrighteous. God's wrong. It's a nature of
self-righteousness. He was angry and would not go
in. And he answered and said to his father, lo, these many
years do I serve thee. So it's obviously some years
that the younger son had been gone since he left into that
far country. Lo, these many years do I serve
thee. Neither transgressed I at any
time thy commandments. Well, this is a high standard.
He says that he's never broken the commandments. There's a cross-reference
here to exactly what we read in Philippians 3 where Paul speaks
of his own pharisaic righteousness when he says, as touching the
righteousness which is in the law, blameless. Saul of Tarsus
considered that his righteousness was blameless. It was faultless. This is exactly what this older
son says. Lo, these many years do I serve
thee, and in that serving there's a sense of doing it as a slave,
not out of love. I serve thee, neither transgressed
I any time thy commandments. And yet thou never gavest me
a kid. You see, they just had this celebration,
this rejoicing, and they'd killed the fatted calf. Now a calf is
a lot, lot more expensive than a kid of the goats. That's a
lot more expensive to have a fatted calf than it would be to kill
a kid. But he says here, yet thou never gavest me a kid.
You didn't even give me a little thing that I might make merry
with my friends. It's interesting here, not that
he would rejoice with his father with this kid, but with my friends,
as it were a separate rejoicing. You see, this was not just the
younger son rejoicing with his friends, separate from the father.
This was the whole household of the father. This was the father's
house. This was coming home to his father. This is a rejoicing in heaven
as to one that comes back into the fold, as it were, who'd left
the fold. But you see, the rejoicing that
the older son talks about is, you didn't give me a kid so that
I could make merry with my friends. Not in the father's house, but
just with my friends. And you see here really, you
can see that he doesn't really have an affection for the father.
But as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy
living with harlots, just how he knew that, we don't know.
But that's what he says that the younger son did. Which has
devoured thy living with harlots, that's with prostitutes, thou
hast killed for him. the fattest calf. So he's really
saying, Father, you are unrighteous. You are unfair. And that's the
nature, you see, of when we get self-righteous. We then criticize
God. And we question, we think that
we put God on the line, whether he's righteous or not. And here,
you see, as I spoke this morning at the Sunday school, we have
those 10 commandments of what we should do. But when we look
carefully at what this older son was doing, he was, as it
were, ticking the boxes, always doing apparently what he was
meant to do, but not in love. He did not love the father. And
how do we know that? He didn't love what the father
loved. The father loved mercy. He was
looking day by day for that son. And if you've got somebody that
goes away from chapel or something, goes away, far away, There may
be some that are really praying for that one to return, and others,
when they return, they're not rejoicing at all. Nothing to
them. You see, the heart, it tells
the difference. But when they come back, what's the reaction?
Are we those that delight in mercy because we have obtained
mercy ourselves? Or are we those that are fighting
against that? And so here, it's interesting
because He said here that neither transgressed I at any time thy
commandment. This is what the statement he
makes. And actually just as he was making
this very statement he was denying the commandment of his father
to go into the celebration. Just at the very
time he was making this statement. But as soon as this thy son was
come, which has devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast
killed for him the fatted calf. So this father, and it was a
rejoicing of this celebration of the love of the father to
this wayward son that God had brought him back and that the
mercy of God in Christ. And thinking about that spiritually,
it's like the marriage supper of the lamb. It's the glory of
heaven, the rejoicing over one sinner that repented. who've
come to find Christ precious and come to trust in the finished
work of Christ like we've been singing of in our last hymn.
And others are saying, you're unrighteous to rejoice in that.
You're sinful. That's a sinful thing. Well,
what is the Father going to do? Well, this is how he replies
in verse 31. And he said unto him, Son, kindness
you see, gentleness, Son, thou art ever with me, and all that
I have is thine. It was meat that we should make
merry and be glad, for this thy brother was dead, and his alive
again was lost. and is found. But what do we make of this 31st
verse? And he said unto him, son, thou
art ever with me. What does that mean? Does that
mean all the scribes and Pharisees were definitely saved individuals? I think if we turn to Romans
chapter 9, we get something of what Paul describes as the extreme
privilege of the Jews. They had a great privileged position.
Romans 9, if you look at that, Paul speaks here of the concern
that he has for his own brethren. If I perhaps read from the first
verse in chapter 9 of Romans. I say the truth in Christ, I
lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost.
This is Romans 9 verse 2. That I have great heaviness and
continual sorrow in my heart. For I could wish that myself
were accursed from Christ, for my brethren, my kinsfolk, kinsmen
according to the flesh. Paul had a great affection for
his fellow Jews. He was really concerned for them,
the scribes and the Pharisees. He had a love to them, a concern
for their souls. And here in verse four, he gives
a catalogue of the privileges of these people who are Israelites. to whom pertain the adoption,
and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and
the service of God, and the promises. Oh, they had a great heritage.
They had many blessings. Whose are the fathers, and of
whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is over all,
God blessed forever. Amen. What a privilege those
Jews had. And yet, that in itself did not
give them, as it were, a right in itself to be in the kingdom
of God. They still had to come and know
that forgiveness. They still needed to come with
repentance. And he said unto him, Son, thou art ever with
me, and all that I have is thine. It was me that we should make
merry. It was the right thing to do. This son who was wayward,
this son who hated me, who didn't value my presence at all, and
wanted to be away from me, and wanted to go his own way, he's
come back with repentance. He's sorry. He's sad about his
sins, and he wants to renew that fellowship. He's now filled with
love to the Savior. This thy brother was dead, and
is alive again, and was lost, and is found. Well, that's where
the story stops. That's where the end of the chapter
is. What happened? What happened? Well, we're not told what happened.
Here, the story finishes. Did the oldest son take what
the father said and come back in and rejoice? in the celebration and realized
that he needed mercy too? Well, sadly we know that it wasn't
so long after this that the scribes and the Pharisees plotted to
kill, to put to death the Lord Jesus Christ. That was their
response. away with this man. We don't want this man. We don't
want this man setting up a standard that is against our own self-righteousness. And they did put to death the
Lord of life and glory. They murdered him at Calvary. They sought to destroy him and
to be away with such a fellow. That was their response. Instead
of realizing the mercy of God, they hated it, they did everything
they could against it. But you see, at the same time,
God was overruling it to bring about his very purposes of mercy
to the entire church of God. as they sought to put to death
the Lord of life and glory, sought to do away with this grace of
our Lord Jesus Christ, this fact that he here was one who received
sinners and eateth with them. They were going to finish this
one off. They weren't going to have him. Caiaphas said, it is
expedient that one man should die for the people and that the
whole nation should not perish. We don't want the whole hierarchy
of the scribes and Pharisees to be unseated by this one man,
Jesus. It's expedient that one man should
die, get rid of him, and then we can carry on in our Pharisaic
religion. It's expedient. Ah, but you see,
they put to death the Lord of life and glory. in so doing they
were gloriously bringing about the very way that the whole church
should be saved. That this one receive his sinners,
and he was going to be that one that would stand in his people's
place. He was going to be the one that
would lay down his life, a ransom for many, so that he could clothe
these people with a robe of righteousness not their own, put that ring
on their finger, that ring of the everlasting love that we
read in Jeremiah, yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting
love, therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee. You see, This
is what the scribes and Pharisees, many of them involved, not all
of them. There was Nicodemus, wasn't there? There was Nicodemus. He came to Jesus by night. Jesus
told him that you must be born again, but we see him coming
back again. When Jesus had passed through
Calvary, he came and gave him an honorable burial. You see,
there were some that came to embrace this truth. So we see
here, Jesus is saying that yes, you
scribes and Pharisees, you are against me because I've opened
the channel of mercy for sinners, but you are sinners too and you
need mercy. And so as we look in this account
of these two sons, one who was the older son who was very religious
and very obedient really to those commands of his father and had
served his father for many, many years, and yet did not really
love his father, did not love mercy, did not rejoice in what
his father rejoiced in. He just wanted to have a party
on his own with his own friends. He didn't want to involve the
father. You see, this killing of the
fatted calf and celebration was for the family. It was for them
that were, it was his father was involved in that, not some
off with some other people. And you see here that, that,
that This older son, you see, he didn't really love his father.
Yes, he obeyed his father, but not in love. And really, Jesus
says, and it says in Deuteronomy 2, that the center of the law
is love. It's not just keeping the external
commandments. They're important, but they flow
out of what we do when we love God. The heart must be the love
to God. And the oldest son, you see,
didn't really love the Lord, didn't really love his father.
He just served his father and he felt that his service was
irksome. It was just a lot and he was
earning, as it were, every day he went into the field, he was
earning or trying to earn that favor with his father. He didn't
love him, as we see later. But you see, When the Lord's
people come and come into his banqueting house and his banner
over them is love, then you see they want to walk in his ways
and they want to delight themselves in the Lord. I've told this story,
perhaps you've heard it before, but it bears repeating, I think.
In the time when there was that gold rush and there was many
going to make their fortunes in that time, there was an Englishman
that went out and he made a lot of money out there and he was
on his return. returning home he came to a place where there
was a slave market taking place. And they were auctioning at that
time as he was walking by, they were auctioning this African
slave. And she was a very beautiful
young African slave girl. And there was these two men auctioning one against the other, bidding,
sorry, one against the other to have this slave girl for themselves. And they were muttering and laughing
under their breath while they were doing it of all the immoral
things that they would do once that slave girl was theirs. And
then this English man, he saw the wickedness of what was going
on. He said, I'll pay twice as much as these men will for that
slave girl. They said, nobody pays that for
a slave. He said, I want that. I'll pay it. So he paid this
money for this slave girl. And he took her down the road
and she could only think that he had purchased her to abuse
her. But he took her down the road
to the place where he could sort all the paperwork out so that
she could be set free from her slavery. And as she started to
understand what he was trying to do for her, she said, you
mean to say you've paid double the price just to set me free? He said, that's right. And she
was overwhelmed. And then she said, she said to
him, I make one request of you. And he said, what's that request?
She said, I want to serve you for the rest of my life. You see, she wanted to serve
a master that had her good at heart. And I believe that's a
picture of how this younger son, as it were, came back to serve
his father. He wanted to serve his father
now for the rest of his life. He'd had enough of going away.
He now wanted to serve his father out of love, because he was living,
you see, on the bounty of God. He'd ruined all his inheritance.
He didn't own anything, really. He was continuing to live on
the bounty of God. God's people are all like that.
Nobody is getting to heaven because of what they've done. They've
earned a place in heaven. Nobody has earned a place in
heaven. Christ has earned that place for his people and he gives
it as the free gift. So we cannot gain our salvation,
we cannot earn our salvation, but we need to come and realize
that we need to receive it on the grounds of mercy. And so
I say to All of you this evening, as it were, see those two sons.
One that was a wayward son who had his eye on the world and
the beauties of it. And the other son who was, as
it were, happy to be at home and happy just to serve his father.
But neither of them really loved the father. Openly profane or
very religious. And you get the whole spectrum
of humanity between those two extremes. But this man receiveth sinners,
and eateth with them. The Lord Jesus came to save sinners. And really both of those boys
needed repentance. They needed to come to love their
father and come to know that they needed mercy. They needed,
as we sung this morning, creating me a clean heart, O God, and
renew a right spirit within me. They needed, both of them needed
mercy. And so may we each be aware of
this as we come you know you come perhaps there may be some
who've come to chapel all their lives and they think that by
coming to the house of God they as it were will gain a place
in heaven. Well if that's how we gain a
place in heaven they're going to be very sadly disappointed.
because we do not gain our place in heaven by coming to the house
of God. But if the Lord has touched our
heart and showed us something of our need of a savior and we
come to God's house to serve him out of newness of life, then
of course we love to come to God's house. So it makes a whole
difference between, you see, that slave girl as being the
slave of this Englishman would have to do what he said because
she was his slave. But she would have hated doing
it. She wouldn't have enjoyed it.
She just had to do it because that's what she was, a slave.
But now you see, she wanted to serve that Englishman, but she
served him out of love. She could have gone free. She
wanted a master that cared for her, that would look after her
and seek her real good. And you see, that is what the
Lord Jesus has come for his people. He seeks their real good. When
Jesus loves his people, the love that he has to his people is
a love that does those people good. It's not a love that debaunches. We live in a world that if somebody
has a great affection towards you, it may be a bad thing. They may just want something
out of you and then off. They're not really seeking your
good, perhaps, but in a true love there is that commitment
and seeking the good of the object that's loved. And you see the
Lord Jesus, when he came to seek and to save that which was lost,
he sought their real good. He sought to bless them indeed,
and to bring them back from their lost condition. And the scribes
and Pharisees murmured, saying, this man receiveth sinners, and
eateth with them. But this is a glorious truth.
And may this be a comfort to each one here then tonight. And
also a warning. How are we coming to God's house? Do we see it more as a slavery? More that we just have to do
it? Or do we see it as something that's a blessing? And those
of you who have been brought up in the things of God and haven't
as yet, as it were, had sought to go away, but you still need
forgiveness. You see, you don't have to go
out and commit some great dramatic sin to need to come to repentance.
That little girl in Scotland who was, I understand she was
one of the, a scullery maid I think she was, And she met with the
family as the minister came, and the minister talked to her,
and she didn't seem to know that much of the things of God. And
he said, I've got a little prayer for you to pray. He said, say
this prayer, Lord, teach me myself. And then he went away, and this
little girl prayed this prayer. As God answered that prayer and
showed her her sin, she was working in the house. She was, in a sense,
an honorable person in an external way. But as God showed her a
heart, she realized that sin was mixed with everything she
did, and she became very low. But before too long, that minister
came back and visited the house, and they said, that little girl
you gave that prayer to, she's really, really upset. And he
went to see this little girl, and he said, well, I'll give
you a different prayer to pray now, just slightly different.
Lord, show me thyself. And you see, then the Lord Jesus
showed him, showed something of the suitability of the Savior
for sinners. So it's not some dramatic thing
that we have to do, and then we can come to a place of repentance. No, we've all sinned and come
short of the glory of God. Another thing I've said before
is that you might think of a testimony. You think of the testimony of
the prodigal son. It's dramatic. He went into a
far country, did all these great and lavish things, and then he
returned empty. And you say, oh, what a testimony.
Yes, it is what a testimony. It was wonderful. And it was
a time of rejoicing when he returns. And I don't want to diminish
it. But if that father, after talking to his older son, We haven't finished the story
here. We haven't got the end of the story. But if the end
of the story was that that older son came and said, Father, be merciful to me too.
I realise I've been wrong. I've realised I've got in a wrong
spirit. I've realised I've served you, but not out of love. Would
you have mercy on me too, because I'm a sinner? And you see that
father would have also welcomed him in. And really, you see,
that's the work of grace. You might think it's wonderful,
and it is, to show somebody who's gone far off in the things of,
far away from God, to see the wickedness of their ways, but
for that little girl that didn't seem to be doing anything externally
that bad as we would look on it, for that girl to come and
say, God, be merciful to me, a sinner. God had to work in
that little girl's heart. And he needs to work in all of
our hearts. We don't have to go out and sin some dramatic and
glamorous sin. We need to realize that we've
come short of the glory of God. The soul that sinneth it shall
die. And we all have come short of that glory of God. We're all
on the spectrum somewhere between the older and the younger son.
We all need to obtain mercy. We cannot get to glory on our
own merits. The oldest son could not get
as it were there by just serving the father in a slavish way.
You see, he brought me into his banqueting house and his banner
over me was love. And that's the motive, you see. The motive is what God goes for.
Yes, he is interested in the external. He is interested in
those 10 commandments. But he wants those 10 commandments
to come from the heart. He wants the response. You think
about it. If a child just does what you say, but hates you at
the same time as doing it, it's not really that nice, is it?
Even though they do exactly what you say. But if they love you,
and they do it out of love. It's very different. And you
see God, we read with David, David was a man after God's own
heart. And creating me a clean heart,
O God, and renew a right spirit within me. And these scribes
and Pharisees that considered that they were righteous and
they didn't need repentance, but these others that had fallen
and come short, oh, they needed repentance. But Jesus was saying,
you all need, the older son and the younger son, they all needed
repentance. They were all lost and they all
needed to be found. And you see, this is the great
message of the gospel. I came to seek and to save that
which was lost. And then in this parable, then
we have those two sides. the sovereignty of God, seeking
that which was lost, although the individuals don't really
understand that that's what's going on, and yet it is going
on. And how Jesus draws his people, reveals them. You see, in John
16, we have that very clearly. In John 16 it talks about sending
the Holy Spirit into our hearts. And in verse 8 it says of John
16, and when he has come, he will reprove the world of sin
and of righteousness and of judgment. These great truths, sin, righteousness,
judgment. What is sin? What is righteousness?
What is judgment? Righteousness, not self-righteousness,
but that righteousness which is acceptable to God. And you
see, all the time we're happy with our own self-righteousness,
we say God's not fair for doing this and for doing that. And
when he showed mercy to this younger son, we say God's not
just. You see, we rob God of his glory.
We would pull him off his throne. And that's what the scribes and
Pharisees thought to do. They wanted to pull him off.
They wanted to ridicule him and when he was on the cross they
jeered at him, they mocked him and said, if thou be the son
of God come down. He saved others himself he cannot
save. And yet some of those very people
that were crying out for his death and crying crucify him,
crucify him, were the very people he was standing in the place
of. We know one of them, that was
the dying thief, one of the dying thieves. We read he cast the
same, they both cast the same in his teeth. They were both
laughing and ridiculing the Lord Jesus Christ, and yet at that
time of ridiculing them, he was standing in their wretched place,
bearing the curse so that they could go free. You see, it's
a gospel that's, it's a love that's beyond all loves. And
as we start to look at these things, there's such a depth
in it. But when He has come, He will reprove the world of
sin and of righteousness, of judgment, of sin. What is the
cardinal sin? Because they believe not on Me. That is the ultimate sin. Why
did Israel not enter into the Promised Land? Because of unrighteousness. Oh, you might list all the grand
sins that you might think are the greatest sins. But this is
the cardinal sin. They didn't believe on him. And
really, the cardinal sin with the oldest older brother was
he didn't really believe and love the father. And yet, you
see, we don't know. There were those that were scribes
and Pharisees that did believe, that did come back. Saul of Tarsus
was one of them. He was one that hated Christians,
were hailing men and women into prison because he hated their
doctrine of mercy for those who were not righteous in and of
themselves. He hated it. Until God opened
his eyes as the brightness of that light above the midday sun
shone into his heart, he realized that he himself was a sinner. And then the thought of mercy
for him became exquisitely sweet. And may that come to each of
your hearts, that one who means nothing to you, perhaps now,
may come to mean everything to you. Unto you, therefore, which
believe, he is precious. Amen.