The Prodigal Son - He Returns To The Father

Luke 15:11-24

INTRODUCTION: We have come a long way tracing the spiritual journey of the prodigal. After sin had brought him into a state of desperate, unsatisfied, spiritual poverty and death, finally is able to face the reality of his situation. Sin is dangerous, unseemly and disgraceful,. Most importantly, he saw things correctly when he saw that sin is the road to death and hell not life. Now we that:

Thesis: God's forgiveness is based upon his love.

THIS WAS ONE OF SEVERAL THINGS THAT WERE NECESSARY FOR HIM TO RETURN

FIRST, We note that in order to return to his Father, he had to leave behind the far country

· He had no more satisfaction in living away from his father.

· There is an end to sin's pleasures, perhaps in the next world - Galatians 5:19-21 The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; [20] idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions [21] and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

DeWitt, "People may come to regret a life of sin and of disobedience to God for a variety of reasons: they may have been found out in it; they may have discovered sin's fruitlessness and frustrating, empty, unsatisfying character, they may even have come to fear the divine judgment seat before which we all must stand at last. But unless they have by the grace of God turned their backs upon sin, theirs is not repentance which marks the life of the prodigal son at this point and which must mark every man who comes to God. "

Application: To come back to God, we must turn our backs upon sin. We can't be in fellowship with Him while we are disobeying his will.

SECONDLY, To turn back to the Father, he made a true confession of his sin Verse 18- "will say to him, "Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in your sight"

· "Against Heaven" - Against God - Sin is first of all an offense against God.

· Psalm 51:3-4 For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.

[4] Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight,

so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.

· The worst effect of sin is that it violates our relationship to the God who made us

· "Against You" Sin disrupts our relationship with God, it also damages our relationship to people around us, our family, our friends, our fellow Christians, all of these people are injured and let down by it.

· We must confess and be real about the damage we have done... 1 John 1:9

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

THIRDLY, The father's love had to be constant for him to return.

· The one unchanging factor in the story is the love of the father.

· He must have been waiting, hoping, looking for his sons return

THIS IS HOW THE FATHER COULD HAVE TREATED THE SON

Deut. 21:18-21 If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and will not listen to them when they discipline him, [19] his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his town. [20] They shall say to the elders, "This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a profligate and a drunkard." [21] Then all the men of his town shall stone him to death. You must purge the evil from among you. All Israel will hear of it and be afraid.

But note the love of the father

· Enormous and profound love - "The proof of God's amazing love is this, that when we were yet sinners Christ died for us," {cf, Rom 5:8}

Oh, how God loves sinner!....The pitiful condition of the sinner is no hindrance to the love of God...

"felt compassion for him, and ran and embraced him, and kissed him." What! In all his filth? Yes. In all his rags? Yes. In all his haggard, shattered wretchedness? Yes!

1 John 4:10

This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

See the contrast between what the boy realistically expected "make me as a hired servant" and the way the father lovely received him.

The blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin." And what happens to them? They are in the bottom of the deepest sea (Mic. 7:19). They are removed from us as far as the east is from the west (Ps. 103:12). God remembers them no more (Heb. 8:12).

OUR GREATEST TREASURE, AS A BELIEVER IS THE ENORMOUS AND PROFOUND LOVE OF OUR HEAVENLY FATHER TO US!

· This love is Antecedent love - The love of the father was there before the boy got home. The Father ran out and met the boy before he got home. The father interrupted the boys confession, he had said enough.

Romans 5:6-8 You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. [7] Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. [8] But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 8:28-29 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. [29] For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.

The glory of our salvation is that God loved us before we loved him. That he took measures to save us before we even knew him.

· This love is an dynamic love - The father is not passive, he is active in his love for his child. He took the steps to go to the boy in need.

John 3:16

"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

Jungle Aviation and RAdio Service (JAARS), the flying department of Wycliffe Bible Translators--had flown thousands of hours over a 25 year span without one fatal accident before April 7, 1972. On that day, a Piper Aztec lost its right engine and crashed in Papua New Guinea, killing all seven persons aboard. The Aztec had just rolled out of the Wycliffe maintenance hangar the day before following a 100 hour inspection. The chief mechanic was stunned when he heard the news of the crash. Reviewing in his mind each step he had performed in inspecting that right engine, he suddenly recoiled in horror. He remembered that he had been interrupted while tightening a fuel line and had never returned to finish the job! That faulty connection had allowed raw fuel to spray out and catch fire while the Aztec was in flight. The mechanic's guilt at being responsible for the deaths of his companions crushed him. For days he did not know what to do.

The other mechanics tried to help him, as did his own family. But when the family of Doug Hunt, the pilot who was killed in the accident, was preparing to return to their home in New Zealand, the mechanic knew he had to see them, talk with them and beg

their forgiveness. He could barely get out the words as he sobbed in their presence. "That hand there," he said, looking at his right hand, "took Doug's life." Glennis Hunt, Doug's widow, embraced him. "Glennis sat by me and held the hand that took her

husband's life," he later wrote, " and another JAARS pilot sat on my other side with a demonstration of love, comfort, and forgiveness. That was the most significant first step in the healing process."

CONCLUSION:

God's forgiveness is based upon his love.

The son left behind the far country of sin

The son confessed his sins

The father loved...The father loves us With an Enormous and profound love

Antecedent love

Dynamic love