February 1, 2015 GRACE- Pastor Mike Rosensteel

February 1, 2015

The Parable of the lost sons

GRACE

Over the next few weeks we are going to talk about grace.

There are many songs about grace:  Many will remember that old hymn Amazing Grace:

Amazing grace! How sweet the sound 
That saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found, Was blind, but now I see.
And grace my fears relieved.
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed.
I have already come;
'Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far
And grace will lead me home.

'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,

Through many dangers, toils and snares

Grace is mentioned in the Bible more than 125 times.

Grace - getting what you don't deserve.

The opposite of grace is condemned - to declare to be reprehensible, wrong, or evil usually after weighing evidence and without reservation, to pronounce guilty:  to convict: in other words - getting what you deserve.

We find grace in both the Old and New Testaments:

Because of sin, God condemned the world to death, but in Genesis 6:8 we find 1 man who God says found grace in the Lord's eyes:

Genesis 6:8  But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD.

Why?

Genesis 6:9  These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, andNoah walked with God.

Noah deserved death - like the rest of mankind - but God extended him grace, gave him what he did not deserve – a relationship with God, why - because he walked with God.

Joseph, Moses, Ruth, David, and so many others the scriptures say found grace in God's eyes. 

Why?  Because they walked with God.  They chose to believe and trust God.

In the New Testament Paul wrote in his letters to every church about the grace of God – he started his writing in Romans:

Romans 3:24   Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:

Romans 5:2   Also through Him, we have obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.

Romans 5:20   The law came along to multiply the trespass. But where sin multiplied, grace multiplied even more,

Romans 5:21  so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace will reign through righteousness, resulting in eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Grace - getting what you don't deserve.

In Luke 15, Jesus is speaking and eating with a group of tax collectors and sinners.  The Pharisees and scribes came and were angry and started complaining  and accused Jesus that His behavior was wrong because He not only ate and associated with them, but also welcomed them by offering them God's grace. 

Pharisees and scribes based their acceptance by God on their behavior and the things they did.   Jesus tells them 3 parables; the lost sheep, the lost coin, and then the lost son.

The lost sheep was a parable about a shepherd who had 100 sheep but when he counted them he only had 99 - Jesus asked this question:

Luke 15:4  "What man among you, who has 100 sheep and loses one of them, does not leave the 99 in the open field and go after the lost one until he finds it?

The lost coin was a parable about a woman who has 10 silver coins but loses 1 of them, Jesus asks this question:

Luke 15:8  "Or what woman who has 10 silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it?

Jesus says when both are found there is joy and rejoicing because what was lost is now found.

Then Jesus tells the parable of the 2 sons:

Luke 15:11 - 12a   He also said: "A man had two sons.  The younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the share of the estate I have coming to me.'

Do you realize this son may well have told his dad "I wish you would drop dead" because a father's inheritance was only to come after his death.  This young son just couldn't wait till his father died.

Luke 12b - 20a   So he distributed the assets to them. 

(Them – both sons received their inheritance from their father while the father was still alive, we will talk more about that next week.)

 Not many days later, the younger son gathered together all he had and traveled to a distant country, where he squandered his estate in foolish living.  After he had spent everything, a severe famine struck that country, and he had nothing. Then he went to work for one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. He longed to eat his fill from the carob pods the pigs were eating, but no one would give him any. 

When he came to his senses, he said, 'How many of my father's hired hands have more than enough food, and here I am dying of hunger!  I'll get up, go to my father, and say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight. I'm no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me like one of your hired hands.'  So he got up and went to his father.

This younger son had completely turned his back on his father and the way of life he had been brought up in. He purposely left the fellowship of his father.  He squandered everything his father had freely given him.  The father could have said no to the younger son’s request but he allowed him the free choice.  The father wisely understood that the son remaining in the household only for the perks would have destroyed any possibility of real relationship.  So he allowed the son to make up his own mind.  The father knew that there was great potential for his son to disgrace the family and yet he also knew that a love relationship couldn’t be forced.

In this parable Jesus was painting a picture of someone whose behavior was the worst imaginable in his culture.  He showed no respect for his father, he engaged in adultery, spending his inheritance on prostitutes and when the money ran out stooped so low as to take a job feeding pigs - an animal that to Jews represented the height of uncleanness.  The son could have died in the pig pen.  Scripture says he came to his senses - he realized he could not have behaved any worse, he realized he was less deserving of his title as son, he had blown it!  He realized his father's hired hands got fed better and lived better than he did.  So he figured he would return home - not to be accepted as a son again but maybe be able to get a job working for his father.

Luke 15:20b   But while the son was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion. He ran, threw his arms around his neck, and kissed him.

Jesus says the father ran - in that culture, wealthy men never did that.  Love for his son overcame all the social norms.  The father desired his son to be returned.

Listen to the son's confession:

Luke 15:21   The son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight. I'm no longer worthy to be called your son.'

Was that statement true - that his sin made him no longer worthy to be called a son?  Yes - but look at the father's reaction:

Luke 15:22 - 24    "But the father told his slaves, 'Quick! Bring out the best robe and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet.  Then bring the fattened calf and slaughter it, and let's celebrate with a feast, because this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!' So they began to celebrate.

The son expected what he deserved; to be disowned, or at least to be severely punished.  But what he did not expect was that his father would immediately embrace him in his smelly, dirty, and broken condition and celebrate that his dead son is alive again, that his lost son was found.  Notice there was no lecture or disgrace or punishment – only celebration.

Luke 15:10 I tell you, in the same way, there is joy in the presence of God's angels over one sinner who repents."

Satan wants us to believe that if we mess up after we’ve come to Christ, that we won’t be accepted that the Father is done with us.  We often feel such shame that we remain at a distance.  God the Father wants us back and will go to great lengths to draw us back.  The father was fully aware of his son’s condition but offered him extreme grace.  (Because this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!')

Then the father gives him 3 things that had great significance:

The robe, not just any robe but the best robe, maybe even the father's own robe.  This symbolized that the son had once again been given the right to enjoy the place of right standing with the father.  He had always been loved, but now he was completely restored.

Ephesians 1:20 – 21   He demonstrated this power in the Messiah by raising Him from the dead and seating Him at His right hand in the heavens--far above every ruler and authority, power and dominion, and every title given, not only in this age but also in the one to come.

Ephesians 2:4 – 9    But God, who is abundant in mercy, because of His great love that He had for us, made us alive with the Messiah even though we were dead in trespasses. By grace you are saved!  He also raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavens, in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages He might display the immeasurable riches of His grace in His kindness to us in Christ Jesus.  For by grace you are saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God's gift--not from works, so that no one can boast.

The ring would have been a signet-type ring that would make a mark on official documents and could be instantly recognizable as the father's mark.  Without the mark of that ring there would be no authority in any document the son had.  The ring symbolized power and authority to carry out the father's business.

Matthew 28:18 – 20   Then Jesus came near and said to them, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.  Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age."

Acts 1:8   But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

These are Christ’s words to His disciples who had deserted Him and betrayed Him.  They had been in hiding because of fear and shame and He placed on them all power and authority that was His because of His resurrection.

Paul gives this message to the Colossian believers that had been caught up in false doctrine and immorality:

Colossians 1:11 – 13   May you be strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for all endurance and patience, with joy giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the saints' inheritance in the light.   He has rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son He loves,

The sandals - in a Jewish household, the only people allowed to wear footwear in the house were the father and his sons.  The father was declaring in no uncertain terms that the boy, despite everything he had done, was his son.

Galatians 4:6 – 7     And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, "Abba, Father!"  So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir through God.

This parable that Jesus told was a picture of grace - getting what you do not deserve.

Can we see that God’s grace is offered freely?  It is not something we earn.  It is something that we can by our bad behavior cause Him to withhold.  The clincher is that He never forces it.  Grace is something we have to accept.  No matter where we find ourselves – never having believed before or having once walked with Him but now feeling shame – there is nothing the Father wants more than a relationship with us.

If you have never accepted God’s grace how would He receive you?

What if you went out and disobeyed your Heavenly Father and walked away from Him, and like the young son in the parable sincerely came back to God, what kind of reception do you think you would get?  Exactly the same.  This is grace.

Our heavenly Father loves us there is nothing we can ever do that would make Him not love us.

Romans 5:8   But God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us!

Romans 8:35 – 39    Who can separate us from the love of Christ? Can affliction or anguish or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?   As it is written: Because of You we are being put to death all day long; we are counted as sheep to be slaughtered.  No, in all these things we are more than victorious through Him who loved us.   For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will have the power to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord!

The Father loves you – no matter where you are – will you accept His forgiveness today?