Vol. 11 — No. 28 July 12, 1970
Luke 15:11-24
And he said, A certain man had two sons: And the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living. And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living. And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine In that land; and he began to be in want. And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country; and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat: and no man gave unto him. And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto 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 hired servants. And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him. And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son. But the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet: And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat, and be merry: For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry.
Dear Christian Friends:
When a still-born baby isn’t, then what? Perhaps last week you heard of the incident. A doctor had pronounced a still-born baby dead, but it began to breathe at the funeral home. In a dramatic way, through man’s physical life, are we able to set the scene in regard to man’s spiritual life! Can’t we imagine the words of the father of this still-born baby to have been, “I thought I had lost my son! He was dead, and is alive!” So likewise two Christian parents may have spent years in training, supporting, educating their son. And all of a sudden, all the son thinks about, talks about, is the time when he can get away from his parents; out of the home; separated from their tyrannical rule. When he was gone, the father was heard to says “I thought I had lost my son!” A Christian congregation provides for the spiritual training of its youth. Many give concentrated hours to the Christian teaching of the child. But come confirmation time, and after that, the preacher hardly ever sees the lad again. Doesn't he say to himself: “I thought I had lost my son!”
But that’s the way it often is also in regard to our spiritual life: we seem to have been stillborn! No life! No “get-up-and-go!” We walk around like spiritual dead-heads! We wouldn’t know a false doctrine if it came up and hit us in the nose! Our confirmation vows were just so many empty words, hot air, spoken to please the parents and get the preacher off our backs! Now the glitter of evil attracts us! We can’t stand the idea of dedication to our religious vows, howsoever correct they were! And for those who do care about the souls of others, it’s like having given birth to a still-born baby!
But the baby we mentioned started to breathe again. And that, dear friends, is what we want to talk about today! How the spiritually still-born start to breathe again! How the fallen Christian gets up again! How the child who spits in his father’s eye makes use of his handkerchief. How those who are the lost sons of God, stone-hard in their unbelief, are guided back to the father’s warm fire-place! We pray that today’s message about godly returning will not be lost upon our souls, as we hear the words of the Father of the Prodigal Son:
You, too, can see that Jesus’ parable reads like the front page of our newspaper! It deals with a richman’s kid! One can’t help but see the parallel in today’s world! Who are the leaders of today’s fall in to degradation, corruption, immorality, rebellion, perversion, and moral rottenness? It is often those who have it all, so far as the world can offer it! It takes money to go to college. Somebody is paying a lot to give such young adults all this time to riot and rebel on campus. To teach, one must be educated. Leaders in education are also leading the way into our corruption and rebellion. Where do many of the hippies come from? From rich families! From educated homes! So often the poor have no time for such extravagence. They have to work for a living. So what we must learn to see is this that what the world offers us, cannot satisfy. A person can have the whole world as his own, and still have nothing!
Can we believe it? Can we really be happy with out color TV? Can we really be happy without a new car every year? A new house to call our own? Can we still be happy, if we live in a hovel, in a hut, in a basement home? Can a person really have everything, and still have nothing? Let Jesus wave before our doubting eyes the Prodigal Son! His father has employees, and he has slaves. He’s a rich man. The son should have been content. He had it made. How we so easily would envy him. In this young man we can see what St. Paul meant when he spoke about God in these words: GOD HAS NOT LEFT YOU WITHOUT SOME CLUE TO HIS NATURE, IN THE KINDNESS HE SHOWS: HE SENDS YOU RAIN FROM HEAVEN AMD CROPS IN THEIR SEASONS, AND GIVE YOU FOOD AND GOOD CHEER IN PLEITTY. And this young man had everything. In plenty, and much to spare.
But really. In his own mind, didn’t he feel he had nothing? The grass had to be greener on the other side. There must be more to life than this! Moneys isn’t everything! There had to be something better. Ah, yes! It must be independence from home! Out from under my father! If I could just get rid of his control, his telling me what to do and not to do! If I could only use my own judgment; make my own decisions; live my own life…then I will be happy! Then I can become a person; a human being…and not be just a nobody with lots of money! “Father, give me my inheritance!” He had coming one third of his father’s wealth. His father obliges. The son turns all his inheritance into cash, and off he goes. Where the father can’t see him. Where the father can't control him. Where he can do as he pleases. Where he can finally discover what life is about. Where he can be free and happy, because He now has everything.
If real life is not in money, then it must be in spending money; in fun and games! Our text calls it “riotous living.” Loose living. Wildest extravagence. Reckless abandon. It’s a familiar picture in our generation too. We don’t have to picture the details, although the older brother accuses him of running through his money with women. So we get the picture. Now he was happy, wasn’t he? Life had nothing more to offer him, but he already had it! He was happy and content, wasn’t he? Shouldn’t he have been? But he forgot about the famine, vv. 11-14….
Friends, oh, may we see it well and clearly. When the pinch came, when he lost what the world offered him in money or pleasure, when he who had had all that money could buy was without that…he was left with out a thing! By now his friends were gone; his women had left him. He had the taste of ashes in his mouth. Who knows what diseases had come upon him. What torments racked his body. He had had everything he could want. And when finally his eyes were opened, he found he had nothing. And the greatest famine is THE FAMINE OF THE SOUL! In his heart he had nothing to lean on. He had nothing in which to trust for help. He had lost his own soul. And in losing that, nothing else really mattered in the end. He discovered life to be only sinking sand.
So we think of ourselves, back in the days of our confirmation. Oh, how important that vow seemed! Faithfulness to God! Serving Him alone! Sticking to the true doctrines! Devotion to our church so long as it retains the truth! Doing good works! No disgracing the Christian name by our evil conduct. Oh, how important our confirmation vows seemed! Then we got in to the swim of life! Then money seemed to be so important, the sure source of happiness. Then prestige and honor among my fellowmen seemed to be a source of contentment. Then a new car. A new home. Things that money could buy. And we forgot about our soul. We ignored our vows. Life was going so fast. We had to get while the getting was good. And in the process some did lose their souls. We can’t read hearts; we can’t count. But don’t we know of some who have altogether renounced their confirmation vows? They give no proof that they are even Christians.
And aren’t we all in the same danger? Blinded by the glitter of gold, we think this is the essence of life! Fun and games! Good living! Lots of money! So there is danger of being spiritually still-born! The words resounding in the chamber of heavens I THOUGHT I HAD LOST MY SON! But Jesus’ story does not end there! It should have. It could have! The man deserved death on the spot! But he had forgotten about his Father’s love!
Our first hymn today talked about God’s “ALL EMBRACING MERCY.” We see it displayed in our text, which reflects how God also deals with you and me, vv. 15-20.
Think like a Jew; then the boy’s plight will get to you! Pigs are unclean animals to the Jews. Picture the scene. The man is hungry! So he literally forces himself on to one of the citizens. The man did not want to hire the boy. The only way to get rid of his pestering was to send him to feed the pigs! And even then, he was not allowed to eat the food which he fed the pigs. He wanted to eat; but in that famine the pigs came first! The Prodigal Son could go no lower. This was it. The bottom! No matter where he turned, he could get no satisfaction. Don’t you see? God was beginning the turning process. He was bringing the boy back home. But first, God had to force the boy to want to come home. He had to show him his sin. God made his life terrible for him.
He was in misery. He experienced the kind of spiritual misery David talked about when he says: “MY BODY WASTED AWAY WITH MOANING ALL DAY LONG. FOR DAY AND NIGHT THY HAND WAS HEAVY UPON ME.” God’s punishment is devastating. God pulls out all the stops. God will have no one go to hell. God’s will is to save all men. And so God will bring men into misery. Physical misery. Mental misery. Emotional misery. Life will get tough. Hard. Severe. Crushing. Different ways for different people. As your spiritual leader, I see much crushing in our own congregation among our own members. God is calling us back! “RETURN, O WANDERER, RETURN,” In every tear we shed, we should see the presence of sin. In every ache we feel, we should realize the existence of sin. In every twinge of fear, we should be made aware of our own unfaithfulness in thought, word, and deed. God would daily remind us of our sins, our weaknesses, the sureness of death, the certainty of eternity. Where shall we be spending eternity? Today is the time for decision.
The Prodigal Son made his decision: He would confess his sins. He was coming back home. He was reclaiming his soul. First, he could confess his sins. He would admit his guilt. He was no longer worthy to be anything but a hired man. He had forfeited his sonship. He had forsaken his inheritance. He had squandered his future. He deserved only…nothing! But notice, he never had any doubt that his father would receive him back! Through his bitter tears, he was still able to recall his Father’s love. And on that love he counted. It was all he had. There was nothing else.
And that, too, has been our training from baptism through confirmation. God loves us. Through His Word God leads us to see that love demonstrated in Christ’s death on the cross for our sins, and in the rain and the sunshine and the blessings of life! But especially His love towards us in Christ! That Jesus would suffer and die for our sins! That He would pay for our guilt. That His holiness would cover our ugliness. That is love. This is mercy and pity. This is compassion. And while the Prodigal Son forsook his Father, his Father never forsook him, as our Father never forsakes us. No matter what evil we have done, what sins we have committed, howsoever terribly we have transgressed our confirmation vows…if only we will return to the Father with penitent hearts, sorrowful tears, repentant sighs, with confession in our souls, and penitence in our mouths…our Heavenly Father is waiting, watching, looking to welcome us back! Thru tears we too may recall a Father’s love.
And what a love! What a welcome in fact, vv. 21-24. Even before the son’s confession forgiveness was already his! Don’t we see? What the father does for his son, who cannot even finish his confession, is to show him that full forgiveness is already his. He is pardoned. He is forgiven. All is forgiven and forgotten. For the joy in the father’s heart over a son who has repented of his sins…nothing is too good for him. The lost has been found. The dead has been brought back to life. The father who had said: I THOUGHT I HAD LOST MY SON, found him alive, and he began to be merry.
There is joy in heaven over every sinner who repents. For every sinner, who in faith returns to God, there is full reinstatement as a full son and a complete heir of eternal life. At times we may wander from our Father’s house. We may have become the Prodigal Son. If so, let us repent, confess our sins, acknowledge our transgressions, admit that the soul that sinneth shall die. Return to the Heavenly Father with tears appealing to His love. He shall forgive! For nothing is too good for a son or daughter who returns to the Father’s home. HAPPY IS THE MAN WHOSE DISOBEDIENCE IS FORGIVEN, WHOSE SIN IS PUT AWAY. HAPPY IS A MAN WHEN THE LORD LAYS NO GUILT TO HIS ACCOUNT!
May our own attitude always bring joy to heaven. The only right answer to God’s despair: I THOUGHT I HAD LOST MY SON, is for each of us daily to return and return again to the heavenly throne, seeking pardon and forgiveness for our daily sins, and daily struggle, strive, and work at leading a life pleasing to God. For if we have God, if we have a soul that is saved, then we do have everything worthwhile having! Whatever else comes in money, property, and so on…well, that’s OK too. Just as long as God calls me His child. That’s really quite enough for any one human being! Amen.
Ministry by Mail is a weekly publication of the Church of the Lutheran Confession. Sermon archives, and subscription and staff information may be found online at www.clclutheran.org/ministrybymail. Audio Sermons are available at: podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ministrybymail
All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the King James Version.