The Parable of the Prodigal Son

Introduction

I, like you, have seen some wonderful scenes in my life. I once was on the Oregon coast when the sea was angry and the waves were crashing with ferocity against the craggy rocky shore of Oregon. I once was in Arizona when there had been desert rains and the desert was in full bloom. It was an absolutely regal sight to see what the rain had done to the desert. I once stood at the base of the Rocky Mountains on a fall evening when the frost had already penetrated the leaves, and when it looked like God had taken a half-filled paintbrush and just slung all kinds of hues of green and yellow and bronze and gold across the mountainsides.

But there is one scene, ladies and gentlemen, that I’ve seen thousands of times in my life now. And I never tire of it. And that scene is when the people of God come together. It is just a marvelous attestation to the grandeur and the glory of God in a way that the aspens cannot picture it. In a way that the craggy shore cannot represent. Because it shows what God has done. We come in all sizes. We come in all shapes. We come with all kinds of intellectual backgrounds and ethnic backgrounds. We come from all races of people. And yet we are the people of God. Because we have subscribed to the Bible, the only rule of faith and practice. The book, chapter, and verse book that gives us a route of pursuit.

In 1 Peter chapter 4 and verse 11, we’re told if any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God. If any man minister, let him minister as the ability that God supplies. That in all things God may be glorified. And so we have the inestimable pleasure of glorifying God by our coming together. And you have warmed the cockles of an old West Texas boy’s heart by coming here on Wednesday night. I should say something, I think, about two families that I know of who are here from far away, distant places, who saw fit in the midst of their vacations to come and be with the people of God on Wednesday night. I think that says something really good about you. And I should also tell you that the young people of this congregation are to greatly be commended, because they have worked hard for this meeting, probably harder than anybody else.

They’ve passed out announcements, they’ve met, and they’ve tried, and they’ve prayed, and I appreciate them for doing so. Thank you all for your kind consideration. I shall read tonight with your kind permission from the fifteenth chapter of the book of Luke, and I invite you to listen very carefully. And if you’d like to follow along in your Bible, we’d certainly admire having you do that also. Then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners for to hear him. And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners and eateth with them. And he spake this parable unto them, saying, What man of you having a hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost until he found it.

And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing, and when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbors, saying unto them, Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. I say unto you that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons which need no repentance. Either what woman having ten pieces of silver, if she lose one piece, doth not light a candle and sweep the house and search diligently till she find it. And when she hath found it, she calleth her friends and her neighbors together, saying, Rejoice with me, for I have found the peace which I lost. Likewise, I say unto you, there is joined the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth.

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 to him. And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my fathers have bread enough in despair, 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 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. Now his elder son was in the field, and as he came and drew nigh unto the house, he heard music and dancing, and he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. 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. He was angry and would not go in. Therefore came his father out and entreated him, and he answering said unto his father, Lo these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment, and yet thou never gave’s me a kid that I might make merry with my friends, but as soon as this thy son was come which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou’k killed for him the fatted calf.

He said unto him, son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine. It was meet that we should make merry and be glad, for this my brother was dead and is alive again, and was lost and is found. I want to introduce you to a new word. Perhaps you’ve heard it, perhaps you haven’t. It is the word triptych, T R I P T Y C H. A triptych a triptych was a hinged writing instrument consisting of three leaves, which was used in ancient Rome for recording documents. It in our generation is a work of art in three panels. I was once in New York and saw a beautiful panel, and on this panel over here was a picture of the priest who passed by the man who was harmed.

And on this side was the Levite who passed by on the other side, and in the middle was the good Samaritan, you know the story. That’s an art triptych. What we have here is a parabolical triptych. It is a triptych, and if you hear triple in that, there’s a little to it. The fact of the matter is that what we have here is three panels that teach essentially the same thing. Jesus’ parables always had one central truth to them. And these three parables are saying the same thing. Jesus was being severely criticized by the Pharisees at this time because he was fraternizing with the sinners, with the publicans and the sinners. And they condemned him. They said he has fellowship with them to the extent that he eats with them.

And Jesus told these three parables, all three are saying the same thing. Every one of them says, I came to seek and save that which was lost. Let me say that again. Each of the parables says the same thing. I came to seek and save what was lost. In the first parable, we have the lost sheep, indicative of the loss of safety. In the second parable, we have the lost coin, which is indicative of the loss of usefulness, or perhaps the loss of something that was considered to be valuable because it was maybe a wedding ring. And in the third, we have the loss of the son, which is indicative of loss of fellowship. In the first of these parables, the shepherd seeks the sheep. In the second of these parables, the f the woman seeks after the lost peace.

And in the third of these parables, the father seeks after the son. And I don’t know whether you are this way or not, but I always love a story with a good ending, don’t you? Each of these parables has a beautiful ending. In all of these parables, the sheep is returned to safety, to the safety of the fold. The coin is returned to its usefulness. And the son is returned to the fellowship of his father. And so these things are teaching the central thematic that is common to all three of them. That is, I came to seek and save the lost. I’m interested tonight in the third of these parables. It has some incidental truths in it that I think should be elaborated upon. In the parable of what we call the prodigal, there are some beautiful things that are shown us.

Let me first of all deal with this business of prodigal. When I was first moved to Houston where I’ve been for the past 30 years, the preacher who was before me there was not gone a lot like I am. And so every time I went off to a meeting, I would come back and they’d say, Well, here comes the prodigal. Do you know that the word prodigal doesn’t mean somebody that left and came back? It means somebody that’s wasteful. So they were saying, here comes the old wasteful preacher again. I know they didn’t mean that, but that’s the idea of prodigality. It’s wastefulness. This young man went and wasted his substance with righteous living, the scripture says. And so we have turned him the prodigal son.

1. We See What Sin Is

And it is prodigal, not prodigal. And so we have the prodigal son. I think we see in the prodigal three things, and you may anticipate these with me as you follow along on the sermon tonight. First of all, we see what sin is. And secondly, we see what sin does. And then thirdly, we see the remedy for sin. That will constitute our lesson tonight. And so I invite your scrutiny of the parable of the prodigal. Here is a young man that teaches us what sin is. Sin, ladies and gentlemen, is a selfish choice of one’s own person in preference to God. I should repeat that for emphasis. Sin is a selfish purpose of a selfish choice of one’s own purpose instead of God. It happens in two or three different ways.

First of all, it can be transgression of a law. God says, do something, and I say, I don’t want to do that. And in doing that, I transgress the law. 1 John 2 and 3 says that sin is transgression of the law. In James chapter 4 and verse 17, James says, to him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin. So we see that sin is just a selfish choice of one’s own person in preference to God. God says, do it, I don’t want to do it. God says, don’t do it, I want to do it. And when I make that choice, I bring myself under the condemnation of sin. Now let me say to you, secondly, that sin is a heinous crime against God.

All sin is against God. When we make that selfish choice, we separate ourselves from God. In Isaiah, the 59th chapter in verses 1 and 2, the writer says, The Lord’s hand is not shortened that he cannot reach down to save, neither is his ear heavy that he cannot hear. But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face so that he will not hear. Sin is separates us from God. All right, now, look at this prodigal son. I have a picture of him. You know, technology changes and communication changes, and all kinds of changes come about, but human beings are the same in any generation. They don’t change much. And that’s the case here. You can see this young fellow.

He is put off by the restraints that his father has. And as soon as he reaches the right age, he he becomes bedazzled by the lights of the far country. I have a picture of him. When he sits out on the top of the house, which they did in the Oriental Economy to kind of stay cool, and I think he looked out across the prairies and to the other side of the mountains and saw the twinkling over there of the lights of the far country. And he was bedazzled by the lights of the far country. They mesmerized him. He just wanted to go over there. He liked what he had heard about it. Perhaps the old caravan had come by a time or two on their way to deliver spices to other places, and maybe they would tell him about the far country and what kind of fun you can have over there and what kind of parties you could engage yourself in.

And so he just becomes bedazzled by the lights of the far country. I remember as a young man when my brothers and I went to New York City to do some work. We got into New York City about eleven o’clock at night. We checked in quickly to the Hotel Prince George, and we got our coats on and we went straight to where the Fifth Avenue was. Times Square was our destination. We got there. We were bedazzled by what we saw. Three little kids from West Texas. Here we were looking at lights that cascaded down the side of buildings. We saw lights that were producing effulgences like that. We saw lights that blinked and lights that flickered. We saw lights that wrote in cursive yet. We saw lights that would spread a message across the scene.

We stood there with our mouths open. We saw lights in New York City. And we were absolutely mesmerized, hypnotized by them. The next morning. We got up and we saw that area in the sunshine of God’s light. And last night’s party was there. And last night’s drunk was there. This young fellow was bedazzled by the wrong thing. The old peddler man came by pedaling his wares, and perhaps he took him out to the back down by the creek and showed him some pornographic things, some pictures that you could buy of the lights of the far country drawn by someone who knew about the sins that were over there, and he was kind of fascinated by that. Temptation always leads to sin, people. Temptation is the predicate on which sin is founded.

Sin is the selfish choice. You’re tempted to that. He was bedazzled by the lights of the far country. That’s the way sin is. And so he made a selfish choice. He tells us that sin is selfishness. You’ve got a picture of him? He comes to his dad and he said, I want my stuff, Dad. I’ve come of age now, and I’m ready to go, so give me my stuff. And so he gets his stuff and he starts out. The first thing he does is stop at the first town he comes to, and he goes to the habitasher and he buys him a long flowing cloak, probably crimson, or maybe burgundy or a rich looking velvet. And then he goes to the livery stable and he buys him a chariot.

One with spoke wheels. And then he takes the money and he buys him a beautiful white steed. And he gets all the accouterments, the saddlery that the steed needs. And he gets him a plume on the top of that horse’s head. So it’ll go like this when he walks. And here he comes, folks, into the far country. Here’s the rich young man coming into town. What happens? Groupies. Groupies. You can count on it. The first thing that happens is that everybody that’s in town that’s been partying sees him and they say, Ooh, let’s go over where he is. Where do you want to go today? He says, Well, I got plenty of money. Where would you like to go? Well, let’s go over here. He says, That’s fine.

Let’s go over there. And they’re all excited. He says, No, I don’t want to go over there. And they say, Well, I didn’t want to go over there in the first place. We’ll go where you want to go. And it’s one party right after the other. Sin is separative in nature. He is now going to be separated from his father. He’s separated from everything that has any quality to it. He’s separated from everything that has any real substance to it, something that is measurably good.

2. We See What Sin Does

Here he is in the far country. And he parties it up and has great fun. And then all of a sudden, something happens. There comes a drought. And money becomes scarce. And the first thing you know, he has to go and sell his cloak. And the first thing you know, he can’t ride his chariot anymore because he doesn’t have the money to buy hay. And so he sells the horse and the chariot. And he parties all of that up, and the first thing you know, he is down and out. Scripture says that he wasted his substance on riotous living. Now, I have slightly elongated that sentence. But you must understand that it was something like that. You must understand that his father is brokenhearted because the boy has left everything that has any real meaning to it.

He is gone now. And he went and wasted all of that money, and the first thing you know, he’s in dire straits. Not only can he not find good work that he’s accustomed to doing, but he can’t find any work at all. And to the extent that he has to go and feed pigs. Now I won’t ask you a question. Maybe I assume too much. But I actually assume that this is a young Jewish boy. Do you have any idea what it meant for a young Jewish boy to feed pigs? The pig, ladies and gentlemen, split the hoof, but it did not chew the good. It was an unclean animal. Why do you think Hitler called the Jews pigs during World War II? That’s the point.

It was repulsive to them. Here is a young fellow who’s from a Jewish background, perhaps, and he’s over here in a pig sty. He’s wallowing around with the pigs, and he’s not only feeding the pigs, but he is in such dire straits himself that he has gotten to the point that he would even eat the millet that he feeds to the pigs. Here he is. Big guy. Listen to me, young people. This is the far country. These are the lights that you see twinkling. These are the things that have the glow of fun and activity. I’m telling you, all of us need to understand that whatever shines is not necessarily gold. We need to understand that sin is selfishness, that it results in taking you places that you ought not to go.

And that’s exactly and precisely what has happened to this young fellow. And when he gets over here, he’s in a terrible condition. He’s not only feeding pigs, but he’s ready to eat the stuff that the pigs did eat. And I want to tell you that that’s what sin does. It separates you from good things. It separates you from holiness and piety. It separates you from goodness. It separates you from anything that is high and noble, that is kind and good. It takes you places that you don’t want to go. And it does not stand still. It’s a constant de-escalation. It’s a constant uh di it’s a constant going down. You’re constantly going down. This young fella degraded himself till he is ending up in a pit of putridity.

Do you not see that? That’s where sin takes you. It separates you. It separated this fellow from the fellowship of his father, from the love that is around the hearth.