Latest / Wetumpka Church of Christ Online / God Wants You: The Heart of Luke 15

Transcript

God Wants You: The Heart of Luke 15 · Wetumpka Church of Christ Online

0:10
He. Was like.
0:50
All right, friends, we have 9:00 welcome.
0:54
It's wonderful to see you all. Happy Mother's Day Mother's Day
0:58
to all of our amazing moms and grandmas, our awesome aunties.
1:02
Happy Mother's Day if you have a mom or did have a mom.
1:05
I think that covers pretty much everyone.
1:06
But if it misses someone, we love you too.
1:08
Happy Mother's Day to you too. It's great to see everyone on
1:11
this beautiful Sunday. We are today going to wrap up
1:16
our little mini series, little mini class on Luke 15.
1:20
Thanks again for the opportunity to present this to you.
1:23
I've I've really enjoyed it and I appreciate your kind words of
1:27
encouragement along the way as well.
1:29
So I believe Dwayne should be back next week.
1:31
So he will pick up with the class he was teaching.
1:34
And so we're going to have even better classes ahead.
1:38
So looking forward to that. He has much more learned than I
1:44
am, so I am happy to sit at his feet by all means.
1:48
So let's see a couple of housekeepy things.
1:51
So in case you haven't, some of you haven't been here for the
1:54
last couple of weeks. We have been doing this this
1:56
little mini series here in Luke 15.
1:58
So 2 weeks ago we read through Luke 15 and sort of did the, the
2:03
sort of relatively moderately deep overview, just kind of
2:07
making sure that we were knowing what we're talking about.
2:10
Last week we talked about the attitudes exhibited by the two
2:14
brothers and we talked about older brother spirit and younger
2:16
brother spirit and how both of those attitudes have the same
2:20
root, which is a belief that they can't trust the father and
2:24
A and a fear they have to take care of themselves.
2:27
And that today we're going to wrap up by talking about the
2:31
Father and some of the, the deeper implications of this
2:34
story along the way. We've said that this chapter is
2:40
is written to or sort of was spoken to the scribes and
2:44
Pharisees who were angry that Jesus was associating with
2:47
sinners. My premise, my, my theory is
2:51
that my thesis is that Jesus is he's talking to them, he's
2:57
showing them he's only a mirror to the Pharisees this whole time
3:00
and that they're really the, the focal point and the, the older
3:03
brother in, in my opinion, is the main character of the story.
3:06
We're going to talk some about that today.
3:08
The other thing that we talked about, my other basic premise
3:10
for this class is that Luke 15 is the gospel distilled into one
3:15
chapter. And as such, we can see
3:18
connections and echoes in everything that Jesus taught and
3:20
every interaction that Jesus had with other people.
3:22
So we're going to look at that a little bit today too.
3:24
So as you can tell, this is a bit of an ambitious class today.
3:27
I'll show you my notes here. I'm going to ask that we just
3:32
hold your questions and comments.
3:33
I'm going to try to get through my material and then if we have
3:36
time at the end, I'll be glad to entertain comments.
3:39
But I'm going to get it down to this point and then we'll see if
3:42
we have time for comments. And then I'm going to reserve
3:45
the last word for myself with my last two points here.
3:47
So we're going to get through all this before I will call on
3:49
anyone. So thank you for your patience,
3:51
understanding. The only exception that would be
3:52
like if there's a fire, that's OK.
3:54
You can just you can interrupt me at that point.
3:56
That's fair. OK.
3:58
So again, I record these classes, just FYI, just like to
4:01
let people know that I'm recording if you do speak up.
4:05
So we're going to ask Adam to lead us in a prayer and then
4:07
I'll start the recording and then we'll keep going.
4:09
Thanks. Put your body please.
4:13
Our Father in heaven, we we praise you for all that you do
4:17
for us and we we praise you for all that you have done in the
4:20
sending of your son to die on the cross for our sins.
4:23
We pray, Father, that as we go through this class period this
4:26
morning, as we consider these things from Luke 15, that you
4:29
will help us to ingest them into our hearts and to strive to
4:35
learn from them and to grow from them so that we might be better
4:39
serving some yours. We pray that you be with Peyton
4:41
as he presents them to us, that he will be able to communicate
4:46
well the the things that he has studied and to be able to do it
4:49
in such a way that it will encourage our growth.
4:52
In Jesus name we pray, Amen. Amen.
4:54
Thank you very much. All right, and record, there we
4:59
go. Excellent.
5:00
All right, so first of all, here is a slide with the books that
5:04
I've been referencing over the last couple of weeks.
5:06
As I said before, I'm not here to endorse everything these guys
5:09
said and wrote. I don't know what all they
5:10
believed. I will tell you that I got a lot
5:11
out of these books. It's Will God run by Charles B
5:14
Hodge Junior. It's The Prodigal God by Timothy
5:16
Keller, The Return of the Prodigal Son by Andrey Newen.
5:19
Those were fantastic. I I read them over the years and
5:22
I've really enjoyed them. Abba's child is when I actually
5:24
just read this week by Brendan Manning.
5:27
I gave it three out of five stars.
5:28
There's some good stuff. It's it's not it's not my
5:31
favorite favorite. And there's some doctrinal stuff
5:33
that of course, you know, we would disagree with.
5:36
But I want to give him credit because a lot of what we're
5:39
talking about today kind of was pulled out or inspired by that
5:42
book. So I recommend those, you know,
5:43
chew the meat, spit out the bone, like as you do with
5:45
everything. But those are some of my sources
5:48
as I was doing this study. And I, I just, you know, I'm a
5:53
librarian. I say we're, we can, we can read
5:56
books. We don't have to agree with the
5:57
authors. We don't have to agree with
5:58
everything in the book. We can read it and we can we can
6:00
take good things out of them. Here's something that is really
6:04
kind of interesting to me, as I have, as I've said many times,
6:08
done a deep, deep dive. And then I did what, 12 weeks
6:12
with the teens and 12 weeks with young adults, Three weeks to you
6:15
guys. So I'm in some ways it's that
6:19
paradox that we've talked about a few times.
6:22
I think sometimes we lose sight of the simplicity of this story.
6:24
This is a very simple story and you know, here I am having spun
6:29
12 weeks out of it a couple different times.
6:31
Here I am citing 4 different books that have something to say
6:34
about it. So it's it's, it's both, right?
6:37
It is. There's a lot of meat there.
6:38
There's a lot of complexity. But at the same time, it's a
6:42
very simple story and it's got a very simple point.
6:45
And sometimes I think that if we're not careful, we can lose
6:48
sight of that simplicity. We can intellectualize it to
6:52
death, right? And and I, I kind of have a
6:54
tendency to do that anyway, that this, that's a general of
6:59
weakness of mine. We can dissect it to death and
7:04
there's things we learned by doing that, but it's really kind
7:08
of amazing. We can do that all we want, but
7:11
until we get to the heart of it, then we'll never ever really
7:15
understand it. So we can spend lots of time,
7:19
write lots of words talking about it, going around it, but
7:23
until we get to like the the very, very core, which is just
7:27
three words, then we're not going to understand it.
7:30
All those 3 words are God wants you.
7:33
God wants you. That is the point of Luke 15.
7:36
It's not a situation that this is not a situation Luke 15 or
7:40
our lives, not a situation where God puts up with us.
7:43
It's not a situation where God sort of begrudgingly goes, all
7:47
right, you get one more chance. It's not a situation where God
7:50
is obligated to to do something for us because he's promised us,
7:55
even though he kind of wishes he hadn't promised.
7:56
It's not that at all. It always comes down to he wants
8:00
us and he chooses us. He chooses us as a people.
8:05
He chooses us individually. He created you individually.
8:11
He made a way for you individually to be saved.
8:15
He wants you and your talents and your work ethic and, and
8:19
your experiences and your knowledge and your kindness and
8:24
your understanding and implementation of the the fruit
8:26
of the spirit. He wants you to do those things
8:29
for him in his Kingdom. And sometimes that seems so
8:35
simple that we feel like we have to complicate it.
8:40
And this is something that I'm learning sort of always, but I,
8:44
I've been really trying to, to, to focus on and learn recently
8:48
is that I don't always let myself just sit in that for a
8:54
little bit, right? I, I, I either take it for
8:57
granted and OK, yes, yes, he loves me moving on.
8:59
Or I feel like I have to caveat it.
9:02
He loves me, but I have to obey him.
9:03
He, he, he loves me, but I could still be lost.
9:06
I feel like I have to explain it, ensure those things are
9:11
true, but how often do any of us just rest in the knowledge that
9:17
he loves me, he loves you individually, full stop.
9:26
If we can understand that and metabolize it, if we can
9:30
integrate that into our our lives, our understanding of the
9:33
scripture, our understanding of our relationship with one
9:35
another, If we can fully make that part of our identity.
9:42
I am the beloved of God. This is Brendan Manning put it.
9:46
I am Abba's child. Then at that point, that's when
9:52
faith can move mountains, right? When once you have a a deep and
9:58
thorough understanding of your position as someone that God
10:03
moved heaven and earth to rescue, that God sent his son to
10:08
die for you individually, that God saw the state of your life
10:13
and your soul, and he said, I'm going to do something about
10:16
that. I'm going to sacrifice my son in
10:19
in blood to rescue you, then the rest of what we talk about just
10:24
doesn't matter, right? And until we understand that,
10:26
until we we have that deeply ingrained in us, then we can, we
10:31
can intellectualize the rest of it and it doesn't matter.
10:36
We talked last week about the, the concept of the yoke, where
10:39
Jesus says, take my yoke upon you and my burden is easy.
10:42
I think I'm getting into my words mixed up, but you know, my
10:44
burden is easy. My burden is, is light.
10:46
And we saw said last week, I don't want a burden.
10:49
I don't want a yoke. I want to be free.
10:50
I want to do my own thing. And we talked about last week
10:53
how there is, there's always, there's always going to be a
10:55
yoke. We get a choice of a yoke.
10:57
We can bear the yoke of the master who loves us or we can
11:00
bear the yoke of the the master who abuses us and doesn't care
11:04
about us. But the point is we're not going
11:06
to escape being in service to something.
11:09
When you can understand, integrate, metabolize this
11:13
concept that Jesus loves you personally and purposefully,
11:18
that's when obedience really starts to do its work.
11:22
That that's when we can, as I said a second ago, that's when
11:25
your faith can move mountains. That's when you start saying I
11:28
am willing to do whatever it takes for him because he loves
11:33
me right that that's that's when we can really start to exemplify
11:38
what it means to be a a person of faith.
11:45
This verse John 316 most famous verse of the Bible.
11:48
Definitely a top three famous verse of the Bible.
11:49
We could probably quote it here and now anyone just want to
11:51
shout it out for God to love the world.
11:54
He gave his only begotten Son that whoever believes in him
11:56
should not perish. But I have everlasting life
11:58
that. How often do we just let
12:00
ourselves sit on that verse? We actually, I'll say we in a
12:04
broad sense, I grew up in the church.
12:06
I grew up in a church, you know, in the Church of Christ, in a
12:10
kind of specific Church of Christ culture and context.
12:13
That's maybe not quite the same here, which is a good thing.
12:17
But but I grew up in a context, I'm not going to speak for
12:19
myself. I'm not going to speak for you
12:20
guys. I'm going to speak for this
12:21
congregation. But I grew up in a context where
12:23
whenever we read that verse, we had to immediately start listing
12:27
all the things that it doesn't mean we had to immediately make
12:30
it about baptism. We had to immediately make it,
12:31
well, it says we should not perish, not that we will not be
12:34
like we had to caveat it to death.
12:36
We always had to to make sure that we were super clear and no
12:39
one thought that we were saying anything other than you have to
12:42
be here, believe in professing to be baptized.
12:46
Yes, sure you do. But do we let ourselves just
12:49
read that verse and just accept it at its face value?
12:53
For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son
12:56
that whoever believes in him should not perish and have
12:58
everlasting life. That is personal.
13:01
That's that's to you as an individual and that's to me as
13:05
an individual. So we've spent a lot of time
13:09
focusing on what God's love doesn't mean it, you know, it
13:12
doesn't mean that you get it out of jail free card.
13:15
It doesn't mean that there's no consequences.
13:17
It doesn't mean that you can just believe and not have to be
13:19
baptised. But we don't spend a lot of time
13:21
just saying it's true. He he just loves me and he just
13:26
offers me salvation and he just saves me because he wants to,
13:32
because he wants me. And that is one of many things
13:37
that Luke 15 is about South. Luke 15 is, as we said earlier,
13:42
it's two, it's four. It's about the Pharisees.
13:46
And the tragedy of it is that that pharisaical attitude will
13:49
never understand right? It, it, it's, it's written to a
13:53
people who until they sort of get past their mindset of I have
14:00
to put everything in a framework of rules.
14:02
I have to put everything in a framework of making sure that
14:06
other people are excluded. I have to make sure that we've
14:08
covered all of our bases. Until they can get past that,
14:11
they're never going to understand it.
14:12
That's to the people he was speaking to at that time.
14:15
I believe that's us again today as well, until they lay aside
14:20
their intellectualism and their superiority, until they just
14:24
accept the words that we all learned when we were tiny little
14:27
babies. Jesus loves me.
14:29
This I know, for the Bible tells me so little ones to him belong.
14:33
They are weak, but he is strong. Those are some of those profound
14:35
words in the English language and they're so simple.
14:38
I love that, that middle verse. They are weak, but he is strong.
14:40
We see that in this chapter as well, right?
14:43
Until we just accept that and sort of stop and pause there for
14:49
a little bit, we're not going to understand it.
14:51
Once you've done that, then yes, you can move into all the other
14:55
conversations that we need to have.
14:57
But it starts by putting aside your intellectual part just for
15:03
a moment, and just understanding his love for you.
15:09
So I, I kind of call out the Pharisees here.
15:12
Jesus does. This whole class is calling up
15:14
Pharisees, both Pharisees of this time and the Pharisees of
15:17
our time. But it is possible that that
15:19
some of them did change, right. We we have Paul is the ultimate
15:23
example of a of a man who who changed who was able to move
15:29
past the rigid framework of the rules of the pharisaical order
15:35
and into the understanding that God loves him and saves him.
15:40
And you know, he has an additional benefit that that we
15:44
don't in that that Jesus, he literally kind of stepped in and
15:48
said, I'm picking you and you're coming with me.
15:51
He had the choice to make. But but Paul did it right.
15:54
Paul was able to move past that pharisaical attitude and then he
15:57
became the great writer of the New Testament.
16:00
So it's possible. It was possible for the
16:03
Pharisees of Jesus day. It's possible for those of us
16:06
with pharisaical attitudes today.
16:07
So when we look at Luke 15, we can see that again, it's to the
16:12
the Pharisees, but it's an invitation to the Pharisees.
16:16
So bear with me for a moment as we go back and read some things
16:19
that we've already read in this class.
16:21
And we're going to look at it kind of through through this
16:23
angle. I'll go ahead and give you the
16:26
spoiler. Here's what we're building to.
16:28
We we always point to the shepherd, the woman, the Father
16:32
as representatives of God. Absolutely true. 100% part of
16:36
the story. Yeah, that's no, no problem with
16:38
that. That's what Jesus is doing.
16:40
And also what he's doing is he's inviting the Pharisees to
16:45
compare themselves to the the shepherd and the woman and the
16:48
father. He's inviting them to come into
16:52
a, a life where they behave like the shepherd, the woman and the
16:55
father, right? So it's both of those things.
16:57
It's a representative of God. And he's also saying you also
17:00
can do this, if you will. So let's look at chapter 15 and
17:05
verse four. He says, what man of you having
17:07
100 sheep, if he loses one of them does not leave the 99 in
17:10
the wilderness and go after the one which is lost until he finds
17:12
it. Look at the way he starts it.
17:14
What man of you would not do this?
17:15
And we said two weeks ago, or I said, I'm not a shepherd.
17:19
I don't really fully relate to this.
17:21
I think I would be tempted to leave the one out in the field
17:24
and or in the wilderness and then just count my 99 as good.
17:29
But I don't, I don't claim to have any understanding of that
17:33
agrarian culture. But whatever the case, he says
17:38
what many of you would not do this.
17:40
The implication is that they, they would do that, right?
17:44
That they, they would. Or even if those Pharisees,
17:46
those really important learned intellectual men, even if they
17:50
wouldn't get their hands dirty out there with their sheep,
17:52
maybe they have brothers, maybe they have cousins.
17:55
Maybe they have, you know, people that they know in their
17:57
lives that are shepherds. So they can they can understand
17:59
that if we move down to verse 8 or what woman having 10 silver
18:03
coins, if she loses one coin does not light a lamp, sweep the
18:06
house and search carefully until she finds it again.
18:09
What we said two weeks ago from my study is that the coins are
18:14
not just the household money, but it was would actually
18:16
represent an heirloom or part of the the the dowry of the wife.
18:21
And it would be 10 coins that would she would wear as a
18:24
necklace that would count as both, again, heirloom and also
18:28
ultimate rainy day fund. And so losing one of those coins
18:31
is not just I lost some money, but it's I lost something that's
18:34
got a lot of emotional and relational value to me.
18:39
So when he says or what woman having 10 silver coins, is he
18:42
inviting them to think of their own wives?
18:45
Is he saying you, you, you know, you know, if your wife lost one
18:48
of her, her coins off of her necklace that she would search
18:51
for? He's he's putting it into their
18:53
lives, right? In both of these situations,
18:56
he's, he's making them think about themselves, their
18:59
households, their families and how they would react to, to
19:02
these lost things. And then that is obviously also
19:08
what he's doing here with the sons.
19:10
He doesn't, he does shift gears, right?
19:12
And then the first two, then the, the sheep and the coin, he
19:15
does say, hey, wouldn't you do this or wouldn't you know
19:18
someone who would do this? And then this the the prodigal
19:21
son story. He then he moves in.
19:24
He doesn't like explicitly compare.
19:25
He just says a certain man had two sons, the younger than said
19:28
to his father, father, give me the portion of goods that falls
19:30
to me. So I believe what he's doing
19:33
here. And again, this is Peyton's
19:34
opinion. I'm you know, we can discuss if
19:37
if there's another angle here. But I believe what he's doing
19:41
here is he's inviting them. He's telling them the story and
19:43
he's inviting them to think about how do you react, react
19:46
when it's your sons. Now, as we said a couple of
19:49
weeks ago, there's nobody in this time and probably not in
19:53
ours who's going to be like, yeah, let me just, you know,
19:55
divvy up my inheritance passive. So.
19:56
So this father is already kind of doing something more than
20:01
than probably anyone would. So we can put that one aside for
20:05
a second. But when he continues the story
20:08
and and he builds the situation of the one son who goes and
20:11
wastes everything, the one son who's staying at home and is not
20:15
living a life of he's living a life of obedience, but he
20:18
doesn't have any heart. He doesn't have any gratitude.
20:20
When it gets down to the interactions between the the
20:23
father and the sons, I think what Jesus is doing is he's
20:26
inviting them. What do you do if this is your
20:29
son? What do you do if it's your son
20:31
who has wasted your your living, who has gone out into the the
20:35
wilderness, who has disgraced the family and ended up in the
20:38
pigpen? And he comes back.
20:40
This father, Jesus says, runs to meet him and grabs him and
20:45
restores him to his former place.
20:47
What do you do when that's your child who's doing that?
20:53
That's not me asking you, that's that's Jesus asking the
20:55
Pharisees and by extension all of us.
20:57
Then when you have the other son who is hard hearted, bitter,
21:02
angry, not able to even experience the joy of a reunion,
21:09
how do you react to that son? Is what Jesus is saying.
21:12
Do you go talk to him with with kindness and tenderness and
21:17
love? Do you just cut him off?
21:20
Do you just say you need to pull yourself together and get back
21:22
in here and be part of the family?
21:24
Jesus is showing us an example of what it means to be the
21:28
Father. So yeah, the father of the story
21:29
is the father is Jesus, but it's also an invitation to us.
21:33
How do we react when our loved ones or when our church members,
21:37
when our neighbors do these things, How do we respond to
21:42
them and again, as I've said many times throughout this
21:46
class, these things are echoed through all of Jesus other
21:50
teachings. I want to look at a couple right
21:53
now if I can get my there's Luke's in the reputation.
21:56
All right, let's look at Luke Chapter 7 and this is going to
22:03
these two passages I'm going to submit to you as evidence of, of
22:08
my my claims that this is not something that's just just
22:13
relegated to Luke 15. It's not just about this one
22:16
story, it's about the whole gospel.
22:18
Luke 7 starting in verse 36. Then one of the Pharisees asked
22:25
him to eat with him and he went to the Pharisees house and sat
22:28
down to eat. And behold, a woman in the city
22:30
was a Sinner. When she knew that Jesus sat at
22:32
the table in the Pharisees house, she brought an alabaster
22:36
flask of fragrant oil and stood at his feet behind him, weeping.
22:39
And she began to wash his feet with her tears and wiped them
22:42
with her hair, with the hair of her head, and she kissed his
22:45
feet and anointed them with a fragrant oil.
22:48
Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he spoke
22:51
to himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would know
22:53
who and what manner of woman this is who is touching him, for
22:56
she's a Sinner. And Jesus answered and said to
22:59
him, Simon, I have something to say to you.
23:01
So he said, Teachers say it, There was a certain creditor who
23:05
had two debtors, 1 owed 500 an Ari and the other 50, and when
23:08
they had nothing with which to repay, he freely forgave them
23:11
both. Tell me therefore, which of them
23:13
will love him more? Simon answered and said, I
23:15
suppose the one whom he forgave more.
23:18
He said to him, You have rightly judged.
23:20
Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, Do you see this
23:23
woman? I entered your house.
23:24
You gave me no water for my feet, but she has washed my feet
23:27
with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head.
23:29
You gave me no kiss, but this woman has not ceased to kiss my
23:32
feet since the time I came in. You do not anoint my head with
23:35
oil, but this woman has anointed my feet with fragrant oil.
23:37
Therefore I say to you, her sins, which are many, are
23:40
forgiven, for she loves much, but to whom little is forgiven,
23:44
the same loves little. And he said to her, your sins
23:47
are forgiven. And those who sat at the table
23:49
with him began to say to themselves, who is this?
23:51
Who even forgives sins? Then he said to the woman, Your
23:54
faith has saved you go in peace. So there's a lot of parallels
24:00
here with the younger brother especially well, and Simon shows
24:04
some parallels with the older brother as well.
24:07
It tells us there in verse 36, this is one of the Pharisees,
24:09
right? Simon's a Pharisee.
24:11
He's he's got this, this mindset of superiority.
24:17
He's he's an elite. He knows the law.
24:20
He's inviting Jesus to his house.
24:22
Maybe this is a Pharisee who is maybe a little more receptive.
24:25
He he's willing to entertain Jesus.
24:27
I don't know what his, all of his motives are, but then it
24:30
tells us that a woman of the city who was a Sinner came to
24:33
his house. And then she does this elaborate
24:37
and emotional act of service to Jesus.
24:41
And of course the Pharisee, Simon, he says, oh, if, if Jesus
24:45
knew who this lady was who's at his feet, then he wouldn't, He
24:49
would not like the fact that she's touching him.
24:52
So many things here. First of all, well, Simon, she's
24:55
in your house and you seem to know what kind of Sinner she is
24:59
and you don't seem to care that she's in your house.
25:01
You're kind of embarrassed that she's touching Jesus, but you're
25:04
letting her come into your house and and hang out with your
25:07
company. So there's, there's a red flag
25:09
there for me, right? He, he's apparently OK with her
25:12
in some contexts, but he's not OK with her being around Jesus.
25:16
That's not cool. We also have this is really I, I
25:21
love it when the Bible gives these little Nuggets.
25:23
So Luke here, he just says this woman's a Sinner.
25:26
He doesn't say what she is. He doesn't say she's a
25:28
prostitute. He doesn't say that she's a
25:30
thief. He doesn't say that she's an
25:32
alcoholic. He doesn't say that she's been
25:34
out there murdering last six husbands.
25:36
He just says she's a Sinner. And that's what happens with the
25:41
prodigal son, right? He goes and he wastes his
25:42
substance on riotous living, but it never tells us what that
25:45
involves. And then the older brother, if
25:46
you remember, at the end of Luke 15, the older brother is the one
25:48
who says he's been out here wasting your living with
25:51
harlots. He's the one who puts the
25:53
harlots into it. But the Bible doesn't tell us
25:55
that's what's happening here. This woman is a Sinner.
25:58
That's all that matters. It doesn't matter what her sin
26:01
is. It doesn't matter to us anyway.
26:04
That's not the point. The point is she recognized her
26:09
sin. She came to Jesus.
26:12
She recognized who he was. She recognized the love that he
26:14
was offering to her, and she reacted.
26:17
And then the Pharisee reacted to that act of love with an act of
26:23
dismissal and judgement, right. That's again, you see the older
26:28
brother there. It's that older brother attitude
26:30
we talked about last week. Jesus then as always, just knows
26:34
how to handle the situation. So he is going to honour Simon
26:38
with, with the teaching. You know, these, these guys,
26:40
they, they loved debate, discussion, intellectual deep
26:45
dives that they wanted to like, you know, really get into the
26:48
nitty gritty of the law. And so when, when Jesus is like,
26:52
hey, Simon, I have something to say to you.
26:53
And he's going to present what in one sense might be kind of a
26:56
Riddle, but it's definitely like a, you know, it's an invitation
26:59
to a teaching. And when he's like, Hey, there's
27:01
this creditor had two people that owed him money and one owed
27:04
a lot and one owed a little. So Simon is sort of like, Oh,
27:07
I'm so special. I have this this teacher in my
27:10
house. And maybe Simon's going, oh, I'm
27:12
one of the cool Pharisees who's like actually listening to
27:14
Jesus. And now this great teacher that
27:16
all these people love is going to honour me with a lesson.
27:19
And then Jesus is like, I have a lesson for you, but it's not the
27:24
one that you want. It's this woman is showing
27:29
greater faith than you. She's understanding the love
27:33
that Ioffer in a way that you and all of your wisdom and
27:37
intellect are not understanding. Let's also look at John chapter
27:46
8, verses 2 through 12. As you're turning there, I'm
27:55
going to get myself situated. John chapter 8, starting in
28:05
verse 2. Now early in the morning He came
28:07
again to the temple, and all the people came to Him, and he sat
28:10
down and taught them. Then the scribes and Pharisees
28:12
brought to Him a woman caught in adultery.
28:14
And when they had set her in the midst, they said to him,
28:16
Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery in the very act.
28:19
Now Moses in the law commanded us that such should be stoned.
28:22
But what do you say? This they said, testing Him,
28:24
that they might have something of which to accuse Him.
28:26
But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with his finger,
28:29
as though he did not hear. And when they continued asking
28:31
him, he raised himself up and said to them, He who is without
28:34
sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first.
28:36
And again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.
28:39
Then those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience,
28:41
went out one by one, beginning with the oldest, even to the
28:44
last. And Jesus was left alone, and
28:46
the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had raised himself up
28:49
and saw no one but the woman, he said to her, Woman, where are
28:51
those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?
28:54
She said, No one, Lord. And Jesus said to her, Neither
28:57
do I condemn you. Go and sin.
28:59
No more than Jesus spoke to them again, saying, I am the light of
29:02
the world. He who follows me shall not walk
29:04
in darkness, but have the light of life.
29:07
So here we have the Pharisees, very concerned about morality,
29:11
very concerned about the integrity of the body.
29:14
They, they want to be right. They want to make sure that
29:18
immoral and dirty and sinful people are dealt with.
29:23
But is that coming from a place of service, obedience and love
29:26
to God? Or is that coming from a place
29:29
of hatred and cruelty and being right?
29:33
You know the answer as well as I Jesus knows the answer.
29:35
That's why Jesus doesn't fall into their trap.
29:37
They're trying to get Jesus. This is not about, we're trying
29:40
to, we're not concerned about this woman.
29:42
We're not concerned about her sin.
29:44
We're not concerned about the the man she was sinning with.
29:46
We're wanting to get Jesus and we are willing to sacrifice this
29:50
woman to do it right. They were very concerned about
29:53
morality, but they were not concerned about the purpose of
29:57
the law or the way that they could serve God or the way that
30:00
they could help anyone. So they're trying to they're
30:03
trying to trap Jesus in in a statement.
30:07
And of course, as always, he's one step ahead of them, several
30:10
steps ahead of them. He he tells them, whoever among
30:14
you is sinless, you get the first whack and that's that
30:20
causes them to think they they all move away.
30:23
He says, woman, where are those accusers of yours says no one
30:25
condemned you and she says no one.
30:27
He says neither do I condemn you go and sin no more.
30:30
So here we have the go and sin no more is a key part here.
30:34
This is not just Jesus saying hey, it's OK to sin like hey,
30:36
put it what you want to do. He he's he's recognizing the
30:39
situation. He's recognizing this is not
30:41
about their concern for her soul or her, their concern for her as
30:46
a person. But he also doesn't just say
30:50
that the sin is OK. He, he, he forgives her and he
30:53
says you're going to go change now, you're going to go be a
30:56
different person. That's again, that's what the
30:58
father in Luke 15 does when he accepts the son back.
31:02
It's with the, it's the understanding that the son is a
31:06
different person than he was before the, the, the returning
31:09
home for the prodigal son was the repentance.
31:11
So we're not saying that repentance is not necessary.
31:14
That's what Jesus is teaching here.
31:15
The repentance is necessary that you you have to you have to stop
31:19
whatever it is that that's holding you back.
31:23
And I think that sometimes we we've kind of missed this verse
31:26
12. I think we often end it with
31:28
neither do I condemn you go into no more.
31:30
But verse 12 Jesus spoke to them again saying I am the light of
31:33
the world. He who follows me shall not walk
31:35
in darkness but have the light of life.
31:37
He's talking about repentance and this is Peyton's opinion.
31:40
But that verse is the exact same thing as Luke 15 and verse 32.
31:46
It was right that we should make merry and be glad for your
31:48
brother was dead and is alive again and was lost and is found.
31:51
He's saying that those who follow me follow me in the
31:55
light. They are changed, they are
31:57
transformed. They're something better over
32:01
here. Back in in Luke 15.
32:02
He says you were dead and now you're alive.
32:04
And that's a good thing. So again, it's the same message
32:07
throughout. But I do want us to do a little
32:09
thought experiment here on John chapter 8 where this woman
32:12
caught in adultery, because I think we all get it.
32:15
I think we understand. I, I know you guys, I trust you
32:18
guys, I know you get it. But I also want us to just lean
32:23
in a little more, just really examine our own hearts.
32:26
It's easy for us when we read this story.
32:29
First of all, we know we've known it since we were little
32:31
kids. We, we, we, we've heard it
32:32
taught many, many times. We, we get it.
32:36
So sometimes when you, when you approach a scripture that you've
32:38
heard your entire life, it is sometimes hard to, to approach
32:42
it with new eyes. So I want us to think though,
32:46
what if this was a different situation?
32:48
What if this was not a woman caught in adultery?
32:52
I'm, I'm not talking about the legalities here.
32:55
I'm not talking about like crime and punishment.
32:58
I'm talking about our attitudes towards sin.
33:00
If this was a story of a, a drug addict caught in a drug deal,
33:06
would we be compassionate? Would we side with Jesus with
33:11
his reaction? If this was a story of a woman
33:15
found about to or having an abortion, how do we react?
33:22
Do do we have the same heart of compassion that Jesus has here?
33:26
If this was a man caught in homosexuality, how do we react
33:31
to that? Do we have the same amount of
33:33
compassion? Again, I'm not talking about
33:34
what's I mean, I'm not saying sin is not sin.
33:37
I'm saying do we see like the Pharisees saw?
33:42
Do we see the sin or do we see like Jesus saw a person trapped
33:48
and hurting in situations that sure they had choices in but
33:53
have maybe gone out of their control?
33:55
Do we see someone who needs to understand that God loves him or
34:00
her personally, or do we focus on the things they're doing
34:05
wrong, the things that we have to keep ourselves clean from?
34:08
Are we putting ourselves in that Pharisaical situation where
34:11
Jesus is eating with sinners or are we putting ourselves in
34:15
Jesus issues, which is whatever you've done, however far you've
34:19
gone off track, I will eat with you and I will love you and I
34:23
will show you what it means to be faithful and obedient.
34:29
I believe that all of this is what's happening in Luke 15 as
34:33
Jesus is talking to the Pharisees and He's saying, when
34:38
your son comes from the far country, tattered, wasted your
34:43
living, nowhere else to go, what's your response?
34:48
When your son is working diligently in your fields but
34:52
has a heart of stone and doesn't understand what it means to be
34:56
loving or joyous, how do you respond?
34:59
He's giving them the opportunity to put themselves in His shoes.
35:06
Let me make sure I'm saying everything I wanted to say.
35:10
Pharisees only see the sin. Jesus sees the Sinner.
35:14
When faced with these scenarios, do we side with the Pharisees in
35:17
their disgust or do we side with Jesus in His compassion?
35:21
So back in Luke 15 again, I want to point out as well that two
35:25
things about the Father. Again, this is true of God the
35:28
Father and this is true of us as we're exhibiting that Father
35:32
attitude. You don't have to be a father to
35:35
exhibit this attitude. I'm not a dad, but I, I try to,
35:38
our wonderful moms out there here also have the opportunity
35:41
to, to give this, this attitude as well.
35:44
So this is, again, it's showing us who God is and it's also
35:48
showing us who we can be and who we should be.
35:52
The father in this story suffers greatly, right?
35:56
Every, every part of the story is him suffering.
35:59
He has two sons, neither of whom truly understand what it means
36:04
to be his son, who neither of them really understand the love
36:08
that he has for them. He has the one son who
36:12
basically, as we said a couple of weeks ago, basically says, I
36:14
would rather you were dead. I would rather have your money
36:17
than have a relationship with you.
36:19
He's got the other son who again is diligent and stalwart and
36:24
dead inside. He loses them both.
36:27
He loses one to the far country and we get the impression as it
36:30
tells us what is the verse 20 or so.
36:32
He rose and came to his father. The son came to his father when
36:35
he was still a great way off. His father saw him and had
36:36
compassion. We get the impression that this
36:39
man is waiting for his son every single day, waiting at the the
36:45
door for him to come back, just longing for his return.
36:49
This man is suffering. This man is losing sleep, he's
36:54
lost his fortune, he's lost his child, and yet when the son
36:59
comes back, it's 'cause for celebration.
37:02
So I'll take it back. I did say there's suffering
37:03
throughout there. He does have that celebration
37:05
that that's really good. I stand corrected.
37:08
And then the he, he suffers the pain and loss of seeing his
37:11
other son in pain and and loss himself.
37:17
But here's the other thing too. Every action that the father
37:19
takes in this entire story is an act of sacrifice.
37:21
He sacrifices his money. He sacrifices even though again,
37:25
I'm sort of reading into it, this isn't specified.
37:27
He sacrifices his sleep, right? He sacrifices his well-being as
37:30
he's worried about his son. When the son comes back and he
37:33
runs down the road to meet him, he sacrifices his dignity,
37:36
right? He sacrifices his place as a as
37:39
a wealthy and prominent and important guy.
37:42
He sacrifices A calf literally like he says, we're going to
37:45
we're going to sacrifice this calf that we've been wait that
37:48
we've been holding back for a special time.
37:50
We're going to celebrate now with you.
37:54
He sacrifices when he leaves the party, even when he when he
37:57
walks out the back door from the celebration, he's leaving behind
38:00
something that he wants to do, which is celebrate with his son
38:03
to go talk to their son. Every act of the father in this
38:05
entire story is an act of sacrifice.
38:09
So that means, and this is a, a tall order, this is something
38:12
that the Pharisees had a hard time understanding.
38:15
This is something we have a hard time understanding.
38:18
This means that to be like the father means that you are going
38:21
to suffer, but you're going to let the suffering turn you
38:26
towards compassion. We're all going to suffer.
38:30
Those Pharisees suffered whether or not they they chose to be
38:33
like, like God, You're, you're going to suffer, but to be like
38:37
the father means you're suffering, turns you towards
38:39
love, turns you towards compassion, turns you towards
38:43
kindness and tenderness. To be like the father also means
38:46
that we're going to sacrifice. We're going to sacrifice what is
38:49
dear to us. We're going to sacrifice again,
38:52
sleep, dignity, time. We're, we're going to give
38:55
things up because we understand that the, the people, the
39:02
situations we're giving them up for are so much more important.
39:07
I don't know if this is going to let me zoom in or not.
39:10
I don't think it will. Oh, it does.
39:11
Nice. This is a, this is a detail from
39:16
a larger work. This is the return of the
39:18
prodigal by Gustav Dore French. I think he he was a woodcut
39:25
artist. It's kind of amazing.
39:26
The, the whole piece is, is lovely, but I, I love this.
39:29
So I just kind of cropped. I just zoomed into crops.
39:31
You could see really well the the father and the son.
39:34
I love the depiction here that this son is returning home.
39:38
Obviously artistic rendering, he's returning home and you get
39:41
the impression that he has gone as far as he can go before
39:46
collapsing and that the father is swooping in to meet him
39:49
before he hits the ground, right, that the father is
39:51
catching him as he's about to to collapse.
39:55
So I love the posture. I love you can see look at the
39:59
the motion of the of the. The cloth there, his Cape, you
40:04
can see this is this is an action shot.
40:07
He's in movement. You can see, look at his face.
40:10
Look at that father's face of gratitude and love and just
40:16
ecstasy that his son has returned.
40:19
And the other thing that I love is look at their hands.
40:23
Look at look at the son's hands on his father's shoulders.
40:26
He is holding on for dear life. And then look at the the
40:31
father's hands. Look at look at him gripping his
40:33
forearm, look at him gripping his back.
40:34
That is a father who is not letting go.
40:38
I love this representation of the story because this shows
40:40
exactly what we're talking about.
40:42
That father wants that son. Your father wants you.
40:49
As I've said a few times already, he's moved heaven and
40:52
earth to get you. Now you have to decide what
40:56
you're going to do with that beautiful timing.
41:00
All right, sorry, no time for comments or questions.
41:02
I am going to, like I said, reserve the last word for myself
41:04
as I make my last point. Please come talk to me after
41:08
because I love, I love this conversation and I would love to
41:10
hear what you had to say that we didn't get to.
41:14
So what happens next? One of the famous things about
41:17
Luke 15 is that the story just stops that, that Jesus ends it
41:21
with the Father's words to the older son.
41:24
And whereas there was a closure with the sheep and the coin and
41:27
the other brother, with this older brother, we don't know
41:31
what happens. Like he just, he ends it with
41:33
the verse that we read earlier. It was right that we should make
41:37
Mary and be glad if your brother was dead and is alive again and
41:39
was lost and is found. So if this was like ATV show,
41:42
there would be that scene with him standing in the backyard
41:44
having that conversation and then it'd fade to black and then
41:46
credits would roll and then we would be like, that's so
41:48
unsatisfying. We want to know what happens
41:49
next. Like what, what did what did the
41:51
brothers say to that? Well, I, I think that's the
41:54
point. I think that that what I think
41:57
that there's at least two things happening here.
41:59
One of them is that Jesus is putting us once again in the
42:03
shoes of that older brother, right?
42:06
Where he, he's making us think, Oh, how do I respond to that?
42:10
Right? He's, he's, he's making us sort
42:13
of consider what, what, what would I do in that situation?
42:16
This is kind of the same thing as God in the garden when he
42:19
says, Adam, where are you? He, he knows where he is, but
42:22
he's making Adam think and, and step up.
42:26
So I think that's that's for sure part of what's happening
42:28
here. But the other thing here is that
42:32
this story just doesn't end. It never ends for any of us,
42:36
right? So we wanted to be like a nice
42:38
little bow with everyone lives happily ever after.
42:41
But in reality, what happens in this family is the same thing
42:44
that probably happens in our families, which is that they,
42:49
they struggle and they try and they work and they learn and
42:52
they grow and they relapse and they repent and they try again
42:55
and they forgive each other again.
42:57
And then they wander some more and then they struggle some
42:59
more. And then they have to learn
43:00
lessons they've already learned 6 times already and they have to
43:03
just keep working at it. That's life.
43:07
That that's, that's the life of a Christian.
43:09
Being a Christian doesn't mean that it's just suddenly fixed.
43:11
We all know that. I hear the announcements and I
43:14
know what goes on in everyone's lives.
43:16
I don't know what goes on in everyone's lives.
43:18
I I know that some of the hardships that we all face,
43:22
that's just the way it works. So it's open-ended A so that we
43:25
can put ourselves in the brother's shoes and think about
43:28
how we respond. But it's open-ended also because
43:30
there is not an end because it's always refinement and growth and
43:34
learning. So Jesus at the end of Luke 15
43:38
brings us to the crossroads and he leaves us to make a choice.
43:44
I can't do any better than him, so that's what I offer to you as
43:47
well. Thank you.