that he finds through his father. And remember the purpose of a parable. What's the purpose of the parable? It is to teach a point. It's to teach through a story an obvious point. So it's important that we remember as we're reading this that we're not reading a literal account. We are reading a story that Jesus is telling. And what did we say this story is about? True repentance and true faith in Christ and the forgiveness of God. That's what this story teaches us. We saw the act of a loving father. who when the son was returning, we saw him out and looking at the horizon to see if his son was coming. And when he saw his son, what did the father do? He got up and he ran. He ran to his son and he hugged him. He fell into his arms and he kissed him. And then the word I shared with you in the last message is he smothered him. with kisses, depicting the love of God the Father. You know, what came before this was the fact that the Pharisees had been rebuking, or not rebuking Jesus, but they had been murmuring about Jesus that this man eats with sinners. And Jesus is preaching the point. And the point is this, that God came to save sinners. That's what he came to save, sinners. And so we see the younger son as one who had fallen away and fallen deep into sin, and then it is there in the pig pen, it is there, he goes from repentance and he goes to being restored. We see the loving father come and love his son. He didn't tell him, oh, you didn't do this, or oh, I told you so this was gonna happen. He embraced him and he forgave him, but there's another character. And there's the older brother. And we're gonna look at the older brother today, the proud son. And here are some things that we should be considering in terms of differences between the two brothers. Both knew the father and were raised in the father's house. Both received their inheritance, by the way, when the younger son asked. I hope you catch that. The younger son went to the father and said, give me what's mine now. It was a way in that culture to basically say, I can't wait for you to die, I want my money now. So the father gave it to both of them. which meant that the older brother would get 2 3rds of the father's inheritance and the younger brother would get 1 3rd. And we don't see anything in the story where the older brother protested, saying, no, no, no, don't give it to him, he took it too, right? The older brother never leaves. He stays with the father after receiving his inheritance. We know that the younger son took his inheritance and he squandered it with what the Bible says with loose living, which is defining immorality. He was running around. But the younger son repents, returns, and is restored to full sonship by the father. And in his repentance, the younger son said, I'm not even worthy to be called your son. Make me as one of your hired servants, right? Today we're gonna see something rather incredible. The older son is repulsed by the forgiveness of the father to the younger son and refuses to participate in the celebration of the younger son's return. And the older son, we're gonna see, despite his working, was seeking rewards for being faithful to his father. I want you to make note of that. And there's one other thing that I wanna share with you guys. The parable does not end with, and they lived happily ever after. It just hangs out there after the encounter with the older son. So let's look in the scripture, Luke 15, and we're gonna pick up with verse 25, and let's take a look at the older son, the proud son. Verse 25. Sorry. My fingers are stuck. Okay, verse 25. Now his older son was in the field when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. Now what's the scene, just for context? What had transpired? The younger son came back, he was filthy, he was dirty, the father runs to meet him, the father says take off those filthy clothes, put on him festal robes, right, put a ring on his finger showing that he's restored to full Full sonship, he tells his servant, he said, get the fatted calf, kill the fatted calf, invite everybody, we're gonna have a party. This son of mine is back, he's back alive. Praise God, hallelujah. And the older son is in the field. He doesn't know any of this is coming on. And we pick up in verse 25. where he writes, and the older son was in the field, and when he came and approached the house, he heard the music and dancing. Now, there's a few things we can glean from the text. Number one, in the field, what was he doing? Well, as an older son, as a son of a rich one, he wasn't actually doing the work. He was supervising the work. He was supervising the workers in the field, right? So he is doing what he should be doing for his business. And we look at the text and we see, and when he came, where was he coming? He's coming in from the field. He's approaching the home and he hears all this commotion, all this music and dancing, right? And he goes and he gets a servant and he inquires from the servant, what is all this noise about? Now I mentioned this before and I gotta mention it again. What was the purpose of the parable? The purpose of the parable was a response to the Pharisees grumbling about Jesus and saying, this man eats. with sinners, and he received sinners. Now, I wanna say something to you. There's a big misunderstanding, I hear this all the time, where people say, well, Jesus hung out with sinners. He hung out with the pimps and the prostitutes. He hung, he did not hang out. He did not fellowship. They were not his best friends. but he did not shun the sinner. You see, the Pharisees shunned the sinners. The Pharisees would look at a person, whatever they thought was a person of not a good reputation, and they would push them off. The Pharisees would walk down the marketplace, pulling their robes together, lest in the midst of the crowd, they would rub up against a sinner. They would rub up against somebody who they thought was not good, not righteous, but not Christ. And we need to be very thankful for that. Because Christ would have never rubbed up against us if he had the mind of the Pharisees. Because I don't know about everybody else, but some of us weren't of great report and great reputation, right? So this whole parable is a response to that. Oh, he eats with sinners. Jesus was eating with sinners because he was invited to eat. But what was Jesus doing? He wasn't drinking and doing all the other different things. He was spreading the gospel. And what's the implication for us? Listen, it's okay to have unsafe friends, as long as we don't act like unsafe people. It's okay to be able to be with our unsafe family, as long as what they see is Jesus Christ in us. The minute they see something other than that, we tarnish the reputation of the Lord and we make it that much more difficult. for people to see Christ in us. You know, the Pharisees placed demanding standards upon the people. In Matthew 23, 13, the Lord issues a few rebukes, but I just wanna read two of them to you, found in Matthew 23, verse 13 and verse 23. Listen to what he says to the Pharisees. But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees and hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of heaven from men, for you do not enter in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering in to go in. In Matthew 23, verse 23, it says, Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees and hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law, justice and mercy and faithfulness. But these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. And may I add something? When we act that way, we become scribes and Pharisees ourselves. Right? When we start making the surface judgments, when we start doing all these others, we act the same way as the scribes and the Pharisees. Right? There's another thing we could take a look at here, verse 25. It says, now when the oldest son came into the field, he came and he approached the house and he heard the music and dancing. This is critical that we understand verse 25 because it is the music and the dancing in the house of the Father. that is representative of the joy every single time a sinner repents. Why were they having music? Why were they having dancing? It was because the son who the father thought was dead was now alive and that in and of itself is worthy. I want you to note that little word, in the house, in the house. because this is where the joy is taking place. Look at verse 26. And this is the older son, and he summoned one of the servants and began inquiring what these things might be. Now, I want you to note, right, where's the noise taking place? In the house. Where is the older son? Outside the house. He has not gone in. Now you would have thought that maybe he would have peeked in out of curiosity to see what was going on. But what does he do instead? Rather than go in, he summons a servant, right? And this would be a child servant because some of the older adults were in there. He summons a servant. He won't go in. He wants to understand what's going on. Right, and it says here in verse 26, he began inquiring, it's an interesting word, that word inquiring in the Greek. What it actually means is he began to basically pepper him with questions. So basically he calls him over, what's going on? Tell me what's going on, what's all the noise for? And he's peppering the servant with questions. Right? As to what's going on. But note, still, he does not enter in. He does not go in. Look at verse 27. And he said to him, this is the servant now speaking, your brother has come home and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has received him back safe and sound. The child servant shares with him the news of the brother's return, which is the reason for the party, right? Now you would think, oh, that would be good news. But you're gonna see that it's not good news. It's not good news. He also adds to it, not only did he return, but he tells him how he returned. He returned safe and sound, right? So not only did he come back, but he came back and he's okay. He's okay. And so the father is gonna have this party. As a matter of fact, that term safe and sound means that he returned back whole, complete, right? And this text conveys a powerful message that the Father has welcomed the Son back with open arms. You know what's amazing about this parable? I don't know, in studying the parable my whole life and reading through this parable, there's something pretty incredible. It's almost every single verse can point back to the goodness of the Father. just about every single verse. I mean, that he returned whole. It's all you see is the goodness. And we told you that the Father here, I mean, this is all symbolic language, right? So who is the Father? It's representative of God the Father. It is love, it is love, right? And the Old Testament, we think about this often. I've heard people say, well, the Old Testament's all about judgment, but the New Testament is about grace. Let me tell you something, that is about as far from the truth as is humanly possible. Yeah, is there law and judgment in the Old Testament? Yeah, there's law and judgment in the New Testament. but it is equally filled with the grace and the goodness of God, particularly to any sinner who would repent. For instance, Jeremiah 3.22, it says this, return, O faithless sons, and I will heal your faithlessness. This is God the Father speaking, right, through the prophet Jeremiah. Behold, we come to thee, for thou art the Lord, our God. Look at Jeremiah 15, 19. Therefore, thus says the Lord, if you return, then I will restore you. Before me, you will stand. If you extract from the precious, from the worthless, you will become my spokesman. They, for their part, may turn to you, but as for me, you must not turn to them. In other words, if you repent, I'll receive you. But you can't go. Isaiah 118. I'll tell you, I love Isaiah 118. It's a verse I tend to quote quite often to myself. Come, let us reason together. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow. Though your sins be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool. There's the Father in the Old Testament, entreating the sinner. And the Father does the same thing today. He calls for men and women to repent. to turn from their sin and to turn to Christ, to put their complete faith and trust in Christ and Christ alone for salvation. Oh, this is so glorious in this parable that the Father is full of forgiveness, that the Father is full of forgiveness and we are gonna see that the older son is not even though he's going about working for his father. What do we see about the older son? We're gonna see that he's full of self-righteousness. He's full of idolatry. He's full of pride. He is egocentric. Me, me, me, and me. And this is probably the worst combination that you could have of any kind of wrongdoing against God. And it is that mindset, it is that heart that prevents him from being happy for his son, for his brother. Look at verse 28. after receiving the news, after being told that his brother is alive. Look at verse 28. But he became angry and was not willing to go in. And his father came out and began entreating him. Oh my goodness, this is so full of tremendous, tremendous imagery. Number one, he became angry. This angry speaks of a fixed anger. It's an embittered anger. It's an anger that will not let go. In other words, it wasn't a momentary explosion of anger, but rather his anger was deep-seated. It was rooted, which means that he had been angry from all the time that the brother had been gone, and now at the return of the brother, he could not find any joy. It's a deep, deep rooted resentment. And what did that resentment produce? He was not willing to go in. Where's the party taking place? in the house. The servant gave him the news. Hey, there's good news. Your brother has returned. Party going on inside the house. What was the response? Deep, fixed, unrepentant of bitterness and anger toward his brother, and he refused to go in. You see any imagery there? I'll tell you it's full of imagery. Right? The good news of a sinner repenting the servants, those who preach the Gospel who go out and tell the Gospel message and those who share the Gospel with many people who at the response of the Gospel get full of anger and bitterness. You mean to tell me Christ can forgive a guy who robbed a bank? You mean to tell me Christ can forgive a guy who who did? this kind of sin or that kind of sin? No. And what do they do? They get rooted and grounded in their anger and they're willing, unwilling to go forward with the Gospel. Look at what's keeping this guy. He, in his mind, is the standard. Not God. He is the standard. And he's unwilling to go forward. Listen, we even see this in the Pharisees. Look at Luke 15, two, as I previously said, right? This was the heart of the Pharisees. Look at 15, one and two. He says, now all the tax gatherers and sinners were coming near him. What were they coming near him? To listen to him. What do you think Jesus was talking about? What was happening in sports? who won the latest chariot race? No. Jesus is sharing the gospel and he's calling. And the Pharisees, the sinners, were hearing this good news. You mean I could be welcomed back to God? You mean I'm not cut off forever? You mean I'm not Desperate like the Pharisees are telling me I can repent and I can find full forgiveness in Jesus Christ. Yeah, that is good news. They're coming around Jesus. They're coming around Jesus. But like the older brother, what did the Pharisees do? Look this guy. Look at who he's associating. Look at all the sinners. Look at all the sinners flocking to him. So many churches are filled with so many Christians that are so super Christian, they forget that at one time they were sinners too. They forget at one time they were lost. They forget at one time the Spirit of God broke their heart and they came to the foot of the cross repenting and placing their faith in Jesus Christ. But not these Pharisees, no, no, no, they were the standard of righteousness. Right? And so we see Jesus, and now we see these Pharisees, and now the Pharisee is portrayed through the older brother, who is appalled that forgiveness would be offered to somebody like that. You know the Pharisees had that view of Jesus, and you know the Pharisees had that view of John the Baptist too, right? Matthew 11, verses 18 through 19, just FYI, you don't have to turn there. The Lord Jesus says this as they were about the Pharisees. He goes, for John came neither eating or drinking, and they say he has a demon. The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say behold a gluttonous man and a drunkard, a friend of tax gatherers and sinners. Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds. You know that term that they say, look at this man, he gathers with sinners. It's a term of derision. They're deriding Christ, right? And the Pharisees believed that once you were a sinner, you would always be a sinner and there would be no hope. Could you imagine if that was the gospel message today? Oh, you're a sinner, there's no hope for you. There's no hope. This younger brother viewed himself as the very picture of virtue. In truth, he measured everybody according to his standard, but not according to God's standards. Christ came calling sinners to repentance. The father, when he saw his son, ran to his son, embraced his son, restored him to full sonship. And praise God that the gospel message calls sinners, the unrighteous, to repentance. So here we have this scene now, it's going on, I guess there were other servants there, right? It's not a real thing that really happened, but if you read into the narrative a little bit, right? And what happens? Who comes out? Look at the verse there. But he became angry and was not willing to go in, verse 28, and his father came out. and began entreating him. That word entreating means to beg, to beg. Get the picture. This guy must have been arguing with the servant. It caught the attention of the father. The father didn't say, ah, you know him, he's stubborn. What did the father do? The same way the father ran, Toward the younger son, the father runs to the older son. And he comes to the older son and he begs him, come in. Come in. Let's celebrate. Your younger son has come. Come in. Come in. Note this, that the father did not dismiss the younger brother. Note that the father did not dismiss the Pharisees. Neither did Jesus. And we know from history and from the Scriptures that Pharisees came to faith in Christ, among whom was Nicodemus, the teacher of all the Pharisees and Joseph of Arimathea, who gave the tomb to Jesus. What does that say? That even in the gospel message, that the gospel called out to those who were far away, called out to those who would accuse Jesus, called out to them time and time again, come, come, come into the Father's house. You know that the gospel today calls out to the most religious of the religious, that the gospel calls out to those who have been in church for 50 years. that the gospel calls out to those who said they accepted Christ when they were eight but haven't been living right at the time. The gospel calls out to all those who carry a Bible. The gospel calls out to all those who listen to Christian music. The gospel calls out to all those who have been culturized by Christianity. However, the reality of Christ is absent in their lives. And by the way, if that be anyone that is here, the Father would run to you, and the Father entreats you, and the Father begs you, come into the house, come into the house, and find the joy and the fullness of the Father. But despite the Father's begging, he was not willing to go in. I'll tell you what. This is a sad, extremely sad point. You know, one of the things about the gospel, and I've said this on multiple times, is that the gospel can be a blessing and a curse. You say, how is that possible? I tell you how that's possible. For the one who hears the gospel message and turns from their sins and places their faith in Jesus Christ and is born again, well, let me tell you something, there's no greater blessing. There's no greater blessing, new life in Christ, born again, all records of wrong wiped out, given a new heart. If any man is in Christ, he's a new creation. Blessing upon blessing upon blessing, amen? But here's the flip side. To the ones like the older brother, who have that deep-seated hardness of heart and deep-seated anger. Well, the gospel becomes a curse. How does it become a curse? Because it is the very words of the gospel that will judge them on that great day. In other words, the father entreating the sinner, come, come, come. And the person saying, I will not come. Well, the words of the gospel, anyone who calls out to the Lord shall be saved, will be the very words that judge them. The writer of Hebrews puts it this way, how shall we escape? If we neglect so great a salvation, there is no more escape, there is no more avenue, there is no more life ring, there's nothing, because we have neglected the grace of Jesus Christ. Look at verse 29 of Luke 15. And now the son gets his day in court, okay? And notice what he does with it. But he answered and said to his father, look, for so many years I have been serving you, and I have never neglected a command of yours, yet you have never given me a kid that I might be married with my friends. I want you to note something in verse 29. I want you to note all the personal pronouns. If you have a Bible, circle this because I want you to see this. Verse 29, here we go. But he answered and said to his father, first of all, notice that word, look. That's audacious. You know, he's telling the father, hey, hey, pay attention to me. That's the first thing we see. But notice, for so many years, here you go, circle, I have been serving you. And I, circle that one, have never neglected a command of yours. And yet you, notice that, you. It's not even father, it's you. That's what you say to anybody who goes, hey, you. But you. have never given me a kid that I circle might be married with my circle friends. You know what that's called? Narcissism. He's completely hung up on himself. He has defined the standard and the standard is him. I served you. I did this. I did that. You never given me for my friends. Let me tell you something. Very easy for us to get caught up in that mindset. I wish I could say that it's never happened to me. But I can't say that with truthfulness. It has. You know, one of the most subtle sins that there is is self-importance. Because it's through self-importance that we develop self-righteousness. Right? If we make ourselves the standard and not the gospel the standard, if we make ourselves the standard and not Jesus Christ the standard, it is easy to exceed the gospel and it is easy to defraud the gospel of what is rightfully the gospel. If we think, well, every Christian should act, look, sound like me, Well then we've exceeded the Gospel. We've added to the Gospel. If we think, oh God understands the way I am, therefore I can continue living a life of unholiness and unrighteous acts, then we've defrauded the Gospel from the standard of the Gospel being Christ. You see, self is the greatest sin. What was the greatest sin? What was the first sin? How did Satan tempt Eve in the wilderness? Eve didn't get the word of God right. She's looking at that fruit, thinking about that fruit, thinking, boy, I wonder what that fruit must be like, right? That's where we get the term, forbidden fruit syndrome, right? And what did Satan tempt her with? Go ahead and eat it. No, no, no, no, God said that we're not to eat it, we're not even to touch it. God never said you couldn't touch it, right? And the famous words of Satan were what? Hath God said? Did God really mean that? God didn't really mean that. God knew that the moment you eat that fruit, you'll be just like God. What does that appeal to? What nature within Eve did that appeal to? Self. Me. I'll be like God. Oh, let me get a piece of that fruit. Right? And as a result, sin entered into God's creation. We're a society today, unfortunately, where self and self-fulfillment and self-awareness is the highest bar people think they can achieve. Self. And what was Jesus' view of self? No one is worthy to follow me unless they deny what? Their self. See, we don't exalt ourselves in Christ. We die to ourselves so that Christ may live through us. but not this older brother, not this proud brother. Notice that his response is not about a love for the father, right? All these years I've served you. That's not love. That's not love. All we see here is is pride, all we see is this self-serving agenda. If he was so against his younger brother, when the father gave the inheritance, he would have told the father, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I love you, I'll continue to work here, I'll continue to do it. I don't need the inheritance, but he took the inheritance anyway. And note the term, I've never neglected a command of yours. Which is indicative of what? His self-righteousness. Of course he neglected commands of his father. Even the statement where he says, you've never given me a kid that I might be married with my friends, reflects his utter selfishness. He was not interested in rejoicing with the father. He just wanted him and his friends. He couldn't share that joy. Although the older brother's sins may have been more respectful than his younger brother, they were both equally unrighteous in the eyes of God. But worse than that, the older brother doesn't even know he was sinful. That's how deceived he was. Therefore, there's no repentance in the heart. The older brother not only hates the younger brother, but think about this for a moment. He has nothing but contempt for the father. Man, the Lord is painting a picture clear. I wonder what the Pharisees were thinking as they were hearing this in there. Look at verse 30. But he said, When the son of yours came, who has devoured your wealth with harlots, you killed the faticab. Notice that term. This son of yours. Not my brother. This son of yours. And you can clearly see that there's no love there for the brother. That term is sarcastic. And in this verse, you see his comparison in the older brother's eyes to the prodigal. And what is it? He's full of contempt. He's full of contempt. He does not understand what godly forgiveness is all about. And this was the heart of the Pharisees. This is exactly the heart of the Pharisees. Now, no to ourselves is definitely warranted here, right? As believers in Christ, We have to be extremely careful that we do not adopt the mindset, the heart, and the ways of the older brother. What do I mean by that? We are not the standard. Christ is the standard of righteousness. The gospel is the standard of truth. And so therefore, we don't measure other Christians by us. We measure other Christians by the word of God. We cannot grow cold to those who are lost in sin. But rather we need to, as the Father did, entreat them. We need to beg them to come to Christ. You know, the thought of forgiveness from the older brother repulsed him. But the thought of forgiveness from the Father was such that he ran. to the younger son. And take a look at the father's response in verses 31 and 32. And he said to him, my child, you've always been with me and all that is mine is yours. But we had to be merry and rejoice for this brother of yours was dead and has begun to live and was lost. and has been found. What did Paul say in Ephesians chapter two? You were dead in your trespasses and sin, but Christ made you alive together with him. So the question to be asked is what's the impact of this parable upon you? That's the question to be asked, right? The impact upon me, and I'll be straightforward with you, is I saw myself as the younger son not as I reread it, as I look back on my life. Because I took my father's inheritance, I squandered it, I went into the distant land of sin, despite my Christian upbringing, despite everything, I took it, I went, I left, until I found myself in the pig pen of sin. And I said, I gotta go back to my father's house. Because even if I scrub a toilet, even if I shovel snow, whatever the case may be, a hired hand in my father's house is much better than what I have become. And I came with faith, and I came with repentance, and I came with tears, and I threw myself upon the mercy of God. Paul writes these words in 1 Timothy 1, verses 15 and 16. And I love this because this sums up the gospel. It is a trustworthy statement deserving full acceptance that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all. And yet for this reason I found mercy, in order that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in Him. Christ came to save sinners. He didn't come to save the righteous. He came to save those who were lost in their trespasses and sin. And those are all who have repented of their sins and placed their faith and trust completely in Christ. It's not those that have perfect church attendance, those who were baptized, those who accepted Christ. It's all those who have repented of their sins and placed their faith and trust in Jesus Christ. This parable is alive with forgiveness, redemption, and the grace of God. And the question for everybody is have you been to the cross of Christ? Have you been to the cross of Christ? Have you turned from your sin? The devil will tell you there's no turning from sin. You are what you are. That was the same lie that the Pharisees told. You can't change. What you did in the past can never be undone. Yes, it can. If you come to the cross of Jesus, if you turn from your sin and place all of your faith and trust in Him and cry out to Him and say, God, save me a sinner. Listen, I'll close with this. I just wanna share this with you. You know, what is the message of the gospel? There's five points to this gospel, five, right? There's a problem. Romans 3.23 says this, for the wages of sin is death. For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. There's the problem. Right there is the problem. The problem is sin. Romans 5a tells us of a person. But God demonstrates his own love toward us in that we were yet sinners. Christ died for us. There's the person, Jesus Christ. He came and he died and rose from the dead so that all who put their faith and trust in Jesus Christ might live. Romans 6.23 tells us about a great gift. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 10, nine through 10 tells us what the response should be. For if thou will confess with thy mouth Jesus is Lord and believe on the heart thou shall be saved. For with the heart man believes unto righteousness and with the mouth he confesses unto salvation. There it is. That's the response to this gospel. And Romans 10, 13 tells us what the ultimate solution is. For all who call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. So what's your response to the gospel? Don't miss this message of the parable, please. Because in it we see all of the fullness, all of the grace, all of the glory of God. And in it we see the response to the gospel message, what true repentance looks like, what true faith looks like. We see the Father's joy over a sinner that repents. But we also see what resistance to the gospel is, what self-righteousness looks like. Self-righteousness ultimately leads to self-condemnation and separation from Christ. Jesus Christ still calls sinners to repentance. This church still preaches that message that calls sinners to repentance. That's the message of the parable of the prodigal son. So if the Holy Spirit is calling upon your heart, respond. Respond to the call. Let's bow in a word of prayer.