He made free use of Christian vocabulary. He talked about the blessing of the Almighty and the Christian confessions, which would become the pillars of the new government that he would bring to bear. He assumed the earnestness and devotion of a man weighed down by historic responsibility. He handed out religious stories to the press, especially to various churches to print in their newsletters and papers. He showed his tattered Bible and declared that he drew the strength for his great work from it. as scores of pious people welcomed him as a man sent from God. We may be surprised, but this man was none other than Adolf Hitler. Hitler was the epitome of a hypocrite. The word hypocrite originally referred to a Greek or Roman actor. who wore a mask and played a part that was very different from who he really was. A hypocrite is someone who pretends outwardly to be moral and religious, but does not actually possess that inward reality. You see, Hitler's actions contradicted his stated beliefs in that he was ultimately responsible for the death of millions, many, many millions of people by authorizing their extermination. You see, it's this contradiction between outward behavior and inward reality. that I want us to be looking at this morning in the passage that we'll be studying. Again, if you have your Bibles, turn with me to Luke chapter 15. Last time we began a story about a father and his two sons, known as the parable of the lost or the prodigal son. In Luke chapter 15, verses 11 through 32, Again, this parable has been called the greatest short story ever written. In Luke chapter 15, verses 11 through 24, which we looked at last time, kind of in honor of fathers and tried to glean principles to apply to us as godly men to live out. We saw four qualities of God himself, the model father that all believers, especially godly fathers, should pattern themself after. He is gracious, he's generous, he is forgiving, and he celebrates reconciliation. This morning, in verses 25 through 32, as we conclude this story, I want us to look at two additional qualities, two additional qualities of the model father. The fifth quality is this. He pursues hypocrites. He pursues hypocrites. Look at verse 25. Now the older son was in the field and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. Having last time discussed the younger son, we are now introduced to the older son. Back in verse 12, when the father gave a third of his estate to his younger son, because his younger son came and kind of was demanding it. Of course, he didn't have to do that, but that's why he was gracious in doing what he did. but he also gave his firstborn older son a double portion because according to the Mosaic law, Deuteronomy 21, 17, the older firstborn got a double portion or two thirds of his estate. So here we see that his older son was in the field. He was out in the field. Now this doesn't mean that he was out there doing manual work because as a nobleman or as a landowner, which now he was having inherited things, they didn't do those kind of manual jobs. It means here that he was managing the estate. He was overseeing the workers that were, the hired men that were working for him. But because he was in the field, the older son did not hear the noise of the celebration that was going on in light of the younger son returning home, repenting of his sin. The father forgiving him, reconciling with him, and then throwing this celebration party. Notice that it was not until he came and approached the house After work, now he gets closer, that he heard music and dancing. It's not until he got closer, again, it just gives us a little indication of just how large the estate was, that he could be out there and there can be an exuberant, exciting celebration taking place at the farmhouse and he didn't hear it. But the fact that the father didn't send a messenger to tell him about his younger brother's return and celebration for him is the first hint that something is not right here. In Mideastern culture, the music would have been various instruments and singers that were singing and playing. The dancing would have involved only the men dancing around in a circle. As the older son arrived home and didn't know what was going on, look at verse 26 where it says, and he summoned one of the servants and began inquiring what these things could be. The phrase one of the servants refers here to a young servant boy. Since all the adult servants were inside, they were inside the house taking care of the guests at the celebration. The children were outside and so he asked one of them as he comes across them, he asked them, what's happening here? The servant boy tells him, look at verse 27, your brother has come. Your father has killed the fattened calf because he has received him back safe and sound. Now this phrase safe and sound doesn't merely mean that he's in good health. Honestly, as we saw last time, he is in real bad shape. He's been starving because even the pig food that he wanted to eat wasn't digestible. And so part of what God used in his life is bringing him to the bottom where then he comes to a census and he comes back home knowing that his father takes care of even the hired temporary workers better than what he's experiencing. So he's in kind of bad shape, but it means more than the fact that he's alive. It refers here to the fact that he is fully forgiven. He is safe and sound back home. He is fully forgiven and reconciled with his father. Again, last time we saw that this is why the special grain-fed fattened calf was killed in verse 23. since this calf could feed up to like 200 people. This was a good size calf. There was a large crowd that was celebrating the repentant younger son's return home. Everyone was in the house, was praising God, was excited, celebrating, but not everyone, not everyone. Instead of rushing right in, giving his repentant brother a big hug, warmly welcoming him back home, rejoicing with his once heartbroken father who is now full of joy because his son has come home again. He's repentant. He's seeking forgiveness. Look how the older son responds in verse 28. but he became angry and was not willing to go in. Stop there. He's angry. We will see from comments that he will make to his father that he is angry, not just at his father, but also at his brother. You see, the older son is angry and judgmental at his younger brother because he's the one who selfishly squandered away his portion of the family estate and humiliated the family, embarrassed the family by his immoral lifestyle. And he's angry and judgmental at his father because he had forgiven, reconciled with, and spent more of the inheritance on a celebration for his brother, who was such a horrible sinner. In his mind, what his brother deserved was a beating, not a party. Whereas the younger son represents or symbolizes all unbelievers who are rebellious and irreligious. According to Luke chapter 15, verse 1, the very start of this chapter, All of these unbelievers, this is a reference, the younger son refers to the tax collectors and the sinners that Jesus was associating with, that he was ministering to. However, the older son represents or symbolizes all unbelievers that are hypocritical and self-righteously religious. Which in the very next verse, Luke 15 too refers to the Pharisees and the scribes who angrily grumbled at Jesus because he receives sinners and he eats with them. Since Jesus saw the Pharisees as the older son and he was using this parable to drive home the point to the Pharisees who were right there, they made the connection. that this older son refers to them. Jesus was showing the sinful response of the older son and how he was like the Pharisee who prayed in Luke 18, verses 11 and 12. God, I thank you that I am not like other people, swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I pay tithe of all that I get." See, it was an external, self-righteous religion. The Pharisees had developed a system, a religious system of 613 laws. 365 negative commands, 248 positive commands. And by the time Jesus came, their religious system had produced a heartless, cold, arrogant, legalistic brand of self-righteousness. They thought they were great. They thought they were the ones that were right with God. because they're the ones who ministered in the temple. They represented God to the people. Comparing the older brother to the Pharisees, John MacArthur states that he, this older brother, has no real sense of sin, no real love for the father, so as to share in his joy, about his younger brother coming to repentance, and no interest in repentant sinners, end quote. You see, just as the Pharisees were in the house or the temple of God, that they made public display of love for God, they outwardly appeared to be moral and religious. They were dutiful in keeping their traditions. Just as that is true of the Pharisees, so the older son stayed near his father. He wasn't the one that took off and ran to a distant country like his younger brother did. He stayed near home with his father. He made a public display of love for his father. He outwardly appeared to be moral and religious. and was dutiful in keeping his father's commands, at least how he saw that, which we will see a little later. But like the Pharisees inwardly, his true heart condition, his true heart condition was just as sinful and just as immoral as his younger brother, even though he did not commit all of the same kinds of sins. Just because we don't commit these certain sins doesn't mean that we are not totally sinful and deserving of God's judgment in our life. It only takes one. James tells us the one who stumbles in just one area, one thing, he is as if he has broken the whole law of God. Because God hates sin. Jesus reserved his most severe scathing for the Pharisees in Matthew chapter 23, verses 13 through 33. Seven times he calls them hypocrites. Because they pretended to be something that they were not. He also called them blind guides, fools, blind men, whitewashed tombs, serpents, and a brood of vipers. Scathing. Now think about that, though. Jesus is love personified. God is love. This is the most loving thing that Jesus could do for these Pharisees, to tell them the truth, to speak the truth in love. Love can be bold, love can be tough. His intent was to rip off their pretentious mask and to shake them up for their own eternal best interest. Until they embrace how sinful they are and the punishment for their sin, they're not gonna be running to Jesus to save them from their sin. As the older son, the Pharisees didn't understand God's grace, God's loving compassion, His forgiveness, His reconciliation or joy in redeeming lost sinners. The Pharisees didn't understand that. This older son did not understand that. And again, the two are synonymous. Therefore, the Pharisees' angry response to Jesus spending time with tax collectors and sinners and joyfully celebrating more over one sinner who repents than over 99 persons who need no repentance reveals the fact that they did not do that, reveals their hardened, self-centered, and unloving hearts. But notice how the father responded to his older son at the end of verse 28. And his father came out and began pleading with him. Hearing that his older son was outside the house, refused to come inside to join the celebration of his younger son who has repented and come back home. Notice that the father came out after him. He came out after him. This is the father felt compassion for his returning younger son and he ran to him in verse 20. So he now takes initiative and he pursues, he pursues his hypocritical older son. Notice that he doesn't angrily rebuke him. He doesn't tell him, you better get in there. This is your younger brother. He doesn't do that. It says he began pleading with him. The word pleading means to come alongside someone to encourage them. And in this case, he is seeking to change his son's mind to come inside to join the celebration. How did the older son respond to this? We see that in verses 29 and 30. It says, 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. And yet you have never given me a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came who has devoured your wealth with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him. You can just feel the contempt and the anger, the sarcasm. You see, the mask is torn off. His true heart condition is now right there on the surface showing. His angry contempt, disdain, and disrespect towards his father are seen very explicitly in his blunt and offensive remarks. First of all, the word look. Look. Imagine yourself saying that to your father. Look. What kind of a heart does that? He's saying, let me set you straight. also in calling his younger brother, this son of yours. In other words, I want nothing to do with him. The older son couldn't care less about having a relationship with such a terrible sinner who has humiliated the whole family. He could not even bring himself to refer to him as my brother. He says, the son of yours. The older son went on to say, for so many years, I have been serving you. Literally, the word serving here means slaving away for you. For so many years, I've been slaving away for you. and I have never neglected a command of yours. Anything you told me to do, I did it. To me, this seems like the pot calling the kettle black when he's thinking and talking about his younger brother, how bad his younger brother is. He is just as bad and yet he's spiritually blind. He's spiritually blind to his true heart condition. As a self-righteous hypocrite, he actually thinks that he has never neglected a command of his father. Reminds me of the rich young ruler when Jesus said, have you fulfilled all the law? He said, yep, I've done every one of them. I've kept every one of them. It's like you're blind. You have a very shallow view of sin. He doesn't see that his obedience to his father was merely external, not internal. He wasn't done out of a heart of love and joy and gratitude. Instead, it was merely a dutiful behavior as a slave to a master. He's doing it because he has to do it. His focus is only on his brother's sin and behavior with prostitutes while justifying his own sin in his heart of violating love with his father and his brother. He saw in his sin Something that was acceptable. You see, his sin was more socially acceptable than his brother's immoral lifestyle. So he's not gripped by it. He's not broken by it. He's blinded to the truth. But 1 Samuel 16, 7 says, God sees not as man sees. Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord, what? Looks at the heart. God knows our heart. The older son then vents his anger. He vents his anger at his father, saying, yet you have never given me a goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. Comparing his dutiful life to his younger brother's debauchery, the older son is angry that while his father gives him a fattened calf in celebration of his return. He has never received even a young goat. A fattened calf used for special occasions costs a lot. A young goat, much cheaper. You haven't even given me a cheap goat. In essence, he's saying, I've done everything you've told me to do. You haven't given me even a stinking goat here. I deserve better than this. Notice that he sees his father as unfair, as unjust, as cheating him out of something that he deserves. He isn't the one who needs to repent and ask for forgiveness. His father does of him. What a description of hypocritical and self-righteously religious people who are outside, they're outside the house, they're outside God's kingdom, heaping scorn on the grace of God to repentant sinners. While believers are inside, celebrating their salvation. As I said last time, this parable primarily addresses unbelievers who need to repent to be, first and foremost, reconciled, forgiven, reconciled with God. Unbelievers, whether they identify more with the younger son or the older son, they need to be saved. However, since we as believers can also, at times, exhibit the same sinful attitudes and actions of both sons, both of these sons. The truths in this passage can also be applied to us in a secondary sense. I like what theologian John Stott said, and I quote, hypocrisy is hideous. What cancer is to the body, hypocrisy is to the church. It is the killing agent. Unfortunately, hypocrisy is also addictive. And even though Jesus reserved his most severe words of condemnation for the hypocrite, we still seem to prefer that lifestyle to truth and authenticity, end quote. You see, as saved sinners, this side of heaven, we all struggle. with the sin of hypocrisy, of being hypocritical, saying one thing and doing another. And I believe we struggle with this more often than we want to admit. You hear where people say, well, I'm not going to church. It's just full of a bunch of hypocrites. When we sin, We are hypocritical to what it is we say we believe. But we're all sinners. A hypocrite wears a mask, pretends to be something outwardly that they are not inwardly and secretly in their heart in reality. And when that happens in all of our lives, We need to have the courage and the integrity to admit where we are wrong, to repent of it, and to forsake it. We need to make the commitment by God's grace to pretend about nothing. To pretend about nothing. And once again, praise God for the promise of 1 John 1, 9. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sin, to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Then we get back on the path of living a life of honesty and integrity. That's a Christian life. It is not a life of perfection. There is no sinless perfection this side of heaven. And this brings us to the sixth quality, which is this. He prioritizes love. He prioritizes love. Look at verse 31. And he, the father, said to him, Son, you have always been with me, and all that is mine is yours. Although the older son was extremely disrespectful, to his father outside the house. His father begins by calling him, look what he says, son, son. It's a very loving term of endearment. As we already saw last time, the main character of this story is the father. Talks about two sons, a younger son and an older son, but the main character is the father who represents or symbolizes God himself, the model father. And here we see God's loving heart for all sinners, even hypocrites. The father goes on to tell him, you have always been with me, and all that is mine is yours, He acknowledges that his older son has always been near him, at least outwardly, though not in his heart, since he sees himself a slave in a way for his father. And although the older son had not yet availed himself to his father's relationship and all the blessings, all the blessings that relationship could provide, He still tells him, and all that is mine is yours. Again, I like how John MacArthur describes this, and I quote, the Pharisees and scribes had easy access to all the riches of God's truth because they served in the temple. They spent their lives dealing with scripture and public worship. but they never really possessed any of the treasures enjoyed by their repentant sinner." End quote. How sad to be so close and yet so far away. And notice how the father prioritizes love by calling his older son to celebrate his brother's return in verse 32. But we had to celebrate and rejoice for this brother of yours was dead and has begun to live and was lost and has been found. The first time the father said in verse 24, this son of mine was dead and has come to life again. He was lost and has been found. Now he says the same thing here a second time, but notice he calls him this brother of yours. This brother of yours was dead and has begun to live and was lost and has been found. since there is absolutely nothing that is more special, more special in this life than for those who were once spiritually dead and lost to become spiritually alive and found through saving faith in Jesus Christ. The Father, again, representing God himself, says we had to celebrate and rejoice. God is a loving God. He is a loving God. It's not His desire that any should perish, but that all would come to repentance. His heart is full of joy in redeeming lost sinners. We see God's love for sinners and his great joy when they repent and are found throughout this entire chapter of Luke 15. We're just looking at the last parable. The first is the parable of the lost sheep. Then there's the lost coin. Now we're looking at the parable of the lost son. All of those we see God's heart of love and a great joy He has for finding what was lost. John 3, 16 says, for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. Romans 5, 8, but God demonstrates His own love toward us and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. God is a loving God. And since God prioritizes love for the lost, love for others, we too, as his children, must do the same. He prioritizes love, we must do the same. In Scripture, God is inseparably connected, loving him with loving others. We see that. We've looked at the great commandment in Matthew 22. We've gone through and seen in 1 John. God inseparably connects, loving him and loving others together. He's commanded us as believers to love one another, even as Jesus has loved us. And He has established our love to be the distinguishing mark that we as His people are truly His disciples. Love matters. We are to prioritize Christ-like love. Therefore, to the degree that we are like Christ, we will lovingly celebrate and rejoice over the same things that God does. And although in the parable we're told that the younger son is saved, and thus his father has a celebration, a joyful celebration for him, we are not told what happens to the older son. It ends right here. But since the older son represents the Pharisees, I think it would be accurate to say that they would write the ending a few months later. Not all of them. You had Joseph of Arimathea, you had different ones who came to saving faith in Jesus Christ. But the Pharisees would write the ending a few months later when they condemned Jesus of blasphemy and sentenced him to death by crucifixion. Although this was the greatest sin ever committed, I love what Peter says in Acts chapter two, verse 23, that Jesus was delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God for our redemption. Jesus came to be the Savior of the world because God so loved the world. It was all part of His redemptive plan. Jesus said in Luke 19.10, for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. He came to die. As our substitute, he willingly went to the cross to take upon himself the holy wrath of God the Father against sin. And he paid in full the penalty for sin that you and I deserved. He willingly took our hell that we might have his heaven. and we who are celebrating God's salvation, of us in Christ, pattern ourselves after Him as we prioritize love for all sinners, for all sinners who are outside God's kingdom, both the prodigals and the hypocrites, both those who live their lives in license as libertines, as well as those who are legalistic. The gospel is for everyone. And we do that as we pursue them by sharing with them the soul-saving, life-transforming gospel of Christ. These are the qualities of God himself, the model father that every believer should pattern themselves after. He is gracious. He is generous. He is forgiving. He celebrates reconciliation. He pursues hypocrites and he prioritizes love. Let me ask you this morning, which son can you most identify with? Which quality of the father do you need most to pattern yourself after? And do you have the same loving heart for the eternal souls of the lost that God does? One of my favorite verses that God used in my life, years ago, when I was in college, to totally change the direction of my life, to call me into ministry, was Matthew 16, 26, where Jesus said, For what will it profit a man? What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world? If you gain the whole world, all your dreams come true. Your marriage becomes everything you want it to be. Those who cannot have kids have children. Your children grow up to be everything you want them to be. What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? What will a man give in exchange for his soul? There's absolutely nothing more important in this life than the eternal destiny of people's souls. What is your eternal destiny? Do you have faith in Jesus Christ? Have you placed your faith in Him alone? If you have, do you have God's heart for the lost so that they would be able to celebrate the way you do in Christ? May we all grow in these qualities of God Himself so that we will be able to better represent Him to a lost and dying world.