R301 Experiencing God Despite Our Failures

We all have failures in our life, but today we discover through the encouraging Word of God the way we experience in God despite them. We'll head to Luke chapter 15 in just a moment with Dr. Don Wilton as we open God's Word together. Know that our phone line is open as well at 866-899-WORD and online at www.tewonline.org.

And now, Dr. Don Wilton. Would you turn with me in your Bibles this morning to Luke's Gospel in chapter 15? We're going to be looking this morning at probably one of my favorite subjects. It's not a favorite subject because I'm proud of the fact that it's a favorite subject.

It's a favorite subject because it is a fact of my own life. Experiencing God despite our failures. Now I want to ask a few questions before we study God's Word this morning. I wonder if there's anyone here this morning. Now I don't want you to raise your hand or to stand up. But I wonder if there's anyone here this morning who has ever messed up before. I wonder if there's anyone upstairs or downstairs, anyone in this congregation, anyone worshiping by way of television who has ever disappointed God before.

Please don't stand up or raise your hand. I wonder if there's anyone here today who has ever let their family down. You've ever messed up. You've ever made mistakes before. I wonder if there's anyone in the choir who's ever made any mistakes. I wonder if there's anyone here in this congregation who has ever failed before.

I've got wonderful news for you today. We're going to discover in God's Word that we can experience God despite our failures. And we're going to discover that this is conditional upon what we are willing to do in response to what God has already done for us. It's not a given. It doesn't happen just automatically. You don't experience God just by osmosis.

It doesn't just filter through. It's not an automatic right. And it certainly isn't a birthright. It is conditional upon God's standards. But the good news is this, that you and I can experience God despite our failures.

I want us to read about this this morning in Luke's Gospel chapter 15. And then in just a moment I'm going to ask you to respond to what God is saying to you. I don't know what it is that's upon your heart, upon your life. Maybe you're saying, I just cannot go on anymore. Maybe there is something in your background and things seem to be going well for a period of time and then guess what happens? All of a sudden it rears its head. Those failures, those mistakes, those hurts, those disappointments, those pains, those anxieties, they come back and they keep gnawing away at you and they keep breaking you down.

And just when things seem to get back on track, here it comes again. You're saying this morning, I don't know what to do about it. How can I ever experience God? Because I've let Him down so many, many times. I'm going to ask you today to respond to God's invitation because this is what Jesus said. He puts it like this. He said, come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. And the good news that we're going to discover today is that God is the God of His word. And that if you and I are willing to do what God teaches us in His word, today can be the first day of the rest of our lives. There is a new beginning and God's word teaches that.

Let's read together Luke's gospel chapter 15 and I'm going to begin reading at verse 11. Jesus continued, there was a man who had two sons. The younger one said to his father, father, give me my share of the estate. So he divided his property between them. Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had and he settled for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country and he began to be in need. So he went and he hired himself out to a citizen of that country who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything. When he came to his senses, he said, how many of my father's hired men have food to spare?

And here I am starving to death. I will sit out and go back to my father and say to him, father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I'm no longer worthy to be called your son.

Make me like one of your hired men. So he got up and he went to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him and he ran to his son and threw his arms around him and kissed him. The son said to him, father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I'm no longer worthy to be called your son. But the father said to his servants, quick, bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet.

Bring the fatted calf and kill it. Let's have a feast and celebrate for this son of mine was dead and is alive again. He was lost and is found.

So they began to celebrate. Meanwhile, the oldest son was in the field and when he came near to the house, he heard music and dancing. So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. What in the world is going on, he said. Your brother has come, he replied, and your father has killed the fatted calf because he has him back safe and sound.

The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. But he answered his father, look, all these years I've been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so that I could celebrate with my friends.

But when the son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fatted calf for him. My son, the father said, you are always with me and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again. He was lost and is found. May the Lord write his word upon our hearts this morning as we seek to understand what it means to experience God despite our failures.

Of course it is rather a redundant question, isn't it? To ask in this congregation today of each one of us if there's anyone who has ever failed or messed up before. Because we know the answer to that question. All of us have failed. You might have heard me say from time to time that the only difference between the best of us in here and the worst of them out there is what? It's the grace of God. It's the grace of God. We are sinners saved by what? By the grace of God. That is why you are so welcome here today, First Baptist Church of Spartanburg, South Carolina. We welcome you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Why? Because all of us have failed and every one of us have sinned and come short of the glory of God. But the reality is this, that when we do mess up and when we do sin against God and against our fellow man, there is within us a gnawing that never seems to go away. It seems always as though these mistakes would seem to rear their heads and to drag us down and to trip us up and to take away our joy and interrupt the flow of the life that God has in store for each one of us.

What can we do about it? Well, in order to understand how we can still experience God despite our failures, let's have a look at what Jesus taught with regard to this man whom we have come to know as the prodigal son. There are five biblical facts that I want us to study about. Number one, let's note the privilege he enjoyed, the privilege he enjoyed. You see, we cannot understand how this man was able to experience God unless we understand his position to begin with. And the privilege that this man enjoyed lay in three areas that are all inextricably intertwined into everything that God is. First of all, the Bible tells us that his first privilege was that he was a son.

What a privilege. This man was part of this family. He was the son of the father. Just like you and I are sons and daughters of our fathers and mothers, this man, the Bible says, was the father's son.

Let me just say this to you, by the way, because this is my own conviction. I don't believe that the story of the prodigal son is about a man who found salvation. I don't believe that's possible because this man was a son to the father.

You cannot be a son to the father unless you have trusted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. It is biblically impossible. This is the story of a Christian man who disappointed and displeased God and failed in his responsibility and yet came back to the privilege that God had given to him to begin with. Some people have said to me, as they've said to you from time to time, pastor, is it possible for me to lose my salvation?

Let me settle this. The Bible teaches, my friend, it is absolutely impossible for you to lose your salvation. There are some people who teach that you can be saved one minute and lost the next. You cannot, once you have received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you cannot lose your salvation. The issue is not whether or not you can lose your salvation.

The issue is whether or not you were saved to begin with. Let's just ask this question. Let's assume that you are the son or daughter of your father and mother. And for some reason, God forbid, you have a falling out with him.

I mean, this is bad. You want nothing more to do with your parents. So you get the best attorney in town and you say to him or to her, you say, I want you to draw up a legal document that divorces me from my parents. Let's just say that you divorced from your parents.

You got a legal document from an attorney at law that said you no longer belong in any way to your parents. And you say, well, that's not good enough. I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to emigrate to China. And I'm going to learn to speak Chinese like the Chinese people do. And I'm never going to speak English again. I'm never going to come back to America again. I'm never going to write a letter to my parents again.

I'm never going to see them again. I'm going to be a Chinese person. I'm even going to have a facelift. I'm going to look oriental. I'm going to change everything about me in order to remove myself from my sonship or from the fact that I'm the daughter of my parents. And you live and die in China and you never see your parents again. Was there any point in that time that you ever ceased to be your father's son?

No time at all. You can never ever cease being the son or daughter of your father. And so it is with salvation.

The Bible says once we have received Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior and are born again of the Spirit of the living God, we come to enjoy an unbelievable spiritual and biblical privilege. He was a son. But note in the second place, and I've already spoken about it, he had a father. The Bible says this was his father just as God is our Heavenly Father. And there is something very special about the father. I do not believe that the emphasis in this particular parable is on the son as much as it is upon the father. You see, friend, it is not what we do, but it is what God has done for us.

It is the activity of God and what God wants us to do is have a crisis of belief and then adjust our behavior in obedience to all that the father has done for us. The emphasis here is upon the father, not upon the son. But there is a third thing about his privilege and that is why that he had an inheritance. Well, the Word of God says he had an estate. He was a privileged man. There was no question about it. You know, the writer to the Hebrews perhaps had an idea of this in Hebrews chapter 2.

He put it like this. He said, how are you going to escape if you neglect so great salvation? What then is the greatness of salvation? The greatness of salvation is not just the fact that I am forgiven and restored. The greatness of salvation is not just the fact that I know that I know that I'm going to heaven. The greatness of my salvation is that I have received the inheritance that God has given to his own dear son and God says all that I have given to my son I am giving to you.

Therefore, how are you going to escape if you neglect so great salvation? I think we must note the privilege he enjoyed, but note in the second place the pressure he experienced. The pressure he experienced. You see friends, verse 13 and following tells us that this man who enjoyed such privilege was nonetheless subject to the pressures of the world around about him. The Apostle John writes about it in 1 John. He talks about conformity to the world.

The Apostle Paul writes about it in the Pastoral Epistles as he wrote and encouraged and taught the doctrine of Almighty God to the churches at Colossi and Philippi and Galatia. He told them that there were going to be unmitigated pressures brought about upon them. Peter put it like this, he said beware, watch out because the devil is as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. The world is going to pressurize you and squeeze you.

What an unbelievable thing. Forgive the interruption, but if you find yourself hearing that truth and wondering is there someone that can pray with me or for me, yes, we are here at 866-899-WORD and anytime, not just during the broadcast, 24 hours a day, 866-899-9673. We'll connect you with one of us, happy to talk or listen or pray.

We'd love to meet you online. Now back to today's message with Dr. Wilton. Young people are being pressurized and squeezed. The world out there is saying, come on, do it, come on, take it, come on, be it, come on, walk over the edge. I want you to know that the reality of this man's life, my friend, was that he was experiencing unmitigated pressure from the world. And this despite the fact that he was in a family that loved him, I'm telling you folks, I have seen children of the finest families you've ever seen who have succumbed to pressure and it doesn't matter how much their parents love them and how much their parents surround them, they push it away and push it away and the world calls them and calls them and it becomes a tug of war and eventually they move and the parents' hearts are breaking and the kids step out and they go out and they go out and they succumb to that pressure. Look what happens.

Look what happens. You see, if we're ever going to be able to understand how to experience God despite our failures, we've got to understand the privilege this man enjoyed. We've got to understand the pressure that he experienced but then we must understand the pleasure that he received. Oh, we don't like to talk about that.

No, sir. We don't like to ever suggest that sin is pleasurable but it is. You see, sin appeals to our senses. It appeals to our taste and our sight and it appeals to our sense of touch and feeling. It appeals to our emotion just as that apple upon the tree in the Garden of Eden appealed to Eve. It was the best apple in the orchard but it was sin.

Why? Because God said it was wrong to take it. People from time to time say, preacher, it doesn't make sense. God has given us the privilege of sexual relationships for pleasure. Why do we have to wait for marriage? Because God said so. That's why it is God's blueprint. That's why we have all these diseases which are ravaging our nation today because man has succumbed to the pressure of the world and has stepped outside of God's parameters and even though there may be a moment of pleasure. The writer to the Hebrews talking about Moses said, Moses came to the point where by faith he forsook the pleasures of this world for a season.

Why? Because he esteemed the reproach of Christ Jesus for greater rich treasures than all the treasures of Pharaoh's court. Yes, sin is pleasurable. He received pleasure. There was no question about it. It's the popular choice. Give yourself over to immoral behavior.

Do whatever you want to do. It's pleasurable. But I want you to note in the fourth place the punishment he suffered as a result. There was the privilege he enjoyed and the pressure he experienced and the pleasure he received but there was the punishment he suffered as a result.

Bible tells us from verse 15 on this man's unbelievable predicament. You see my friends, there are the three A's in society today that are killing our people. There are three A's, the triple A society which I'm convinced in my own heart is the ruination of America today that is killing our people because our people are succumbing to the pressure of the world despite the privilege that we have. A number one, addiction. You know that statisticians have us know, Dr. Neely, I can't remember it exactly but something like 40% of Americans are addicted. You say addicted to what? Addiction takes all kinds of forms.

The most common are addiction to drugs. Young people don't ever let anybody come to you and say why don't you just take a puff of this thing? It always starts somewhere. You can go to a ball game and don't let anybody come up to you and say just take a drink of this.

Just do this, just do that. Alcoholics all over the world began with one Budweiser, with one Michelob. Everybody's saying it don't get no better than this. They have dumb dogs with girls dancing around them and frogs croaking their way into our homes to tell us how marvelous it is to become addicted to the world's poison. And I'll show you homes that are broken up, families that are separated, children's hearts that are broken left, right and centre. Why?

Because of the world. You see, friend, they'll show you the product but they'll never show you the punishment that you're going to receive as a result of it. Addiction, the second day is abortion. The greatest holocaust that has ever set foot upon this great nation, my friend, is the sin of abortion. Never let it be said that there is any excuse anywhere for any person to ever succumb to the things that God's Word speaks against.

We need to choose life, not death, because we believe in life and you can parade in front of us today countless thousands of women whose lives have been broken for all time and eternity because they succumbed to the world's pressure and opted for an abortion. But then there's the third A, adultery. Adultery. Oh, we don't like to talk about adultery. You say to me, pastor, what is adultery? Adultery is any form of sexual activity outside of the sanctity of marriage and I'm going to say to you, my beloved friend, that the Bible speaks most clearly to this sin. The Bible tells us clearly what the consequences of adultery is. I can show you today men and women whose homes are broken, whose families are broken, all because they gave away to the pressure of the world for a few moments of pleasure.

I'll show you men today, my friend, who would stand readily and say, oh, get out there and warn the world about the sanctity of marriage and the sanctity of your vows before God. You see, the triple A that is killing our world, addiction, abortion and adultery, it permeates the very fabric and existence of our being. If we are ever going to understand how to experience God despite our failures, we need to examine what Jesus was teaching, the privilege he enjoyed, the pressure he experienced, the pleasure he received, the punishment he suffered. He suffered. This man ended up in the hog pen, folks. There are hog pens all over society today.

There are people everywhere that would give anything to eat anything, figuratively speaking, and yet they have reached the bottom of the barrel. But oh, I've got some good news for you today. I couldn't preach this message if I had to sit down now. It's good news for you. You see, we've got to understand the peace he returned to. I want you to know, beloved friend, that the Bible says that when he was still afar off, the father looked and saw his son and he was filled with compassion and he went running out to his son and he said, my son, my son, you have come home. You've come home.

Welcome. And he killed the fatted calf and he got a ring and he put it on his finger and the Bible says there was great joy and there was rejoicing and there was exceeding gladness. You know why? Because this son had come to understand, beloved friend, that you can and you will and you must experience God even despite your failures.

What great truth. No matter what we've been through, God is ready to meet you right where you are. Would you open your heart now to what Dr. Don Wilton wants to come into the studio and share next. Are you ready to give your heart and life to the Lord Jesus Christ? Why don't you pray this prayer with me right now? Dear God, I know that I'm a sinner and I know that Jesus died for me on the cross. Today I repent of my sin and by faith I receive you into my heart. In Jesus' name. My friend, I welcome you today into the family of God.

This is exciting news. If you just gave your life to Jesus Christ, welcome to the family of God. Maybe you rededicated your life. Dr. Wilton wants to hear about it. We want to pray with you and give you some free resources at 866-899-WORD. Give us a call. Let us pray with you.

Let us put these resources in your hands. The number is 866-899-9673 or meet us online as well and discover more about who we are as the encouraging word. Many have asked how can you get involved prayerfully and financially with our ministry.

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