Grace And Our Past Failures - Part 2

Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Wednesday, April 27th. Do you know the story of the prodigal son? We are reminded today that no matter where you are or what you've done, the Heavenly Father is waiting to celebrate your return. There are many people who want to be delivered, many people who want to get out of the bondage that they feel so desperately about.

But somehow they don't know how to get out. They're not quite sure how God will respond if they come to Him again and say, Father, here's my past. Will you forgive me? Will you give me a new beginning?

They're not quite sure. The title of this message is Grace and Our Past Failures. And I want you to turn, if you will, to Luke chapter 15.

Now let me just give you a brief idea of what's happening. Remember that these two sons, the younger of them, said to his father, Father, I want what's coming to me and I'm leaving. And so he took his part of the inheritance. He left. The Bible says he went into a distant country and he squandered it.

He ended up in a hog pen and a point of real, true desperation in his life. And it is out of this story that God displays and describes for us his own character, himself, as in few other passages in all the Bible. What I want you to see today in this passage is this, that it doesn't make any difference which hog pen you're in. It doesn't make any difference how deep in sin you are.

It doesn't make any difference what's going on in your life. God tells us in his word that for our past sins, his response is the response of grace. God responds to our failure with grace.

Now, there is a dramatic picture in a comparison of something I want you to see here in just a moment. He responds to our failure with grace. Now, listen carefully so you won't misunderstand. This young man decided to come back home. Now, you listen and say, Amen. He was not forgiven because he returned home. He was forgiven before he ever thought about coming home. And I say that because some of you who are saying, well, you know, I want to get right with God. But I'm telling you, I just don't think God would accept me. I have sinned against him. I've disobeyed him. I've disobeyed my parents. I've disobeyed my Heavenly Father. I've sinned against heaven and against other people. How in the world is God going to take me back? What am I going to have to do to get back? What am I going to have to do to get worthy to be acceptable in the eyes of God?

You can do nothing, absolutely nothing. His acceptance by his Father was not dependent upon his confessions or his repentance or his desire to do better. That's not the reason the Father accepted him. And that's not the reason the Father accepts us.

It is not based on that. Listen, it is based on the character of God. Who is this God whom you and I serve? He is a God of righteousness and justice, yes. But he is a God of all grace. The Bible says he is the God of all grace.

He is a God of love and forgiveness and understanding. Now, when you look at this passage and you look at what Jesus was teaching here, it's very evident what he was saying. That listen, if it is the character of God to love and if he loves you and me unconditionally, then that's the way it is.

It isn't based on performance or what I'm going to do. It is an unconditional love. Now, one of the primary reasons that there are several reasons that people who get caught up in the sin will not come back to God. First of all, they feel so much shame over their sin. And what I want you to see here is this, that Jesus has pictured this Heavenly Father as a God of grace because that's who he is, a God of grace.

Now, listen to this. He put this young man in the worst condition he could be in. Spent it all, squandered it all, left it all, immoral, bankrupt in every way, had absolutely nothing, swapping hogs for a Gentile hog farmer.

Brother, that's as low down as you can get as a Jew. Jesus said, now, I want to tell you how my Father responds to people like that. And so he told the rest of the story. Here's what I want you to watch.

Now, watch this carefully. Listen, if the Father had died, do you realize that this young man could never have come home? He couldn't have come home. You say, well, he had a brother.

That's what I mean. He had a brother. That's the reason he couldn't come home because, you see, his brother is typical of the law. Listen to this now. The brother now, when the son comes home and they're having this big festive party, lots of food, music and dancing.

And I mean, they're just really having a big blowout. The son comes in and he says to one of the servants, what's going on? The Bible says he was angry. Listen to this conversation with the Father.

The Father comes out trying to get the son to come on into the party. Listen to what he says in verse twenty nine. He answered and said to him, look, for so many years I have served you, performance. And I have never neglected a commandment, rules. And yet you've never given me a kid that I may be married with my friends. Look at this. But when this son of yours, not my brother, when this son of yours who wasted his wealth on and devoured it with harlots, you killed the care for him.

Anger, bitterness, resentment, hostility, separation. I have performed. I've been with you all these years. I've kept the rules. I've not disobeyed.

Now, suppose the product would come home to him. Let me tell you what it had been like. Oh, you're coming back. Forget it. Man, you blew it, brother. You got your part of the inheritance.

What was do you? You got your rightful part and you blew it. That's your tough luck. You messed it all up.

You blew it. The only way you can come back is the work for me. And not only that, you can just count yourself as one of the hired hands.

You get paid the same thing they do. But I'm here to tell you, you're going to have to live under our rules and our regulations. You don't like it.

You don't stay. That's the law. But let's look at his father now. Suppose his father had been the same kind of man. The Bible says that when this young man was coming home, that his father saw him away a great distance off.

If this father had been like most people picture God, a God of law, rules, regulations, stipulations, legalistic, live up to, perform or else. Here's what the father would have said. That looks like that's that backslidden, wayward, despicable, prodigal son of mine coming up the road. Well, I'm getting out of here because I don't want to see me sitting out here, standing out here. So the father leaves.

Finally, the son comes and he and the father meet. The father says to him, you look like a mess. What in the world have you been doing? You've lost weight. You're filthy. You stink.

You don't even have any shoes on. I guess you've lost it all, haven't you? What are you coming back here for?

If you're coming back here, let me tell you something right now. You've got to make amends. You've got to make restitution for what you've done. You've got to pay back all you've wasted. You're in debt, son. You're in debt to me the rest of your life to pay back all the money that I gave you out of those hard years of work that I did. And I gave you your share and you wasted it and you squandered it and you spread it around.

You messed it up and you just messed up your life. You come back here, you've got to pay. And I mean, you better perform. How long, son?

I don't know. The rest of your life. I don't know how long it's going to ever take you to pay it back. But I'm going to be watching you and you better live up to the rules and if you don't, you're out.

Now, if you want to come back under those conditions, come on. Go on out to the slave's house and get yourself some clothes. Get busy. Get to work and start paying back what you owe me. But Jesus told this story so he could get to the next part.

Listen to this. The Bible says this, Father, and here's the picture of Holy God, a God of grace. This old father standing on the porch and he looks down the road a long ways and he sees that boy.

And the more he looks at him, he thinks that looks that looks like my son. And the scripture says when he recognized that it was his son, listen, his heart just ballooned with compassion. And what is what did he do? He went he took off running down the road. Now, the reason Jesus put that in there was this.

In the customs of their day, no important person ever ran in public. And what Jesus is saying is when one of his backslidden children living in sin comes home, God the Father runs to meet him. And what does he do when he runs down the road to meet him? He doesn't stop and say, hold it right there. What a mess. Hold it.

You stink so bad I can't get close to you. The Bible says he ran to that boy. He didn't stop. He didn't say anything. He ran and threw his arms around him and hugged him.

Listen, hog slop and all. He hugged him smelly and all. He hugged him. He kissed him.

He rejoiced over him. And here's this boy trying to say, now, Father, listen, I know that I've done wrong and I want to ask you just make money behind you. Oh, son, I'm so glad to get you home.

I just love you. Bless you for coming home. He couldn't even listen to the confession for loving that boy. Listen, that boy didn't come home to get forgiven. He was forgiven before he ever left home. And listen, that father didn't forgive him because he came home. He was forgiven before he ever came home. That boy didn't have to come home and repent of his sins to get forgiveness. Listen, that daddy didn't even listen to any of that. He hugged him and loved him. And he because he was already forgiven.

Do you remember where he came from? This is a Jewish boy slopping hogs for a Gentile hog farmer, having lost his father's entire inheritance and spent his life in immorality and debauchery and has absolutely wasted his life. And what is the response of a loving father? Come on, son. And what happens while he's trying to confess in this passage, he says, hey, ho, let's have a big party tonight. Bring the best robe, not just the robe.

Kill the fatted calf, not just the calf. Bring me a ring, a sign of sonship and restoration. Give him a robe. He says, we are really going to have it tonight. All the slaves are invited. Everybody's invited. Big feast, everything, food, laughter, dancing, music. Hallelujah.

My sons come home. You said, well, now, I think if I could get that kind of reception, maybe I'd get back to God. My friend, listen to me. Do you know why that's in the Bible? Because Jesus was portraying in a language, in a culture, in an environment with things that people could identify with to say to you and me, when you and I come back and get our hearts right, all of the angels in heaven rejoice. And there is praise and thanksgiving and blessing. You say, but you mean to tell me that I can go away and live in sin and live like this? And all God has to do is just say, come on in.

No, I didn't say that. Do you know why God can take folks like you and me who've sinned against him and disobeyed him? Do you know why he can take folks like us, take us back in love and forgiveness and kindness and graciousness? Because grace is God's kindness and graciousness taught us without regard to what we deserve or what we are worth. And in spite of what we deserve, you know why?

Here's the reason. He said in his word, here's the law. The law is the soul that sin if it shall die.

Every hog pin boy has had it. That's what the law says. So how does Jesus keep face with all of his holy angels, all of his prophets and all of us? How does God the Father forgive us and love us back when he said the soul that sinned if it shall die? And look what this young man's done. Look what all of us have done. How does he forgive us? Here's the way.

It's the only way. He says that he so loved you and me and everybody else that he gave his only begotten Son that whoever believes in him would not perish but have eternal life. Not if and but except none of that have eternal life. The only way God can be true to himself and be a loving God of grace is that his son paid your sin debt in mine in full. You know what that means? That means every despicable year of your life, every sin that you've ever committed, all those days, weeks and months and years in the hog pin.

You know what that means? All of that was dumped on Jesus. And when he died, your forgiveness was provided. You think that's cheap? Let me ask you this. If you're a father who has a son, a mom who has a son or a daughter, father, do you think it would be cheap to you if in order to save millions of people, your son or your daughter had to be almost stripped naked and hung between two criminals, crucified, dying with spikes in hands and feet?

Would you call that cheap? Neither does God the Father. It cost God the Father the life of his son, Jesus, to make it possible for us to be forgiven.

This is a God of grace. You say, but look at that. You mean to tell me I can get by with sin?

Now watch this. Always being asked that because somebody is so afraid somebody's going to get by with something. Let me ask you a question.

Are you listening? Would you say that the prodigal got by with anything? He bankrupt himself morally, financially, relationally, in his personhood, lost it all, blew it all. Do you say that he got by with something because his reception by his father was son?

I love you. You were forgiven before you ever left home. That's this wonderful God of grace that you and I serve. Does that mean that there's no judgment? No, doesn't mean that. It means that God's not in the judgment business today upon his children. No condemnation. Therefore, there is therefore no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.

Listen, not any. And you know what the wonderful thing about that is? You don't have to live up to anything.

That is, we don't have to perform to get God to accept us. What did this young man have to do to get his father to accept him? Nothing.

Not a thing. Listen, his coming home made it possible for his father to express toward him what his father felt toward him while he is in the hog pen. The coming back didn't get him for love and forgiveness. The coming back made it possible for the father to express it. I don't know what you're going through, where you are, but I want to tell you this.

Our father is a father of grace and love and forgiveness and kindness toward his children. You can step out of that hog pen and turn your failure into a testimony of the grace of God. And how do you step out? You make a decision. You jump the fence. That is, you make a decision. You just turn to the father and say, Father, I've had enough of this hog pen living. I'm coming home. And you know what happens? You look into the eyes of a loving, gracious, kind and forgiving father who says, Son, daughter, I've been waiting.

Come on. How do you reject that kind of God? I don't know what you're going through in life and what you feel trapped by. But if you will turn your focus to God and say to him, I'm sick and tired of hog pen living. You may be the finest dressed man in your town, drive the finest automobile, live in the biggest home, but you're in a hog pen if you're out of God's will.

What you're eating will never satisfy the deep yearning hunger of your heart. And how do you get out of the hog pen? You just tell him. I'm sick and tired of the hog pen and I want to come home. Trusting, this is very important, trusting that in the death of his son, Jesus, he took all the consequences of your hog pen living, dumped them on him. He paid the penalty and you're accepted, accepted in Christ Jesus by the way of the cross. Father, when we think of how good and gracious and kind you are, we think of the price that you paid for our salvation. We tell you that we love you and feel so inadequate in saying it. I pray for those who have never been saved, who know in their heart they're running from you.

They desperately need you. Would you just enable them to see in this simple message that if they have never trusted you as their personal savior, that's step number one. It is the first and only step that can be taken, looking to you as a God of loving, kindness and forgiveness and knowing that their sins, wicked and vile as they may be, that Jesus, when he died, took them with him. And the moment they're willing to accept him as their personal savior, their sins are forgiven. They become a child of God.

Life begins anew. Father, for so many of your children who are living in sin and who wondered if you will take them back, would you just turn their focus to you today and remind them that not by performance or rule keeping, not by promises or hard work, but by the acceptance of grace. And, oh, Father, that we cannot add one single solitary thing to your grace.

Our pride wants to, but we can't. It's all grace and grace alone. Amen. Thank you for listening to part two of Grace and Our Past Failures. We would also like to invite you to join us in celebrating 45 years of God's faithfulness. Stop by InTouch.org slash 45 years to learn more. This podcast is a presentation of InTouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.