Hey, podcast listeners. Thanks for streaming today's podcast from Pathway to Victory. Pathway to Victory is a nonprofit ministry featuring the Bible teaching of Dr. Robert Jeffress. And right now, your generous gift will have twice the impact thanks to the Light the Darkness matching challenge. It's active now through December 31st.
To give a special year-end gift, go to ptv.org slash donate or follow the link in our show notes. Now here's today's podcast from Pathway to Victory. Hi, this is Robert Jeffress, and I'm glad to study God's Word with you every day on this Bible teaching program. On today's edition of Pathway to Victory, do you have that sense that all is not right between you and God?
Are you ready to come back home again? You know the old saying, a journey of 1000 miles begins with a single step. When you do that, like the prodigal son, you're going to find a surprise. Awaiting at the end of the journey. Welcome to Pathway to Victory with author and pastor, Dr. Robert Jeffress. And Happy Thanksgiving, by the way. Chances are you can point to a time in your life when you felt closer to God than you do right now.
Well, just because your relationship isn't what it used to be doesn't mean it can't be restored. Today on Pathway to Victory, Dr. Robert Jeffress outlines three essential steps for reviving your relationship with God. Here's our Bible teacher to introduce today's message.
Dr. Jeffress. Thanks, David, and welcome again to Pathway to Victory. From the Jeffress home to yours, Happy Thanksgiving. We hope you're enjoying a wonderful Thanksgiving celebration with those you love. First, I'm eager to express my profound thanks for those of you in our listening family who have supported Pathway to Victory in the last year.
Without question, 2024 has been the most impactful season in our history. Because of your generosity, we have touched more lives than ever before with the life-giving message of Jesus Christ. And now God has seen fit to posture our ministry for even greater impact in 2025. It starts with a record-breaking matching challenge that has been established in the amount of $1.5 million.
This staggering amount means that we have an opportunity to double the sum. As people like you give generously toward this like-the-darkness matching challenge, every dollar you give before the deadline on December 31st will be doubled in size and impact. Plus, when you give today, I'm prepared to thank you by sending our brand-new leather-bound Pathway to Victory daily devotional for 2025. This exclusive daily devotional has become a favorite annual tradition for Pathway to Victory, and I can tell you that this navy blue edition is the most beautiful we've ever published. I'm going to say more about the daily devotional and the matching challenge later in today's program.
But right now, let's turn in our Bibles to Luke chapter 15. I titled today's message, The Journey Home. I once read an advertisement for a book.
I love the advertisement. It said, this book is for people who are sick and tired of feeling sick and tired. Perhaps I'm speaking to some of you who are sick and tired of feeling like all is not right between you and God. You're sick and tired of wondering what God's disaster is going to be in your life that sends you back to Himself. You're sick and tired of wondering what is going to happen, what really is going to happen to you after you die. You want to come back to God.
You want to enjoy that relationship with Him you once enjoyed, but you wonder if it's really possible. How can God possibly forgive me for what I've done? Even if He does forgive me, how can I make up for that time I have spent apart from Him? And even if I do come home to a right relationship with God, how do I know that I'll remain home?
I think the prodigal son probably had those same questions. If I come back to my father, will he forgive me? And even if he does forgive me, will I live in his house as a slave or as a son? And what about that inheritance?
Is it lost forever? And am I a hypocrite for coming back to my father when I really feel nothing for him? And what if when I come back I find that life in that home is just as unbearable as it was when I left that home? I want us to turn to Luke chapter 15, the story of the prodigal son as we look at the journey home from the far country. Luke chapter 15 beginning with verse 16.
Jesus said, And the son was longing to fill his stomach with the pods that the swine were eating, and no one was giving anything to him. But when he had come to his senses, he said, How many of my father's hired men have more than enough bread, but I am dying here with hunger? I will get up, and I will go to my father, and I will say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in your sight I am no longer worthy to be called your son.
Make me as one of your hired men. And he got up, and he came to his father. The story of the prodigal son reminds us that there are four steps that are necessary to journey from the far country back to the Father who loves us. And we're going to look at those four steps, essential steps necessary to coming home to the Father who loves you. What are those four steps?
You can write them down on the side of your outline. First of all, there has to be a crisis. Secondly, repentance. Third, forgiveness. And finally, perseverance. Let me say it again, crisis, repentance, forgiveness, and finally, perseverance. First of all, let's look at a crisis. I have never known any Christian who has lived in the far country who has ever come back to God without a severe crisis coming into his or her life.
C.S. Lewis said it this way, pain is God's megaphone. God whispers to us in our pleasure, but he speaks to us, he screams to us in our pain. Pain is God's megaphone.
It was the great Christian statesman, Malcolm Muggeridge, who paid tribute to the value of pain in his own Christian life. He said, contrary to what might be expected, I look back on experiences that at the time seemed especially desolated and painful with particular satisfaction. Indeed, I can say with complete truthfulness that everything I have learned in my 75 years in this world, everything that has truly enhanced and enlightened my existence has been through affliction from our earthly existence.
Isn't that an amazing thing to say? Anything I've learned worthwhile, I've learned not through the easy times, but through the painful times. He said as he looks back after 75 years of living, he can look back on those painful events with particular satisfaction.
How can that be? How is it that we can ever look back on painful experiences with particular satisfaction? You see, the fact is, once we've come back to a right relationship with God, those painful things that God used to bring us back to himself, we view those things in a different way. Think, for example, about our ultimate homecoming experience, one day when we get to heaven. Remember what John said about that time in Revelation 21, he said, for on that day God will wipe away every tear from our eyes.
There shall no longer be any death or mourning or crying or pain, for the first things will have passed away. I had not been at my pastorate in Wichita Falls very long when I went to see a young mother who was dying with cancer. She lived in a very small apartment. She was divorced. She had two small children. I'll never forget the sight of walking into her apartment. She had a large tumor that had eaten away most of her face.
It had caused her to go blind. I remember praying with her, and several weeks later she died. If I lived to be 100, I'll never forget that funeral service and what happened afterwards.
After the service was over, I was standing by the hearse watching as they loaded her casket into the back of the hearse. And her five-year-old daughter was there looking at that scene, crying out, Mommy, no. Mommy, no. Mommy, no.
It was a terrible experience. Are you saying, Robert, that that girl will ever be able to look back on that experience in a helpful way? Will she ever be able to look back with satisfaction about what her mother went through? But when we get to heaven, heaven will put a new perspective on the suffering that we went through in this life. We will no longer see pain and suffering and death as the victor. Instead, we will see them as a prelude to an even greater existence. As Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15, at that time death will finally be swallowed up in victory.
See, that's what happens. It's not that pain and the memory of pain is erased, but we have a new perspective when we experience victory. The first step God uses to bring us back into a right relationship with Himself many times is a crisis. Now hear me, nobody ever comes home without a crisis, but many people go through a crisis without ever coming back home to God.
To paraphrase a popular phrase, a crisis is a terrible thing to waste. I mean, don't go through all this pain and suffering and not allow it to work its positive benefit in your life. And that leads to the second step that leads to a homecoming, and that is repentance. Repentance. Now, you know the word repentance kind of conjures up all kind of false images in our mind.
You might think of the scraggly street preacher with the sandwich board yelling, repent, for the end of the world is at hand. But that's really not the essence of what the word repent means. In fact, write down this definition of repent. It is a deliberate decision that leads through a definitive action.
To repent means to make a deliberate decision that leads to a definitive action. A few years ago, Amy and I were down in Austin with her family, and we were celebrating her parents' anniversary. So they had us staying in this rustic setting. It was a dump, okay? That's what it really was. It was just a dump out in the middle of nowhere.
But they said it was rustic. And so we all had our little cabins there. And so one night, it was time to go to dinner, so we were going to go into dinner to a well-known barbecue place. And so we all got in our cars, and we started driving, and they went further ahead and faster than I did. And pretty soon, we were lost. We were out in the middle of nowhere.
And I kept driving and driving and driving, and I noticed the city lights kept getting further and further behind me. Now you know how we males are. We hate to ever admit we're lost. And we suspend logic.
We keep thinking if we'll go long enough in the wrong direction, suddenly it will become the right direction. But a near-empty gas tank and two complaining children in the back seat convinced me it was time to make a change. So what did I do? I surveyed the landscape. I realized I was lost. I finally put my foot on the brake. I did a turn, a U-turn. I looked for oncoming traffic, and then I pushed the accelerator going in a new direction. In other words, I repented. Okay, now I didn't stop and put my head on the steering wheel and sob uncontrollably. Oh, why did I do this?
Why, why, why? There was none of that. It was just simply a deliberate decision that led to a definitive action. Now that is a picture of repentance. Now let me say again, there is a difference between genuine repentance, a deliberate decision that leads to a definitive action. There is a difference between repentance and grief.
There is a real difference. In 2 Corinthians 7, verse 10, he said, For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death. I want to give you four more characteristics of genuine biblical repentance that come straight from the text.
First of all, true repentance should not be confused with grief. A man sat in my office one time, completely broken over his divorce. He told me the situation. He had been in an extramarital affair for five years, and one night he was talking to his mistress on the phone, and his wife overheard the conversation.
Not too bright, would you admit? She overheard him. She immediately filed for divorce.
He was in my office. He was a broken man. He was filled with grief. He was grieved over the breakup of his marriage. He was grieved over what he had done to his wife. He was grieved over the financial ruin he was experiencing because of the divorce. He was remorseful. He was repentant to an extent, but not enough to change his actions. True repentance should never be confused with grief. Secondly, true repentance never leaves a residue of regret. You know, one reason you may be hesitant to come back home from the far country is the regrets you feel like you may experience once you do.
I know this sounds kind of ludicrous, but again, you men might be able to identify with this. You know, one reason I hated to admit that I was driving in the wrong direction? I dreaded making that U-turn and having to make up those miles to retrace those miles that I had already covered. I mean, you know, after all, I was headed in a direction even if it was the wrong direction.
That kind of makes you feel good. But to turn around and waste all that time retracing steps you've already taken, there's just something painful about that. You know, it's the same way in our relationship with God. When we have been in the far country for a long time, one reason we're hesitant to take that first step back home is we really don't want to feel regretful.
But you know what Paul is saying in this verse, 2 Corinthians 7, 10? He says the godly kind of sorrow produces a repentance without regret. Whenever you truly turn around and head back toward God, you're not going to be filled with that regret that you're fearful of.
You know what's an interesting thing? When I finally made the U-turn in my car and started heading in the right direction, there was a surge of relief that came over me. I knew I was going in the right direction. Not once do I remember looking in the rearview mirror saying, oh, I wish I could be back where I was.
It just didn't happen. And it's the same way with true repentance. When you truly turn around and start moving back toward God, there won't be any regret in your life. Number three, true repentance is a gift from God. True repentance is a gift from God.
In 2 Timothy 2, verses 24 and 25, Paul says, For the Lord's bondservant should not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness, correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth. Your ability to turn around, to come back to the Father who loves you in and of itself is a gift from God. Think about the prodigal son. The Bible says in Luke 15, verse 17, After months, years in the far country, it says the son finally came to his senses. He came to his senses.
You know what that intimates? It intimates that during those months and years he was away from his father, he was out of his mind, literally. By the way, do you know it makes no sense for you and for me to be living separated from God? It makes no sense for us to be estranged from the one who created us, who loved us the most, who wants nothing but good for us.
It is absolutely ludicrous that we would run from the person who loves us the most. It makes no sense. But the only way we will ever come to our senses is from a divine act from God's hand.
Nobody ever comes to his senses on his own. It is an act of grace that allows us to see things as they really are. And that's what Paul is saying. He is saying repentance is a gift from God. I had somebody write me this week. They emailed me and they had a question about predestination and election and free will.
And the question was this. They said, Pastor, do you think it's possible if God wills for somebody to be saved, is it possible for that person to choose not to be saved? Have you ever wondered about that before? If God wills for somebody to be saved, is it possible for that person to resist the grace of God and not be saved? I want to say very clearly, I believe salvation is by grace and completely by grace. Without God's grace, none of us would believe. Without a supernatural working of God in our life, not one of us would ever just awaken one day and say, you know what, I'm a sinner and I'm going to trust Christ as my Savior. The awareness of our sin, the ability to believe, that doesn't happen apart from a supernatural working of God in our life.
I believe that with all my heart. But I also believe that it is possible to resist the grace of God. And I want you to listen to this verse in Hebrews. I pointed the person to that I was writing, Hebrews chapter 3, verses 7 to 9. Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says, today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as when they provoked Me, as in the day of the trial in the wilderness where your fathers tried Me by testing Me. And then in verses 12 and 13, take care, brethren, lest there should be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart in falling away from the living God.
But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called today, lest any one of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. Read the book of Hebrews and over and over again it says, do not resist the Holy Spirit. Do not harden your heart against God. If it is impossible for a person to resist the Holy Spirit, if it is impossible for a person to say no to someone God has ordained, then why does God say don't harden your heart? Don't resist the grace of God. Don't resist the Holy Spirit of God.
The reason God says don't harden your heart is, it is possible to harden your heart against God. That sense of sin and a need for a new direction in life, that comes from God. It is the gift of God, the grace of God that leads us to repentance, true repentance, the ability to turn around, the desire to turn around is a gift from God. And then finally, true repentance always results in definitive action.
It always results in definitive action. Again go back to 2 Corinthians 7 verse 10. For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret leading to salvation. Ungodly sorrow leads nowhere but to death. But true repentance leads to salvation. That word salvation means completeness, maturity.
It will always lead you somewhere. By the way, you see that at work in the prodigal son's life. It says after he came to his senses he realized how bankrupt he was financially and spiritually, he came up with a plan. He said this is what I will do.
I will get up and go to my father and do thus and such. I want you to think what that plan entailed. It meant that the prodigal son first of all had to go to his employer and say in the far country I don't want this job any longer.
As menial as it is, I don't want it any longer. It means he had to have a plan to go back home. It means he had to have a speech ready and prepared for his father. It means he had to be prepared to be accepted by somebody, a father and perhaps an older brother who was anything but friendly toward him.
But he was willing to do all of those things to make a plan and to get up and go to his father because he was tired, sick and tired of living in the far country. What about you? Do you have that sense that all is not right between you and God? Can you look back and see how God has been using certain crises in your life to get your attention? Are you ready to come back home again? You know the old saying, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
But you know what? If you're willing to learn from those reproofs that God has sent in your life instead of resist them, if you're willing to make that U-turn and take that first step in a new direction toward God, when you do that, like the prodigal son, you're going to find a surprise awaiting you at the end of the journey. As you feel the nudge of God's Spirit drawing you back home, I hope you'll respond by taking your first steps toward the Father who loves you.
You will never regret receiving his warm embrace. Well, for the prodigal son and anyone listening today who wants to walk with Jesus in 2025, I'm pleased to offer you a helpful resource. I'm referring to the brand-new, leather-bound Pathway to Victory daily devotional for 2025. I've written a devotional message for every single weekday in the new year. You're welcome to request this daily devotional, more than 500 pages in length, when you give a generous gift to support the growing ministry of Pathway to Victory.
And here's the best part. When you give today, we'll apply your generous gift toward the Light the Darkness matching challenge that's been activated. Because of this record-breaking matching challenge and the amount of $1.5 million, every dollar you give between now and December 31st will be matched and therefore doubled in size, having twice the impact. You might be surprised to learn that Pathway to Victory, like all ministries, has to pay radio and television stations to air the program.
They have legitimate expenses that have to be covered. But your gift to the Light the Darkness matching challenge allows us to acquire more release times on radio and television and to optimize all the opportunities on the internet and digital streaming as well. So thank you for giving generously. We couldn't accomplish our mission without friends like you. David.
Thanks, Dr. Jeffress. When you give a generous year-end gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory, we'd like to say thanks by sending you the brand-new leather-bound 2025 Pathway to Victory daily devotional. If you'd like to request your very own copy, call 866-999-2965, or it's even easier, simply go online to ptv.org.
And when your gift is $100 or more, you'll also receive this month's teaching series titled Reigniting Your Passion for Christ, and it comes on both DVD video and MP3 format audio discs. Remember, your contribution right now will be doubled in impact through our Light the Darkness matching challenge. So be sure to get in touch today. Call 866-999-2965 or go to ptv.org. You could also send your donation by mail. Here's that mailing address, P.O. Box 223-609, Dallas, Texas, 75222. That's P.O.
Box 223-609, Dallas, Texas, 75222. I'm David J. Mullins. One day in that little city of Nazareth, an angel appeared to a teenage girl named Mary. Why would God pick such an average, ordinary girl to be the mother of the Savior?
Discover what made Mary so extraordinary. That's Friday on Pathway to Victory. Pathway to Victory with Dr. Robert Jeffress comes from the pulpit of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas. You made it to the end of today's podcast from Pathway to Victory, and we're so glad you're here. Pathway to Victory relies on the generosity of loyal listeners like you to make this podcast possible. And right now, your special year-end gift will be matched and therefore doubled in impact thanks to the Light the Darkness Matching Challenge. Take advantage of this opportunity to double your impact before the deadline on December 31st. To give toward the Matching Challenge, go to ptv.org slash donate or follow the link in our show notes. We hope you've been blessed by today's podcast, From Pathway to Victory.
