Reconstruction: A Journey | Ps. Lindsey Brenner

Welcome to the Celebration Church Orlando podcast.

Thank you so much for listening today.

We hope it encourages you and inspires you.

Here's today's message.

Hello.

Welcome.

Thank you for joining us this morning in person or online, or maybe you're watching this back later on on YouTube or listening on our podcast.

We are honored and humbled that you would join choose to join us today.

I'm Lindsay.

I'm here on staff at Celebration Orlando.

I've been on staff for um many years longer, but in Jacksonville, but here in Orlando for about four-ish years, I think.

Today, I'm not the normal speaker.

Today you're gonna hear from me, and I'm honored and humbled to do so.

But our our pastors, our lead pastors, pastors Keith and Megan, are actually out um cruising to celebrate their youngest son's celebration from uh graduation.

So they're celebrating him.

We're excited, he made it, woo-hoo.

So let's do this.

They're probably not watching right now, let's be honest.

They're probably enjoying their cruise.

I don't blame them, but I know them and I know they're gonna be wanting to re-engage and see what happened today.

So let's take a quick moment, let's put our hands together, let's say we love them, we miss you guys.

Well-earned vacation, enjoy your time.

That's awesome.

Awesome, awesome.

So we are in our final week of the deconstructed series.

Who's been enjoying this time?

I'm so thankful that as a church we have chosen to take on this series.

It's not been an easy one, it's been heavy, but I think it's been incredibly necessary.

And so we are in the final week, and in order to take full opportunity of what has been provided over these last few weeks, I want to make sure you guys are aware we've provided you guys with extra resources, and not just from one perspective.

There's been so many voices that have been part of this conversation.

And um, so not only Sundays are available on YouTube and our podcast, but also we have had a quick night.

We have an incredible um podcast called After the Message, which continues the conversation from this Sunday, from every Sunday.

And so it's a lot of voices that you can hear on there, a lot of perspectives.

So if you've missed any of it, I would encourage you to go out, check it out on podcasting platforms, YouTube, find it, it's there for you.

Okay, so before we jump in this morning, I want to give you some context.

So take some time really quickly, open up your Bibles if you have it or your app.

Let's go to Luke 15 together.

And before we read this passage together, I want to unpack a little bit of context to what's happening here in the Bible.

So Luke 15 opens with Jesus being joined by tax collectors and sinners, and the Pharisees and the scribes, seeing this, begin complaining.

And they say, This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.

So, in the normal Jesus way, he doesn't do a simple response.

He takes the opportunity to respond to his accusations through three different stories, three different parables.

And what we see him share is the idea of something being lost and incredible measures that are gone through to bring it home.

So the first one we see Jesus tell, and I want you guys to remember we have a wide audience here.

It's not only responding to the Pharisees and the scribes, he's also speaking to those who he was joined with, which are tax collectors and sinners.

Very wide audience.

He responds to the first with a first story about a lost sheep.

And in this example, Jesus communicates that the reason why he is receiving of these sinners is it's like a shepherd who leaves the 99 to find the one lost sheep and then celebrates with his friends.

Verse 6 says, Rejoice with me, for I have found my lost sheep, which was lost.

Then he goes on to tell a story about a lost coin.

And in this example, he communicates that the reason he is receiving of sinners is like a woman who stops what she's doing, she alters her environment, and she does this to find the one lost coin of her ten.

And then when she finds it, she celebrates with her friends.

Verse 9, rejoice with me, for I have found the lost coin which I had lost.

Third and final, and probably my most favorite, this is the most layered and complex of the three stories, is a story about a lost son.

And we're gonna spend our time looking at this today.

In this telling of this story, Jesus communicates that the reason he receives sinners and eats with them is like a father who finds a lost son and celebrates with all of his house.

And what all these three stories have in common is this lost, found, big celebration.

Lost sheep, found sheep, party.

Lost coin, found coin, party.

Lost son, found son, party.

And I believe anytime we see this in the Bible of repetition, whether it's an idea or word for word verbatim repetition, there is emphasis added.

God wants us to uncover something and a powerful truth in our lives.

So I want you to remember lost, found party.

So Jesus' words and actions here told through these stories is the example of God's love reaching out to sinners, pursuing them, loving them in radical, nonsensical, even scandalous ways.

So we're gonna now jump into the text.

Luke 15, we're gonna start in verse 11.

Let's read together.

He also said, He being Jesus, a man had two sons.

The younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the share of the estate I have coming to me.

So he distributed the assets to him.

Not many days later, the younger son gathered together all he had, traveled to a distant country where he squandered his estate and foolish living.

After he had spent everything, a severe famine struck that country, and he had nothing.

Then when he worked, then he went to work for one of the citizens of that country who sent him to a field to feed pigs.

He longed to eat from his fill his fill from the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one would give him anything.

When he came to his senses, he said, How many of my father's hired workers have more than enough food?

And here I am, dying of hunger.

I'll get up, go to my father, and 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 like one of your hired workers.

So he got up, went to his father, but while he was the son was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion.

He ran, threw his arms around his neck, and kissed him.

The son said, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in your sight I am no longer worthy to be called your son.

But the father told his servants, Quick, bring out the best robe, put it on him, put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet, then bring the fattened calf, slaughter it, and let's celebrate with a feast.

Because this son of mine was dead and is alive again.

He was lost and is found.

So they begin to celebrate.

Now his older son was in the field, and as he came near the house, he heard music and dancing, so he summoned one of the servants, questioning what these things meant.

Your brother's here, he told him.

Then he became angry and didn't want to go in.

So his father came out and pleaded with him.

But he replied to his father, Look, I have been slaving for many years for you.

I have never disobeyed your orders, yet you never gave me a goat so I could celebrate with my friends.

But when this son of yours, who has devoured your assets with prostitutes, you slaughtered the fattened calf for him.

Son, he said to him, You are always with me, and everything I have is yours.

But we had to celebrate and rejoice because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again.

He was lost and is found.

Verse 24 and verse 32, we see in this story are almost identical, word to word, word for word.

And it not only repeats these words, but it repeats this idea that all of these previous parables are sharing.

Lost, found, and a party.

And I believe, once again, that the reason for so much of this idea of repetition is that God is trying to show us something very, very important.

I believe that we are all on a journey, okay?

So every day trying to uncover more about who God is, more about who we are, trying to process the world around us, when there's hard things, when there's heavy things.

I believe that we are all trying to do that daily.

And I don't think we ever arrive.

We're constantly in this place.

And this series has been super helpful in removing the taboo of the idea and the word deconstruction.

It's good, it's healthy to examine, to unpack what we think and we believe, and then put it up against the word of God and his character and see how it stacks up.

It's good to see what doesn't line up and to remove it.

That's healthy and beautiful deconstruction, and it's super, super necessary.

But this is not easy, right?

To be forever in process, to allow God to guide us, lead us, expose things to us, to help him, let him renew our minds.

That's not an easy thing to do.

So as we wrap up the series on this final week, I want to take an opportunity to share something simple yet very profound.

We've talked about heavy things, important things.

But today I want to take the time to unpack God's love.

That it's with us, that it pursues us, and it meets us wherever we are in this journey.

So this morning, I titled the message Reconstruction a Journey.

Let's pray, God.

I pray this morning that you are with us.

Thank you so much for your presence, for your faithfulness, God.

Right now I ask, God, that you would be in these words, Lord, as we look at the word, as we look at your truth, God, I pray that you would unpack for all of us exactly what you would have us to see.

God, that you would open our eyes and our ears.

God, that we would experience true love, God.

True what it means to follow you as a son and as a daughter.

God, make it apparent to us, affect change in our hearts and minds like only you can do in your name.

Amen.

Amen.

Okay, so I would consider myself a handywoman.

All right.

I love to build things.

I love to um put things together, take things apart, design, and actually I do pre-manufactured things, but some of my biggest claim to fame are um actually building the crib that my children sleep in.

Um I decided to build it when I was younger when my sister actually got pregnant.

So she had all of her three kids, they stayed in it, and then I refinished it, and now both of my boys have been able to sleep in it.

Um that was one of my biggest accomplishments, hardest tasks I took on, but one of my proudest accomplishments.

Also, I've done like other kind of like tables and the bed now that my the toddler bed that my son is in.

But what I what I am is not intimidated about construction experiences.

It excites me, it makes me come live, and I love doing it.

So at the beginning of January, my husband and I decide to take our family of four on our very first vacation with everyone.

And obviously the pandemic was long, it was hard, and so we had been anticipating this for a long time.

Uh we always went on an annual ski trip, but this year we, I mean, we hadn't been able to go for a while, so we were super excited.

But as you can imagine, anybody have small kids in here knows going on something like that is no small feat.

So I had lists on lists in my phone, on paper, everywhere.

I was trying to make sure that nothing hindered a good vacation.

So I was trying to make sure everything was in order.

In this process, everything was going well until I made one big mistake.

And that was the night before we left.

Um, we had things in order for the most part, final things, you know, things you can't pack like toothbrushes until tonight.

So we're kind of in this process.

I pulled a stroller in from outside and I see that it's incredibly dirty.

So I have the bright idea to disassemble it and to wash everything in it.

So the problem with this idea is we we have a bob stroller.

It's um, if you don't know, it's like a hefty outdoors all terrain kind of thing, and we have used this thing to its full capacity since we got it in 2018.

And a quick confession, we had not washed it since then.

Okay, so 2022, and okay, and the kids have used it thoroughly.

So we decide, well, not we, I will take full ownership.

I decide it's a great idea to disassemble and wash it.

So I do, I this is not scary for me.

I do all the necessary things, pictures, videos, the whole nine, and take it apart, throw things in the washer, and then I get distracted.

I go on the final other checklist, totally forgetting about the fact that it is still disassembled.

Go to sleep, wake up the next morning, it's like early, early.

We have just enough time to pack up and dip.

And I realize, thanks to my husband going, like, hey, where's the stroller?

My heart literally sinks.

I realize I haven't assembled it.

And this is an incredibly essential to our journey.

How are we gonna lug all of our kids and our luggage through an airport?

Like, impossible without the stroller.

So they start going into the car, getting buckled in.

I rush inside, literally just trying to throw it somewhat together, so it's kind of functional.

So I do my very best in like five minutes.

I have a lot of parts left over.

I'm gonna be real honest.

So I grab a Ziploc bag, I stuff them all in, a little like to go screwdriver, stick it in my suitcase, and we dip.

Um, we end up at the airport.

Anyone who's flown recently knows it's insane.

Like line from one gate to the other side, like crazy stuff.

So we're in this line, we're trying to do our best to get through it, and lo and behold, we get stopped at security.

Let me break it to you, it's because I have a screwdriver in my carry-on.

And so I'm trying to tell him the reason why I have this is because my stroller, like I'm trying to help them understand the desperation of this mother, but um, they let us go.

But at this point, by the time we're done with security, and let me tell you, this is no exaggeration.

Sometimes I think people who speak exaggerate their stories.

This is no exaggeration.

I have to be very honest.

So by the time we get through security, we look at our clocks and we realize the gate has closed.

But anybody who's been to MCO knows that you still have to go on the monorail, you've got to go through, like, you've got to go.

So my husband's like, just go, just go.

He's grabbing all the luggage still.

And I'm sprinting, like mom jogging, stroller, sprinting.

And inside, I'm terrified that the stroller that I've chosen to wheel my kids full sprint through the airport, toddlers, that is gonna either eject them or it's gonna collapse or something.

And I'm feeling like a terrible mom, but there's nothing else to do, so I'm sprinting.

Thankfully, I make it to the gate.

They'd already closed it, but they were very they felt horrible for me, probably because it's like mom sprinting across an airport.

They're like, they let us in, it's photo finished, we get there, we get to Montana, everything is great.

The thing is, is the whole time externally it stayed together, it got us to our our destination, right?

But internally, I knew, I deeply knew, something was missing.

And I think by God's grace that we got there.

And this illustration for me, I think, ex is a perfect depiction of a process of reconstruction and deconstruction.

There are important steps everyone must take in this process.

And through my stroller experience, and in my opinion, I want to share a quick four-step process that if you are in process, when you are in process, make sure you don't miss a step.

In my case, like in my case.

So here are, if you're taking notes, here are my four-step process here.

Step one in our journey, it's healthy to take time to stop, examine, clean, and repair.

This is maintenance.

Like I said, it is not bad to dismantle, clean up, to repair.

This is when we give adequate time for us to address the things, normal wear and care of life, the things that happen, the things that we don't have time to address always.

We have to stop periodically and deal with the maintenance, right?

So low tire pressure, applesauce pouch smushed into the seat.

I gotta address it at some point.

And for us, this is healthy to address these things.

And this normal maintenance that we should go on in our processing can look like a lot of different things.

Maybe it's for you stopping, looking and addressing the things that are are in your social media feed, stopping voices that you should not be listening to.

Maybe for you it's something like examining how you spend your time every day and reordering and restructuring.

Or maybe it's taking time to repair a relationship that is important to you, that needs repairing.

This is healthy and this is maintenance.

Step two is in our journey, deconstruction must lead to reconstruction.

We cannot remain disassembled.

I needed my stroller.

It was imperative for the journey we were going on to get us to our destination.

But all those pieces laying across my laundry room floor were no good to me separated, right?

It was good for a time to take it apart, to clean it up, to repair, to do this maintenance, but that whole process would not be worth it to me unless I had reassembled it so I could actually functionally use it.

Got it?

So you cannot remain disassembled.

We have to take the time to reassemble once we've gone through our maintenance step.

That's where I failed.

Um, step three in our reconstruction process, we can appear stable and functional, but we need to deal with the missing pieces.

In the process of building, putting things together and taking them apart, very often there is bound to be missing pieces.

Some are necessary, some are not.

But the point I want to make here is that we can't ignore them.

We can't discard those missing pieces.

And in my case, I took them, I put them in a ziploc baggie, I knew I didn't have time to deal with them, but I knew that they were necessary, so I stuffed them in the side, and I figured at some point I'll have time to deal with them.

But I could not discard them.

This is an important part in our reconstruction process.

And the action step in which we can address these missing pieces is step four.

Step four, we deal with the missing pieces by taking inventory.

Okay, so there's a lot of things that I would categorize as missing pieces.

And in my past and previous and all the different experiences I've had of construction, I've seen a few different experiences, and I want to try to draw some conclusions on maybe the different pieces, missing pieces you have experienced or are experiencing in your own life.

Um, so how many of you knew know that manufacturers actually purposely leave and include extra pieces at time?

There's a purpose behind this.

If you've ever built something, they want to lessen the opportunity that if something got lost or misplaced or didn't get added to the box, they want to remove the opportunity for a customer to call and say, Hey, you're gonna have to ship me some more screws.

I can't put this dresser together or whatever.

That's probably gonna affect their overhead.

So they have come up with a strategy adding extra pieces.

The point of that part is those extra pieces, I know if they're extra, if I'm doing the step of taking inventory.

Instruction manual says four screws.

They gave me eight screws.

I have four left over.

Perfect, we're good.

I have the four I need.

And if the cases of IKEA, like deciphering those hieroglyphics, that's hard, but you do your best, take inventory, check out the stick figure guy, and see does it line up?

But the point here is we have to take inventory, right?

There's another opportunity of missing pieces, and I found this before by moving.

You take something apart, you put things in bags.

I don't know why I always put things in baggies, but that's what my that's my go-to.

Um screws in baggies, and it's like, okay, this is the bed, this is the couch, you know, you have your things and you know these are the pieces.

But likely in the process of anybody's move, it kind of turns chaotic.

You end up either mixing up pieces, adding pieces, you end up with extra pieces.

And and I think the point here that I'm trying to make is that there's going to be a numerous amount of reasons why you have extra pieces.

But if you miss the step of taking inventory, you could perhaps discard something that's incredibly necessary or keep something that's not necessary.

So let me give you a couple of practical examples of what this could look like.

So maybe you have extra parts in your life that aren't necessary, and you've taken time to take inventory and you you remove the things that have been added on or added to your bag over time, like like religion, cultural influences, half truths.

There's a lot of things that we can collect in our own daily living.

And when we take inventory, we realize wait.

This is not lining up.

Let me remove that.

That's the good kind, okay?

So that's okay to discard those.

But the step of taking inventory is so important.

Or maybe you have extra parts that are bigger, deeper, harder questions in life.

Like, why did my dad leave?

Why is he not in my life?

Or why do I have a terminal illness?

Or, or why am I in this place where I lost my loved one?

Those are heavy, deep, hard, and they can create missing pieces that only on the other side of a journey will ever understand the complexity of God and his plan and what he's intended and his heart.

And it's hard.

But what I would encourage, if those are the missing pieces you have, that you would not discard them, that you could still address them, you'd stick them in your pocket, and you'd hold on and rest in the fact that one day we'll understand, we'll sit in a place where there will be no sickness, no pain with God and in full certainty of who he is.

But maybe your extra pieces are kind of like in the case of my stroller here.

Very clearly necessary.

And I knew this because the entire journey from the airport all the way to our gate, the basket, like the undercarriage, was literally dragging on the floor.

So I'm acutely aware that a lot of things are missing here.

It shouldn't be doing that.

And in turn, externally I see it appearing functional, but internally I was nervous that my children may get injured due to my negligence.

And in the process of reconstruction, when you have these kind of missing pieces, and we attempt to reconstruct and reassemble our lives without God, his truth, or his discipline, we will only have the appearance of functionality.

Because peace, hope, rest, true fulfillment can only come from God.

And if we attempt to construct our lives without God, we will surely always still be missing something.

So leftover pieces can indicate a lot in our life.

And the only way that we can know their intention and what the purpose is is if we take nurse inventory.

What do we need?

What do we not need?

Take inventory.

So I have two sons.

I'm actually 20 weeks pregnant with our third child.

So surprise if you guys did not know.

We don't know yet if it's a boy or girl.

We find out on Thursday.

I'm Team Girl because let's be honest, I need a little bit of like balance in my world.

I love my boys and I will be happy with whatever God chooses to give me.

But Team Girl.

So this has really this, I figured we could do a fun little poll really quickly since I found out on Thursday.

Who do you think, who in here thinks that I'm gonna have my third boy?

Raise your hand.

Okay, not too many.

All right, all right.

Who is on my team, Team Girl, and thinks it's gonna be girl?

Woohoo! Okay, yeah, there are some of you who didn't vote.

I'm watching them.

I see you.

But um, yeah, I'm praying um for whatever happy, healthy baby God gives me.

But Team Girl.

Okay, so this had nothing to do with my message.

But honestly, I've been feeling a little bit awkward with you guys on some Sundays, like on stage, like, oh no, I wonder if it's looking, you know.

So I just thought, let's break the ice.

I have an opportunity in a public setting to tell you all, yes, I am indeed pregnant.

It doesn't have to be weird anymore.

Okay.

So back to the story, the point of all this.

But I currently have two sons, to my knowledge.

And in this narrative, in this narrative from Luke 15, we see a father of two sons, a younger and an older.

I want to look at the younger son first, okay?

So this younger son, he's come to a point in his life where he's missing something, or he feels like he's missing out on something.

He's maybe struggling with his identity, feeling stuck.

Maybe he feels like he can't compare to his older brother, or that under his father's roof he's hit a ceiling and he's missing out on his potential or his future or his happiness, maybe all of these things.

But what we don't, what we do know is something triggered this younger son to go to his father and do something very bold and actually very disrespectful.

He goes to his father and he says that he wants his share of the inheritance.

This was actually contextually okay for him to do, but what it communicated was something deeply, deeply, deeply disrespectful.

I'm very emphasizing the deeply, deeply.

Um, but what he wanted to communicate here, what he was communicating is that I wish you were dead, and I kind of want to move on without you.

Pretty hurtful stuff to the father.

And it's interesting to me that in life, sometimes we can get so tunnel vision from our discontentment and our pain and what we're experiencing that we can make some incredibly selfish and isolated decisions that can affect the people around us that we love deeply.

And that's what the son did.

And while the father could have responded in a lot of different ways, he chose to give him what he asked for.

He chose that he would let the son choose.

And in love, if I'm being really honest, without choice is really not love.

He didn't want to rob that of him.

So the father loved him enough to give him the freedom to leave with the father's blessing.

Okay, so the son has the inheritance.

He sets out to a far country where probably nobody knows who he is, nobody knows his family, he can start his new identity, he can live this life in full freedom, he's probably really excited, and he begins to live a very lavish, wild, and recklessly abandoned life.

He goes to parties, he eats all the best foods, he's enjoying his life and living what appears to be full of freedom.

But it was merely just the appearance of freedom because everything he left with, he squanders.

Everything that was gifted to him from the father is wasted.

And then a famine comes, and he finds himself alone, faraway city, unknown, and completely desperate.

And to give you context, famines were not uncommon.

In this context, it was kind of like a recession or inflation.

And how many of us in here can relate to inflation?

Anybody?

Housing prices, interest rates, food, gas prices through the roof.

Anyway, so we can understand this son.

Okay, he's experiencing inflation.

But with this type of situation, I want to be clear this the the recession or the inflation or this thing was not targeting the son, but what it did do is expose his vulnerability because he was outside of the covering of his father.

So he finds himself in this position, desperate.

So he gets a minimum wage job with a guy in the field somewhere in this new city, and he finds out his new job title is pig feeder.

Or maybe the more respectable would be manager of pig feeding.

But regardless, he's feeding pigs.

And this is his new life.

He finds himself in a situation, he's feeding the pigs, and what he does is he has this moment of realization.

He comes to his senses, it says, and he's sitting there while bent over feeding the pigs, and he's salivating.

He's wanting a bite of the pig's slop and realizes he can't even have that.

And in this low, low moment for him, he has this light bulb.

Wait a second.

The people who work for my father, even they have enough food to eat.

They're not wishing to eat the animals' foods.

They have more than enough.

I know.

I will go back to my father.

I can't believe that I didn't realize how good I had it as a son.

But this is my idea.

I'll go back, I'll apologize, I'll repent, and then I'll just say, hey, just hire me as your one of your workers, I'll work for you because at least then I won't be hungry and I'll have my basic needs met.

So this is his idea.

So he comes up with this speech, okay, Father, I have sinned against you, against heaven and in your side.

I'm so no longer worthy to be called your son.

Make me like one of your hired workers.

And then he begins this journey, this long journey, we know.

It probably is enough time that he's probably about rehearsed this about a thousand times in his head.

Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your side.

Like he's getting the courage to be able to repent to his father.

And when the house is just inside, okay, a blurred vision in his in his future, um, he hears the audible voice of his father running toward him, calling his name.

Father probably takes off his coat, his sandals, and he's in full sprint after his son.

And the fa and the son is probably here, like he's mid-rehearsal, father.

I have, and he's pro and he's trying to process what's happening right now.

Father on his way.

When the father gets to him, embraces him, kisses him, is super excited to see him.

Probably very shocking to the son, but the son clears his throat, he gets ready.

Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight.

And he continues before he even gets to the last line about make me one of your hired servants, the father stops him, interrupts him, yells back to one of the workers, quick, bring out the best robe, put it on him, put a ring on his finger, sandals on his feet, then bring the fattened calf and slaughter it.

And then let's celebrate with a feast.

Because this son of mine was dead and is alive again.

He was lost and is found.

So they began to celebrate.

And they go inside and party.

Talk about a 180.

And all the son did was turn, which was repent and return to the father.

Turn and return.

That's it.

He sp still smelled, and I'm sure he smelled bad of pigs, drunken living, sweat from miles of traveling back home.

He still had wasted all of his father's money.

He probably was still wrecked with a lot of guilt from all the sin that he had done.

And instead of needing to write any of that, the father was standing waiting for him to return, ready to run after and receive him.

And he acts undignified.

He humbly degrades himself, running to pursue his son and restore his dignity.

The son was crowned and clothed before he was ever even cleaned in this story.

And this is beautiful.

And I think Jesus is trying to show us that this is mercy, this is grace, this is love, this is the gospel, the beautiful heart of the Father.

And that's what all of this is about.

John 3 16, for God so loved the world he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

Romans 5 8.

But God shows his love for us, and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

John 1 12.

But all who did receive, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.

Ephesians 2, 8 through 10, for by grace you have been saved through faith, and it is not your own doing, it's the gift of God, not a result of your works, that no one may boast.

This is the gospel.

Through Jesus, you become family simply by receiving, turning and returning.

He took on sin, he that knew no sin, so that by him we could experience right standing with God at his table, eating his food, wearing his robe.

This is the beautiful point of the gospel.

We are his son, we are his daughters, period.

And maybe this morning you're like this younger brother.

Maybe you've been running away on a journey of your own, deconstructing without him, trying to live your life through your own filters, your own ideas, looking for freedom, trying to stumble your stroller and your own strength, but missing all of this pieces, all these pieces.

And the undercarriage of the stroller is just dragging along, and you know deep inside that you're missing some things.

Let me remind you, it's because you cannot achieve any of those things outside of the father.

You need the father in this process.

You can only gain those things from him.

So there they were.

They were celebrating.

Everybody is excited.

It's been a big 180, lost, found, party.

And then the camera pans.

And we see an older son.

The older son out in the field working diligently.

He is the model citizen, I'm sure.

And he hears off in the distance this music.

He's confused.

What is going on?

He starts heading towards the house.

He stops one of the workers and he asks, what's going on here?

And they say, your brother's home.

You didn't know that?

Your brother's home.

Your father is so excited.

He's done all of these things, throwing a lavish party all to celebrate.

And right then the brother's countenance completely changes.

He becomes furious.

And he's probably mad at his brother, but I see here that he is mostly mad with his dad.

And honestly, I can understand him.

I can understand this logical frame of thinking.

He's probably thinking, wait a second, you're talking about my younger son, the one who decided to make all of these bad decisions, take the inheritance before it was his time to walk out of the house, leave us with all of his responsibilities.

This son, then he wastes it all on prostitutes, and we've stopped to throw him a big party.

He's probably not even been home for more than an hour.

Are you kidding me?

And he looks at his father, he's probably thinking, wait a second, I know what needs to happen.

I'm gonna tell my dad.

I'm gonna tell him instead, our brother needs to work for us as a worker for at least a year.

He needs to prove his faithfulness, he needs to prove his loyalty.

He's got this list.

Maybe he needs to recoup some of the money that he's lost, maybe he needs to go apologize to some locals who has brought because he brought shame to the family name.

He's thinking of this laundry list of things that the brother needs to do first.

And he's mad, and I understand that.

How many of you can relate with that?

Logic, reason, it makes sense.

But what we see here is something completely scandalous, just as scandalous as the younger son's redemption story.

So, while the younger son, the older son is fuming mad, he's probably arms folded, made his way at this point to the porch, and he's staring through the window, looking at this party, just thinking, this is ridiculous.

I'm not gonna even go inside because that will appear like I am so in support of all this.

So he makes a statement, he stays outside, and then the father comes outside.

He says to the father, Look, I've been slaving for you for many years, I've never disobeyed you, yet you gave me a, you haven't even given me a goat so I could celebrate with my friends.

But then when this son of yours, who has devoured your assets with prostitutes, you slaughtered the fat and calf for him.

And in his anger, in just two sentences, we see a lot of painful, stinging words he throws at the father.

I want to remind you again that this is Jesus speaking these words, telling the story to a large audience.

He's telling this to our tax collectors and our sinners, the younger son.

He's telling this to the Pharisee and the scribes, the older son.

It's a wide audience.

And so what he's doing here, in contrast to the first two parables, is he's going on to highlight the experience of the older son.

The out, not just the outward type sinners, lost found party, but an inward type of sinner.

So what I want us to do is I want to look at a chart that I kind of put together to compare and contrast what the son is complaining about and how the father responds to him.

This is the older son.

So what we see is the older son's son saying, he doesn't say this, sorry.

It says, then he became angry and didn't want to go in.

Older son.

So his father came out.

The father was inside.

He was celebrating.

He probably overheard or found out from one of the workers, hey, your older son's out there and he's pouting.

He's pretty upset.

He probably wants to talk to you.

And the father had a lot of options that were within him, well within his rights to respond.

But what we see the father do instead of asking a worker, go get the son, make him come inside, or yelling from outside, hey, listen, you better stop pouting, come inside.

All of these things he could have done.

Or he could have said, Hey, you know what, I'll deal with this tomorrow.

He needs to learn a lesson.

Instead, what we see is the father coming out, pursuing him, similar to the way he did the younger son.

The father pursues both the harlot and the hypocrite.

But it says then the son says, Look, I've been slaving many years for you.

I have never disobeyed you or your orders or commands.

Father's response.

He came out and pleaded.

He entreated him.

I really like the fact that this chart will allow you to see orders, commands, pleaded, entreated.

When you look at the definition of those words, command, what the son was basically accusing or saying the father was doing, says to give an authoritative order to dominate from a superior position.

But what the father did was plead and entreat.

That definition is to ask earnestly, to plead with, completely opposite to what the father is doing and what the son is experiencing.

The father isn't commanding, although he could have, he's appealing to the son's heart.

Then the son is saying, you know, he basically disowns him.

He says, then your this son of yours, in this one little phrase, this son of yours, he not only disowns the father, blames him for the actions of the son, but he disowns his brother.

A painful moment of disownership.

The way the father responds, son.

And what's interesting to me is in this passage, son is used a lot.

The other eight times we see it in this passage, it's H-U-I-O-S, the Greek word.

And that means son.

But if here is the first time we see a different word, this Greek word, T-E-C T T-E-K-N-O-N, technon.

And what this refers to is a more intimate, tender relationship.

He's saying, My child.

He's not belittling him, he's speaking endearingly.

And I have a child, I know what it's like when you think through the filter of ownership, not disownership.

That's what the father is doing in response.

The son says, You never gave me a goat so I could celebrate.

You won't give me anything, but you would give this all to my brother.

And the father responds to that and says, You are always with me, and everything I have is yours.

We see the son relate to the father, command, works like a worker.

He's not even relating to the father in relationship with him.

Then the father is responding to him, no, my child, you are in relationship with me.

So what we see here is the son wanting to relate to him as a slave, and the father saying, No, I'm trying to awaken you to what a real relationship with me is like.

The older son has been in close proximity, proximity to the father, eating dinner every night, working alongside each other, seemingly near in proximity.

But the son had removed himself, his heart from the father.

He was far from the father.

And the father is saying here, son, everything that is mine is yours.

Everything I have is accessible to you.

If you come inside, if you choose to sit at the table, if you choose to be satisfied with everything I offer you.

And maybe this morning you're more like the older brother.

Maybe you've been in church for many years, you've served God, you've served faithfully, but maybe in the process you've gotten hurt.

Maybe you have been looking at God through a lens of a skewed perspective based on legitimate painful experiences.

But you're living with the wrong idea of what God is, who God is, the relationship with Him as you being a son and daughter.

And you're trying to assemble your stroller through your works, what you do, what you don't do, relations.

Through a lens of religion and not love, of slave and not son.

And I believe this morning God is inviting you back to Himself to go on a journey of reconstruction with Him, not apart from Him.

Because just like the younger son, everything you need, and that we see the Son, the older son, void of, is found in the Father, and it cannot be found outside of Him.

The final scripture, verse 32, the final passage here is the Father saying, But we had to celebrate.

We had to rejoice because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again.

He was lost and is found.

This repetition of idea, this repetition of phrasing.

And what I think is happening here, when it caps it all up, yes, we talked about the younger son and it's lost, found, celebrate.

I believe the father was also entreating his son, and likewise Jesus entreating the Pharisees, the scribes, the tax collectors, and the sinners.

And what he's entreating is saying, hey, lost, found party.

He wants to go into right relationship with us.

He's entreating all of us because let's be honest, we are the sons.

Sometimes one more than the other or combination of the two, but we are sinners of the worldly kind and sinners of the religious kind.

And he is saying, come inside.

Come inside.

Take off this idea of what you have to do and what you can't do.

Take some time to sit down, eat from the table, enjoy the feast, be a part of this relationship with the Father.

So this morning, my prayer is that wherever you are in this journey of reconstruction, and I believe that we all are on a journey.

Reconstruction, deconstruction, answering questions, trying to figure out, trying to do it in our strength.

That this morning you would see yourself as a son and as a daughter, that you would see him as a father.

No matter where you are, near, far, close in proximity, but far from his heart.

There is nothing you can do or not do that could change his love for you.

And my prayer this morning is that that idea would overwhelm you.

It's hard.

It's hard to wrap our mind around it.

It's hard to fully fathom that kind of love because we've never experienced it apart from God.

It's impossible.

Sometimes I look at this passage and I think that I'm supposed to be the father.

That's impossible.

But what I believe this morning is that as we choose to position ourselves, to look at him, to gaze at his love for us, to relate to him as son and daughter, as we allow that to transform our hearts and our minds the way it's intended to be, that we could not help ourselves but to attempt to love the people around us the same way.

To extend ourselves, to entreat other people.

The Father loves us this morning, whether you're far, whether you're near, whether you whether you're close to his heart or far from his heart.

This morning, would you please bow your heads?

So maybe, like I said, you're the younger brother, you're the older brother, or some weird combination of in-between.

You're trying to assemble your stroller, all the wrong pieces.

You're still feeling deep satisfactor dissatisfaction, and you're holding on by just the stability, the appearance of stability.

This morning, I really want to give everybody in this space an opportunity to respond to the Father's invitation.

He wants us to come inside, rest, celebrate, enjoy his fullness, enjoy his love, enjoy his gift.

We just have to receive it.

We have to go in.

We have to ask him to help us in whatever process we're in.

We can't do it apart from God.

So this morning, if that's you, I just want to say a prayer.

Process this with me, process this with God, and let's invite him into wherever we are in this journey.

God, we thank you so much for this unfathomable love.

It is hard to understand, it's hard to wrap our minds around it.

Both for the younger sons' experience and the older sons, for the worldly and for the righteous.

But God, we are so thankful that we are your sons and daughters, that by your incredible gift we can receive right standing with you.

God, we're sorry we repent if we have been far from you.

Whether not in heart or in proximity, God, we are sorry if we've tried to do this alone.

If we've been trying to deconstruct without you, reconstruct without you.

We understand deeply now, God, that you want to be with us in close relationship, intimately carrying us through this process.

Lord, we repent, we turn and we return to you this morning.

We invite you into the process wherever we are.

Thank you for your love.

Amen.

So at this time, we're gonna actually go into another song.

Let's stand up.

These words are powerful, and I want us to be able to.

Maybe you don't want to sing them out, maybe you just want to receive them.

But I want you to think through the lens of this story of the younger, this the older brother, and process that God's love through this song.

Thanks again for listening.

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